Facebook – What I Like and What I Don’t Like

6-30am

It’s Sunday morning and 6-30am. Mike’s alarm went off an hour ago! So I woke up and made us coffee. He has gone back to sleep again. I turned on my cell phone and mindlessly scrolled through my Facebook newsfeed. When I think of people’s lives, I think diversity. That is what makes Facebook so interesting for ‘people’ people and maybe so off-putting for people who are not ‘people’ people.  I am fascinated by what makes people tick. I love to peek into their lives and watch their stories unfold. Several years ago, when Facebook had just become all the rage and I had just joined (2007), a work colleague just in passing said something about Facebook that I’ve never forgotten….”it’s just a subtle form of voyeurism!” She couldn’t have been closer to the truth.We like looking at people without them knowing!

We are all so very different and yet all so very similar. We come from a range of colourful backgrounds, income groups, social standings and educational levels, yet we all converge in this one online melting pot.

One of the big advantages of Facebook is that it keeps people connected. I love to see their photos and rejoice in their successes. It’s easy to know what is going on in the life of a far-away friend by checking out their profile and seeing their lives unfold in a series of pictures. It’s a log of their life displayed in simple worldwide technicolour.

But probably the biggest downside of Facebook is that it most often unveils a very lopsided view of life. Generally people put up only all the good stuff. Life looks rosy and quite often, a ‘boastful’ kind of lifestyle comes out. It’s those travel photos, new cars, awards and magnificent successes that result in envy and dissatisfaction of those watching. Discontent is a horrible illness that creates deep unhappiness. Comparison is toxic and Facebook leads the way in pitching a wall-to-wall display of one life up against another.

It’s so interesting how the technological age has grown the malady of comparison. Apart from newspapers, the  media of 100 years ago had trickled into existence with a handful of photographs and magazines world wide. Some advertising hit hard and where it hurts the most…

The arrival of moving pictures, first in  grainy black and white bought elegance and fame to a bigger screen. Popularity increased when colour arrived….

Television advanced the ‘must have’ movement to the masses. The small screen got even smaller with the arrival of the personal computer which could bring  the world to your home…

…and finally, our handheld devices got all the information we’d every need at our fingertips…

…and with it comes the universal dilemma of comparison. I’ve got news for you: it will never end! There is no life that you will EVER match up to. You could be Oprah Winfrey reading this and although she may say she has a pretty good life, I can guarantee you that she cannot say she has a perfect life. She will look at others and ask, “I wonder what my life would be like if I were them?” She too is comparing her life to others.  It’s just built into us – to look at others and wonder how you can get what they have got – but to overlook that others lives are not perfect.

So when it comes to comparison, I have to fall back on the strongest foundation I have. That is the Biblical one. The words of Paul in the Bible burst through my brain, saturate my thinking and lead me again to understand that contentment comes from within…

My home  may not be as magnificent as others, my bank balance not as big and how I look far from matching the beauty I see sometimes on the screen before me, but I have learned to be content. It’s learned. It doesn’t come overnight.

You can make it easier to achieve by counting your blessings and reminding yourself what God has done for you. You can make it easier by nurturing an attitude of gratitude. You can make it easier by knowing that all the comparison issues are temporary and that the majestic homes, the bulging bank accounts and beautiful looks will not last. Only what is of eternal value will last. So sow into the relationships you have with those around you. Befriend, love and bless, laugh and dance and play, give thanks to, rejoice with and praise the Lord. Those things are eternal.

God bless you!

In His Grip,

Helga xx 🙂

Gratitude Pic…I just love this…at the very least, ‘like’ yourself because you will never be without you