Welcome to the Goodlife: And that takes place offline, according to our author. She constantly catches herself in the process of other people’s Insta-Stories stealing her own moments of happiness and that should finally be over. A plea to real life.
I had a wonderful day yesterday. In the morning I had a leisurely breakfast with my boyfriend, then I went to an interesting event, met a lot of people I hadn’t seen for a long time and in the evening I met up with a few friends for delicious drinks. I felt great. Overwhelmed by feelings of happiness that I missed so terribly during the lockdowns. I couldn’t get out of the radiance. It even got to the point where my cheeks hurt from what seemed like a perma-grin throughout the day. It was actually a perfect day – until I reached for my cell phone.
Fuck FOMO
Because then it was back: FOMO. Fear of missing out often occurs to me when I open one of the countless social media apps on my smartphone and see how supposedly wonderful the life of everyone else in my feed seems to be. You meet more people, more interesting people (supposedly) and seem to be having more fun than I do. How absurd. I’ve just experienced the most beautiful day in a long time, had such a high density of experiences as I haven’t had in two years and still a bad feeling kicks in, which I can’t ward off. I see stories from friends, acquaintances and celebrities who attended the same event and afterwards I suddenly get annoyed about which lectures I did NOT hear, which people I did NOT meet and which things I did NOT experience on site. What doesn’t occur to me at the moment is that I was busy with something else at the time and experienced other things that were important and beautiful for me at the moment, which I was incredibly happy about ten seconds ago.
Sometimes I wish I could go back to the days without social media
In these moments you wish me back to the time when there were no smartphones and above all no social media. I spent evenings with my friends at the lake, made music, grilled and had endless long conversations. We went swimming and enjoyed life carefree. Then we might have taken some souvenir photos and told other friends about it the next day, but that was it. And that made me so happy. I didn’t know what person XY from my parallel class did over the weekend and I didn’t care. I was completely with myself and my own experiences.
So colorful, so loud, so unreal – Insta-Stories
Worst of all, being unhappy after consuming Insta Stories is not an unfamiliar phenomenon to me. Despite great moments, many vacations, time with friends and family, I still find myself getting stuck in the 15-second snippets of other favorite moments and every time I think that everyone else is better (what does that even mean). lead life. You quickly get the feeling that everyone experiences more on social media, does better things, is more successful, has more friends and has a lot more fun. It’s easy to forget that people only show the best two minutes of their daily lives and, above all, only post when they’re experiencing something supposedly interesting. In addition, you only look at these 15-second impressions when you are not experiencing anything exciting yourself – because otherwise you probably wouldn’t have your cell phone in your hand. There are moments when you lie relaxed in bed because you finally didn’t want to do anything today, or moments when you’re sitting on the train home after a long day and can’t do anything else anyway, or moments when you’re is not in the best mood. Then social media is simply poison for your own soul.
But why do we still do this to ourselves and why do we let something drag us down like this? We know only too well what our own posting behavior is like. You don’t upload bored in bed, sitting on the train, or having a bad time. You also don’t post that you have herpes or a huge pimple on your forehead that makes you feel insecure. You also don’t post when you’re in a fight, worried about your job or struggling with life in general. It’s birthdays, concerts, festivals, picnics and trips to the beach, vacations, weddings, gifts and visits to the café that make it onto the screens of our followers. Our feed is full of beautiful holiday photos, concert reels and party snaps.
Do what mom always preaches: put the damn cell phone aside!
Make it easy for yourself and put your cell phone aside more often. Better call your best friend or best friend and tell them about your great day. Lock up these moments for yourself and enjoy them instead of sharing them on Instagram and Co. – rather in the here and now. Yes, I also find myself sounding like my own mother, but if we’re being honest, she’s right. Our life is so much more wonderful and we would feel it more if we weren’t constantly comparing it to millions of others. In the past, there was no way, especially for the super-rich, to be able to look so privately into their everyday lives. And nowadays we can not only compare ourselves with our acquaintances, but also with complete strangers (semi-)celebrities who chill on their yachts, celebrate exaggeratedly self-promoting parties, open five bottles of champagne and hold the next sponsored designer bag in the camera. But we tend to forget that they also lie around in bed boringly for many hours a day, argue with their partners, have hours in which they find themselves and their lives stupid.
So here’s a little reminder again: In moments when you feel lonely, have nothing to do or don’t want to have anything to do, but you could use a little happiness, you should rather dig out your old photo albums, dear friends Write a message or just go for a walk. Because your life is the best, because it is you who live it. Stop comparing yourself and be happy more often about the beautiful little moments you experience and be thankful for the people around you. #moreRealityInRealLife