The Loneliness

The Loneliness

Feb 6, 2022 | Social Media

It has been reported that the feeling of loneliness may be correlated with the use of social media, and, even at face value, there seems to be merit in these reports.

It is rare–or does it even happen at all–when someone posts the moment of a sadness, the moment when something went absolutely wrong. “Wait, stay right there, let me grab my phone so I can take a picture of you crying at the news your grandmother just passed away.”

Such “moments” do not happen, because there is something patently absurd about stopping a moment to share it without fully experiencing it. There is something terribly isolating when one uses social media to the extent that it becomes embedded in one’s experiences of moments.

We are missing something out there, and technology can capture it. wait, we can edit the moment with a filter. We can edit reality itself, right?

Maybe we can. Maybe reality is turning into a digital experience. Maybe we are evolving, and love, hate, anger and sadness can all be adequately felt through a screen.

There just seems to be something so lonely about the experience of social media, staring down at a tiny screen, plugging into a matrix that mines your use of it for data that is then sold to companies that try to sell you. Social media is not all bad. There are wonderful moments captured on there that indeed are beautiful, raw, poignant.

Rather, we are referring to the rank and file, the ones who watch others on social media in abject silence. These are the forgettable people who are not worthy of being watched themselves. They are lonely, maybe even petty, possibly not. They are right, however, about one thing. They are forgettable–and most people are, which is a shame.

The Validation

The Validation

Nov 2, 2021 | Social Media

There is something deeply disturbing about the validation required by many today.

Did we eat the right food, say the right thing, buy the right product, look good doing it?

While not completely worthless–it is very rare when something can be designated in such a manner–social media is pretty close. Do we really need to say things to an audience of people that we for the most part do not know or honestly even care about?

Do you really care about Roger Jones, that dude you never talked to in 4th through 12th grade, but now 20 years later like each other’s posts about grilled cheese and babies?

Admittedly, there must be something biological that occurs when we post snippets of our lives on social media platforms. It sort of feels good. Yeah, our lives rock, our kids are too cute, our knowledge is too stellar.

It is crap. It really is a bunch of crap. There is something to be said for living within one’s own mind and heart and the parameters of a life you created with your own hands. A life that can be turned off or erased, which is entirely the case with social media, is not real.

The time we spend updating people we do not know, care about, or possible even like, can perhaps better be spent on the people with whom we work, love, or trying to love, etc.

There is an emptiness to social media, a puffing up of the proverbial chest, a step back into our primordial minds in which we must have sought validation wherever we could.

Validation cannot be bought, sold, or offered through video screens. Rather, it is an experience inside one’s mind, earned through breathing, letting go, crying, making mistakes, quitting jobs, landing them, giving birth, saying goodbye, falling down and getting up. 

Social media validates itself–that is all it does. It validates technology and the sadness we feel, but rarely express…

Jumping Ship

Jumping Ship

Jul 22, 2021 | Millennials

There is something to be said about jumping off of the proverbial ‘Millennial Falcon,’ this notion that people in their 20s and 30s do not just understand social media better (and they do), they understand more about life.

It is impossible that any one generation has THE answer(s), but millennials benefit from the visual nature of social media, which ‘captures’ their enlightenment. It is a preposterous idea, but one marketed to great effect.

Imagine if Baby Boomers had access to such technology in the 60’s? Surely, their message of peace and love seemed right. We see copious footage from TV and movies that demonstrate the force of their beliefs, but what we are missing is the platform of social media afforded to millennials that codify their ‘brand’ of knowledge.

What do millennials know? They know how to use technology, and this singular bit of knowledge bleeds into other areas of life and society. They know things, and with the click of a button this knowledge will be imparted to all.

There is something magical and yet predictable in the knowledge of young people. They KNOW, because they do not know what they do not know. Add on 15 years, a divorce perhaps, the birth of a child (or two), debt, wrinkles, the loss of one’s hair or job, and what you have is reality.

Reality is not pretty, nor do millennials possess a deeper understanding of it than anyone else. Like anyone, everyone, they are what they are, and it is neither good nor bad.

It is time, however, to abandon the ‘Millennial Falcon.’ Like all modes of transportation, it will eventually run aground or get blasted from the sky.

It is time to jump ship…

The Isolation

The Isolation

May 18, 2021 | Social Media

For those of us who sometimes feel isolated and alone, social media can tend to make us feel worse about ourselves. We are not part of the scene that is social media. We don’t have as many “likes,” “shares,” or “follows.”

Whatever social media is measuring, we don’t have enough of it. We are always missing out on something. Did we see the latest tweet or Instagram post of whoever is trending at the moment?

Honestly, do any of us really remember the most impactful Facebook post of our lives? When was THE moment we saw THE post that unlocked THE answer? There was no such moment.

The world is not a static image that one may ‘click’ at one’s leisure. It is a world of loss, tragedy, murder, rape, love, hope, deception, hunger, homelessness, awful humans and much, much more.

Social media enables us to look outward so we can avoid looking within. It is not all bad. There is beauty in it, too, but there is also something very isolating about the experience of it.

Social media packages reality into sound-bytes and pictures that show others what we want them to see. It is a carefully, although often thoughtlessly, curated experience that does not reveal the fact that our lives are lived in our own heads.

How do we capture the reality of reality in a format that primarily reveals the lives of others through images and/or videos that capture very limited points in time? There is no context for what we are seeing, no before and after, which is real life.

Do you have “friends” on Facebook that in fact have no idea who you really are? Were they high school friends that you have not seen in 20 years? How are we using the term “friend” now? Are you our friend?

There is something subtly quite isolating about social media. We can connect with the world without ever leaving the screen of our handheld device. No, that is simply and utterly false.

Regardless of one’s age, we make time to physically meet the people that matter — and that number may be in the single digits. Social media allows us to participate in something without really being part of it at all.

The Answers

The Answers

Mar 26, 2020 | Millennials

We have all seen it, right? The look on a millennial’s face when he or she discovers THE answer on their phone.

They are surrounded by individuals who experience the same thing, and these moments of bliss are captured and disseminated through social media channels at nearly warp speed.

Isn’t it natural, though, for all younger people to feel as if they have the answers? The difference now is that younger generations are able to capture these moments with technology and promote them. Might Baby Boomers have experienced such things, too?

What will happen when today’s younger generations grow older and time seems less infinite? There is something deeply disturbing about the march of time. It goes on without us, and that reality is obvious the older we get and the more we see change, yet stay the same.

Do millennials have the answers to life’s mysteries? Media coverage seems to suggest they know something profound. However, might it be that millennials know technology better than older generations? They know how to use technology, but that knowledge seems to bleed into the arena of life itself, which is profoundly problematic.

Some answers are known by each generation, but the question becomes what kind of answers are they? Can a 29 year old advise a 60 year old on the complexities and nuances of life? Maybe. Do millennials fundamentally understand aspects of life? No way. Technology, however, provides photos and videos of them in that sort of nirvana that only exists for younger folks.

As we age, the excitement of what we think we know is tempered by the experiences that make up entire decades of what we do not know. What would it look like on social media to see pictures of 85 year olds staring at each other in rapture and clicking buttons? We would surmise they have dementia? After all, what can older folks know, right?

What those who are older know, however, cannot be measured by Google analytics or captured in an online review of a local vegetarian bistro. Rather, it is the actual content of a life that has been lived and all the detours and nuances that result from the pain, loss, tragedy and triumph of existence.

Do millennials have the answers? Sure, they are exuberant and bring fresh perspectives to age-old human foibles. Have they experienced decades worth of life and loss? No, they have not.

Ask a 25 year old what is life, and he or she will look toward the future. Ask a 50 year old the same question, and he or she will turn around and look back…