Sunday, August 10, 2014

Don't Let "Likes" Define You

I suppose if we all want to be in the world of social media (and really, how can we not?), we need to accept that there are people who will assign nearly all of their personal value and self worth to who "Likes" or doesn't "Like" enough of their content. Not just their sense of self is involved, they will assign how you feel about them based on what you "Like" or don't "Like' enough of. Ironically, these are the same people who will not pick up a phone to call and say, "I miss you, how can we connect more often?" or make any real human-kind of contact to let you know they are feeling somehow shunned by your lack of activity on their content. 

When will people understand that Facebook does not show us everything our "Friends" or even our "Family" post? If you are simply reposting the content of others (memes, recipes, jokes, etc), I don't feel the need to acknowledge it - unless it really speaks to me. I've spent my entire life being told I talk too much, it would serve me to learn when it really contributes to the communication to chime in. Now that I've potentially learned that, the rules to the communication game have changed and my not acknowledging every post on my feed has people hurt and in turn, being hurtful to others. Sure, we can agree, "It's their problem" but the fact remains, this is how our kids are growing up and if you are not teaching your kids how to have a strong sense of self outside of the social media platform, you are not serving them as their parent(s). 

Are you guilty of this? Do you feel miffed if select people don't interact with you enough on Facebook? How do you handle those feelings?