4 Reasons Why Social Media Is Holding You Back From Living The Life You Truly Deserve To Live

1. You won’t perpetuate your own addiction

Besides being a major time-suck, social media is one hell of a drug. The more you use social media sites in the present, the more you will crave them in the future. It’s as simple as that.

2. You won’t feel inclined to doubt your self-worth, or others’.

Naturally, the argument is that it’s “totally normal and acceptable to self- evaluate.” Well, isn’t it? In the grand scheme of things, yes, self-evaluation can be beneficial – healthy even – when analyzing malleable aspects, like your weight or lifestyle.

But, when it comes to social media, the savage, scrutinizing beast within all of us is rapidly unleashed. Social forums cause us to observe ourselves and question, dissect, further gouge at the parts we are most insecure about. And this act of self-prodding is rather harmful for the ego. If committed perpetually, scrutiny can lead to sporadic melancholy-like symptoms. Or worse, depression itself.

On the bright side, in foregoing self-scrutiny, you also won’t have to scoff the girl next to you for posting that stupid, semi-drunken picture of herself captioned “my squad > yours.”

3. You won’t feel inclined to validate your self-worth.

Yes, we live in the real world, but our self-worth is decided by the virtual. Currently, ‘likes’ and comment quantities carry more weight than ever before, and follower count is almost as important as, if not more important than, your SAT score. And, boy, if your Instagram feed isn’t looking like Urban Outfitters’, you best damn be in the process of getting it there.
But, let’s be honest, no one relishes the shitty feeling that comes after seven ‘likes’ and the realization that your best friend also posted three minutes ago and already has a whopping 65.

I’m sorry, but your how your Instagram feed looks is not going to matter in 20 years; and the amount of likes you got on your new Facebook profile picture is not going to get you into your dream school or help you nail that interview for the job you’ve wanted since you were little.
That is the thing about social validation – it’s fleeting.

4. You’ll be more present.

Too often, I’ve witnessed people sitting in silence – nose down, eyes wide, consumed by the two by six inch screen in their hands, ignoring their peers to the fullest extent. As if this virtual isolation – this constructed, technological oasis – could be comparable to content through actual, verbal communication. Millennials worship social media, almost as if they found God somewhere within the web and the power it held over them. But, whether they realize it or not, they are tirelessly, yet amiably enslaved by something they can’t even see.

No, this is not love. This is not God. This is their gateway drug to isolation.
Social media has to power to create disconnection, all the while claiming its inverse. But despite feeling like you most certainly can’t live without it, in truth, you can.