I've been thinking about writing about social media and its effects on people's lives for some time now, and this is a touchy subject, since even babies start life already connected. It's amazing to see how the color and the movements that happen on a small screen seem to mesmerize everyone indiscriminately.
Nowadays, everything is at your fingertips and this has ended up replacing the look. I recently watched a Spanish movie called “Our Lovers” and, among so many other things, one caught my attention for the way a woman approached a man. And that's just what I'd like to talk a little bit about today. She came to him in a bookstore cafe, started talking and suggested that they not introduce themselves by their names, because each could name the other as they saw fit and they wouldn't exchange phone numbers either, because they would have face-to-face meetings and not virtual ones. Her argument was that if this worked before, why wouldn't it work now too? And the film unfolds from there, but that's another story and it's up to each one to decide whether to watch it or not...
I have seen an increase in the number of people who are unable to socialize because it requires “eye to eye” and usually generates a certain discomfort, as if the person felt naked by that look. In fact, the eyes are the window of the soul and through there we spend our most intense, deep and hidden feelings. And when someone can read that in us, we feel threatened, as if a fragility invaded us. But what if we started to think that it is through contact with humans that we can evolve, even if it brings pain and discomfort? Or even that precisely for these reasons, we grow?
We all lost with that. Of course, we can use all the technology at our disposal, but old habits don't have to be totally discarded from our lives. A conversation between friends, sometimes in smaller groups, so that we can really pay attention to each other, to the conversation, to the content being talked about. This allows us to get out of the superficiality of encounters and get to know each other and ourselves better, without fear and with fewer defenses. The screen is a great defense and at the same time it encourages us to do things we would never do in person. Disrespect has increased, intolerance has also increased and on the small screen with posts on Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and others, we put what we would like to be or how we would like to be seen by other people, and this can be the opposite of reality. It is necessary to start paying attention to the following: each person posts what he wants, according to his intentions or possibilities, but that doesn't mean that we need to feel affected by what the other posted, it goes without saying that he is a liar or displayed, because when making a value judgment, judging what was posted, it is very likely that the judgment made still inhabits us and that the post hit our contents not yet prepared. If not, just look at what was posted and go on with life without wanting to do or be like that person, without thinking that you are worse or better than the other, without comparing your financial condition with that of the person who posted your trip to a paradisiacal place that we would love to know.
In fact, the purpose of this article is to brush up on the discomfort brought by social media, which serves as a trigger for me to look inside myself and get to know myself better. It is important that we start exercising social practice with simple things, such as going to a restaurant and not talking to other people virtually while we are there, because if we are with people at the table and talk to others on the cell phone, we are probably not living in the moment. present, we are not with one friend or the other.
In closing, I would like to remind you that we only live in the present. That is, at the moment when things are happening. If we shift thought to the past or the future, we shift the psychological moment to something that has already closed or that does not exist. The present is called this because it is the possibility of allowing us to live, enjoying everything that that moment, people and the universe offer us, and this passes very quickly.
Therefore, I wish you all a good present time, mastering social media and not being dominated by them. A good reflection!
You may be interested in another text by the author. Access: Love: is it possible to learn to love?
