My Relationship With Social Media



     Promoting from elementary school to middle school represented the end of my "tween days" and the emergence into my teen years. In middle school, I was obsessed with social media. Apps like Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter, and occasionally Ask.fm scattered my iPhone homepage, and I could not get enough. At one time, I had 60 different Snapchat streaks, the highest being around 400. I was obsessed with the number of likes on my newest Instagram post and spent hours crafting the wittiest tweet. Interestingly enough, this was the time in which I thrived socially. I had a decent amount of friends and my middle school experience was unforgettable.

     I soon departed from my "cringey" middle schools, and my emergence into high school was a whole new ballpark. Bombarded with countless hours of homework, I no longer had the time nor desire, to waste my precious time scrolling through pictures or tweets and clicking through numerous Snapchat stories. I dreaded sending my daily "keep the streak." Looking through my Twitter timeline became a drag. Instagram stories made me angry. Needless to say, my relationship with social media began to fall apart as I entered my high school years, as did my social life in real life. I began focusing on my schoolwork and schoolwork only, not making an effort to expand my social circle and meet new people.

     My relationship with social media over the past three years has been a rollercoaster. As a sophomore in high school, I have learned to dislike social media. My Snapchat career recently ended after the death of my 815-day streak with my best friend, and I am proud to announce that I have no streaks. Over the years, I have learned the importance of being present in the moment. I realized that by spending so much time in cyberspace, I was missing out on opportunities that were right in front of me. Though I do not particularly enjoy the social media world, I still find myself getting sucked back into the black hole of poison. No matter how hard I try to cleanse myself of it, it always seems to seep back into my life. My relationship with social media is something that I am still working on and is something I will continue to work on for years to come.

Comments

  1. AnonymousApril 23, 2018 at 7:19 PM

    I completely agree with the concept of peer pressure that comes along with social media. Especially in middle school, we look to social media as a way to fit it and be socially accepted. We tend to let our presence and popularity on social media define who we are. I really enjoyed your point about being present in the moment because it is apparent that several people are so involved in their screens that they miss out on what's right in front of them.

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