Social media forms a significant part of our lives, so be it personal or professional relationships, we rely on platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Whatsapp, etc. to maintain them. Presence of social media has made our lives comfortable by bringing convenience to our doorstep and by presenting to us the technological wonders that were far-fetched, some 15-20 years ago.
Now-a-days, things come to you easy, so be it connecting with a long lost friend, buying a gift for your dear one or finding a perfect date, it is no more difficult, all thanks to the very much prevalent social media and rampant progress being made at the technological front to make such platforms more user friendly.
As rightly said, one really doesn’t value much, the things that are easily achieved, however it is not an individual’s fault but the basic human psychology. Unfortunately, this is what is happening with the relationships that are very much impacted by the ubiquitous social media.
There were days when some new relations were formed only when 2 people were physically present, so be it at a social gathering, library, classrooms or workplace but now, there is a virtual world that exists in parallel to the real world and it doesn’t demand people to be physically present with each other.
As a result of this, finding friends has become relatively easy but the strange part is, most of us fail to maintain that friendship for a longer time period, despite the fact that there are innumerable ways to stay connected.
This is so because social media has presented to us so many options that we have started to consider different people in our network as one or the other option for us. For example – You are finding it difficult to maintain a long distance relationship, move on and find an easy option, may be someone who is relatively near to you physically; one of your good friends is upset with you, doesn’t matter much, you have many facebook friends so why to waste time in placating that someone. Let us just give it a thought, are we really enhancing our relationships or deteriorating the existing ones and if your answer is latter then you really need to introspect.
On one hand, social media helps us to stay virtually connected and expand our network; while on the other hand, it is just a network and cannot be called as a friend circle. So, instead of running after a new relationship only because it is easy to find one, why not just make our existing bonds stronger, why not make a better use of social media platforms by connecting with that old school friend, finding that favourite teacher on facebook and saying hello to him/her, asking that old colleague how is he/she doing in life and career or doing a video call with your parents who stay too far from you.
Trust me, it will give you immense happiness to connect with people who really matter to you and to whom you are special. You won’t get that same happiness in finding multiple profile matches on tinder.
I won’t opine that social media platforms are redundant and should be abandoned but if you have close to five hundred friends on Facebook and in the times of crisis, you have nobody whom you count upon then there is definitely something wrong with these connections that are so easy to form but turn out to be of little importance when you actually need them.
So, treat social media platforms as one of the means to stay in touch, rather than letting them rule your life, relationships, peace of mind and your priorities.
In the chase for comfort and convenience, do not make yourself laid back to an extent that you are not ready to go that extra mile to maintain your valuable relationships. It is absolutely alight to venture into a new relationship but in order to maintain that, a social media platform is just one of the options and not the only means so don’t count too heavily on it. Take out time to meet your loved one’s personally, rather than virtually.
After all, paying a surprise visit to someone is way better than a casual ‘Hi’ on Facebook messenger!
