social media - whose life are you living?

“It's entirely possible to get to know someone without actually seeing them in person. In fact, it's better like that because none of the superficial stuff gets in the way. You really get to know a person. And it's easier to express yourself when you're writing things down. At least it is for me. I like to order my thoughts, and delete them if they don't make any sense. You can't do that in real life.” 

― Cat Clarke

Social media. The epitome of modern life. There are many conflicting opinions on it, as is expected from any relatively new thing. Now, I do love social media (I'm using it as we speak, with tumblr, flickr, and youtube all up in different tabs while I write this) and I use it a lot. A lot. 

But recently I have been noticing some downsides.

Some background: I've been pretty busy recently with homework and all that, and I've noticed that it's been becoming harder and harder to keep up with all of my favorite youtubers and bloggers, not to mention all of the tweets, pictures, and posts over the various other medias I follow. 

At first, I cursed my schoolwork and personal duties for not letting me have any time to catch up with my social networks. What new videos and posts was I missing while I was obligated to do my work? My personal life was interfering with viewing others'. 

Perhaps you see the flaws in my thinking. And now I do too.

I was too wrapped up in the lives of countless people that I haven't even spoken to that I forgot that I too have a life that I am supposed to be living.

That, I feel, is the main issue with social media. While there are certainly many, many advantages to being able to connect with other people's lives, too much of that connection can sometimes make us forget that we are living our own lives. We should make our own lives and stories and not waste too much of our time watching other people make theirs. 

Now the problem that I face is how to cut back. How do I stop watching other people's lives when I feel so connected with them? For many of these people, I have seen them at their highs and their lows and for some of them, I have even followed them for years. They feel just like old friends. But it is a one sided friendship, and again, a friendship that prevents me from growing my own story. 

This post has been long and rambly, but I hope that it was understandable. Don't get me wrong, I adore social media and all the positives, but sometimes we need to step back and realize that we have our own lives in our own hands that needs to be lived.