Outgrowing Things

 

I had stopped using Facebook about a year back. After years of using it, I had started feeling uninterested in it. It did not make sense anymore. I logged into Facebook yesterday in order to reach out to someone whose phone number I did not have. When I scrolled through the ‘timeline’, I saw a college friend still posting his own pictures as if celebrating himself. He has been doing this for 10 years now; is he not supposed to quit at some point? Another friend still posts her family pictures. A few celebrities I followed, were still posting their own pictures. It seems everyone on Facebook is doing “self-love”, but needs to show one’s pictures to others, in order to get validated. What kind of absurdity it is? If one is doing “self-love” (as the practice of self-respect and care is called), why does one need to give daily updates to others?

A few days back, I deactivated my casual Twitter account too, because it was eating up lot of my time and it also filled me with negativity whenever I logged in and saw others’ tweets. I decided that enough was enough.

I have not been posting anything on LinkedIn since long time. Once upon a time, I was an active user and I also used to write articles. Later on, I deleted all my articles (my blog was the right place for it anyway). Yesterday, I checked LinkedIn and people are writing loads of idiotic stuff and getting thousands of likes and interactions. Social media is becoming a mad world. Someone had a bad experience with a bank, so he wrote a big post declaring that the bank had lost it. Lot of people post useless stuff no one should care about, but surprisingly lot many people go and write comments on such posts!

It seems everyone is suffering from huge insecurity and would get an anxiety attack unless others see their social media posts and validate them. It had taken time for me but I had come to the stage when I did not care to show my presence by writing and sharing unsolicited stuff on social media. I had seen that many others were ‘there’ before me; when they did not ‘need’ social media for any kind of validation. I had seen that they were much more at peace in their life and it felt a sign of self-confidence too. I could not be like them when I tried. So, I took my own time but gradually I reached there. I was going to reach there anyway, because I have seen that I am a man of varied interests and I need variety to ‘tickle’ my brain. I can’t read same subject for whole life, or do the same thing for decades. And I am glad that I reached a stage when I do not need any social media.

I know that I am still writing blogs. That is mainly because I love writing and I do want to continue that. But, sometimes I have even felt like quitting it. I will wait for the time when I shall be able to ‘outgrow’ even blogging.

- Rahul Tiwary