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Social media blues

By Aliza Batool
Fri, 01, 21

Another thing you can try is to be more aware that you are using social media to connect, not to compare. Keep its influence on you in check....

TIPS ‘N’ TRICKS

Our mums and dads, all are queens and kings. Yes, in the true sense of the word, but what I mean here is the kings and queens of fake news. With the integration of social networking services in our society, in our day to day lives, Baby Boomers and Generation X have unveiled their unique talent: receiving, watching and mass sharing videos, images and audios every single day. While Millennials and Generation Z clearly have a better sense of judging authenticity of news, what we struggle with is social media blues.

And that is scary, even more frightening than receiving a poorly edited image of a gigantic cow found in Lahore I once received from my father. The social networking sites are infamous breeding grounds for envy, jealousy and then inevitable depression. Human beings have always been competitive but Millennials and Generation Z are grappling with an issue no previous generation has faced: social media blues. Feeling empty after reading a happy post from a friend and spiraling downwards into a pit of despair, we often forget that what we are competing against is the illusion and we start pitching our normal usual self to the best (and mostly fake) identities appearing on our walls. And what’s worse is feeling bad for feeling jealous.

But it is perhaps time to face our demons.

We, wearing the cap of consumers than creators at the moment, cannot reduce the amount of photoshop and fake realities out there on the social media, but what we can control is our perception of other people, and how we choose to respond to it.

But, how can we do it? Here are some of the things we can do about it. The foremost important thing is positive emotions. A misconception about positive emotion is that it is only about feeling good and happy about your life. But in reality, it is much more. It doesn’t only refer to feeling optimistic all the time, but rather recognizing all the emotions that you are feeling, reflecting on the source, and deciding what you will do about them. It is about feeling more peaceful and looking at the world in a new way. So how to use positive emotions to help you in this situation? Well, you can start by not allowing the success of others to be drawn into your lives, unless you make peace with it. If you feel a sense of jealousy and a pang of envy, instead of shutting this emotion down, accept it. Mead (2020) gives us a structured approach for dealing with, and accepting emotions: listen to your feelings, decode what they mean and express them (in writing or talking to a friend).

Another thing you can try is to be more aware that you are using social media to connect, not to compare. Keep its influence on you in check. When you feel you are struggling hard to combat jealousy, do a digital detox, and shift your focus on real-life social interactions for a while.

But what is a better way to reduce the social media induced anxiety than expressing gratitude? Social psychologists believe that gratitude helps not only in strengthening relationships and improving mental health, but also in improving your self-esteem. So when you feel low, mention good things about your life on social media. Talk about your achievements, and people you are grateful for. And remember that the goal is not to make others jealous, but to make yourself feel better (so do not over do it!).

Interestingly though, some therapists even suggest posting anonymously or on private (only me) posts and being as boastful as you want to improve mental health.

And if nothing else works, pinpoint the profiles you cannot stop comparing yourself with, and click on the magic button ‘unfollow’.

So remember to prioritize your mental health over meaningless scrolling. Your battles are not with the unrealistic digital versions of others, but the ones that go on within yourself, and as Kopp (1999) says ‘all of the truly important battles are waged within the self.’

Let today be the last day of social media blues.