ENOUGH WITH THE SOCIAL MEDIA!

Hi everyone. It's been a while again but I'm back. I have to say that lately I feel really uninspired when it comes to doing things with internet. I actually hate everything about it. The constant connection with it is driving me crazy. I used to check my phone every morning when I woke up and in the evening I would browse through Facebook for hours. Then I started thinking about this. Why are we so obsessed with internet/social media? What makes it so fascinating?

I could say for myself that I wasn't yet born into this world of facebook, instagram etc. which I'm really glad about it. I remember the day we got internet installed in our home-we got it later than everyone I knew. Everything was AMAZING. You could google whatever you wanted. The first thing I got familiar with when I started using internet were games where you dressed different dolls. I was obsessed with this (and I dreamed of having this many clothes). Later I discovered Youtube. I spent hours there. I listened to so many songs, discovered new artists every day. I also started watching Youtubers. Everything was so easy and entertaining. Before that all I could do is play games like chess and cards and watch movies on CD and of course listen to music. That is it. I also remember we only had one computer and I would argue with my siblings whose turn it is to use it. It was so innocent. At that time Facebook appeared. I remember joining it in 2009 and that was just something new for me. A whole new world. You could say I became addicted to it. And before that I was obsessed with Messenger. Does anyone still remember that? I would chat with my friends all day long. That's how it all began I guess.

Later in time smartphones appeared. Now that's also one thing I got later than my peers but I finally got one and that was just mind-blown. Since then I can say things got a whole lot different. At first everything was still new and I didn't know what you can do with it. My friends had the same knowledge as me so that means we still hung out alot outside, at home, went rollerblading... When I was in my last year of high school I discovered the real side of internet and social media.

Social media was never a big deal when I was a kid. It didn't exist back then. At least I think it didn't (maybe I was just ignorant about it). So it all unravelled in my teenage years. Worst years ever and the best actually :D. These were the years where you had to have everything your friends had. If they had a cool new t-shirt, you needed one too. That's precisely how it was with electronic gadgets and everything that came with that. When one of your friends started using a new app, you had to have one. That's how our minds worked and it still does in some cases. So I started using Tumblr, Instagram, Snapchat. All of the things that were never that big of a deal. Then I started discovering everything, how it worked, what are the features... After some time of course I got hooked on it. I would use these things all the time. I would always have a phone in my hands. It was just disgusting. I was never aware of the consequences that the internet and social media have. I would stare in my phone most of the day. I would talk to my friends only via facebook, Snapchat. What kind of a relationship is that?

A year ago I started realizing that this has a weird impact on me. I would go through Instagram feed or Facebook feed and see alot of people having the best time of their lives, I saw pictures of the most beautiful women and thinking why can't I look like that. I would feel sorry for myself, for how I looked. I would think their lives are better than mine. I realized I didn't appreciate my own life because I was so concentrated on lives of other people. I only thought of negative things. That also triggered my thinking that I need to be like them, I need to have cool photos taken somewhere nice. In reality what you see on internet is only 1 good picture. Who knows the story behind it, how the person felt when posing for it. Another thing I would do is I would wake up every morning and go through Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook and just scroll-almost like a robot. I would do the same thing before going to bed. The sad thing about that is that I wasn't even aware of that impact. I wasn't aware that I'm the one to be blamed for doing and thinking like that. If I didn't spend so much time on these apps, maybe I would like myself more and didn't feel pressured about a lot of things. For the last year I constantly had this on my mind, and through that period I started using internet less. There were days that I didn't even open Facebook because I got bored of it and I knew there was nothing there that interested me. I also deleted a lot of apps from my phone.

Right at this moment I love how I feel about myself. I love the fact that I don't use my phone that much, I love that when I check my phone, there aren't 10 notifications from different apps. I just love seeing nothing on my homescreen. I feel like some sort of burden was lifted from my shoulders and that I can do whatever the hell I want with myself and most importantly: I don't need to prove anything to anyone. It's just me, myself and I. That's all I need ( besides my friends and family:P ). 

The end of my long ramble which is basically an explanation of my absence hah. Hope I didn't bore you that much. Have a great day.

❤

Photos by Maja