Conscious Consumer

I have been thinking a lot about the internet and the thought that our world is flat. I don’t have to wonder what life is like in Greece I can just follow along on someone’s story or insta live video or facebook live video. I can see how my favorite star or singer is living. I get to know people through social media and then I feel like I really know them, or they’re my friend somehow. Not that people don’t make friends on social media, I have, but what if sometimes all of this access is too much. 

There’s the saying that knowledge is power, but what if too much knowledge is dangerous. I think anything in excess is dangerous. We all know that putting healthy food in our body is good, but what if we need to be careful with what we put in our eyes and ears too. This conversation has been going on for awhile now across different social media feeds. Funny story my sister and I were just talking about how instagram got started 6 years ago. Right before Zoë was born this app came out and it became a thing. Our lives drastically changed 6 years ago. Zoë has had an internet presences since the day she was born. She is featured in my feed, friends feeds, and even in Tommy’s work. Our life has never been the same since that little app was created and then add in Facebook and all the others, I’m not sure what we did 7 years ago. It’s kind of crazy the impact social media has had on our society in such a short amount of time.

Some of you may know and maybe you don’t, but last year for lent I gave up social media. I had realized how much it was distracting me. I’ve slowly found my balance with it and I do enjoy the interaction and keeping family and friends up to date. But I became aware of how much it was hurting me and how much it was ruling my life. I could barely be without my phone and always had it in my face. Not saying I don’t still have days like that, but when I do I make the conscious decision to put it down and leave it. When I find my patience wearing thin I can usually see that it’s because my time has been spent in an alternate world. That I’m craving something other than my life. That’s what I mean when I say maybe too much knowledge is dangerous. It can lead to feelings of resentment, desires for another life, discontentment, maybe even a little anger, for sure bitterness. Taking that time away I was able to cleanse my mind of all of the junk that had built up. I was able to see my life clearly. I have two wonderful children. I had the life I had desired for so long. I just didn’t see it because all I could see was what she had. I don’t know exactly who she was, but she had what I wanted and I wasn’t satisfied with my life, even though really I was. Man that’s when the what if’s really creep in. It’s such a slippery slop.

I guess the conversation always ends here. You are responsible for what you consume. Just like you are responsible for the food you put in your body, you are in charge of the social media content you consume as well. So it’s safe to say for myself that exposing my heart to ALL of social media is dangerous and I have to be careful with what and how much I consume. I don’t want to be lead down a rabbit hole where I can’t define what is real and what isn’t anymore. I want to keep my perspective on reality and less on the what ifs. I want to be responsible with the way I use social media, for myself and for others. Social media is a powerful tool, don’t get me wrong there is always good and then there are the drawbacks. For me I want to be aware of it for Zoë and Grey. If I can navigate the murky waters before they get ahold of it, my hope is then I can set a healthy example for them. I have to face reality that I’m apart of the generation that knows what life was like before social media and what life is like post. But they will never know a life without social media. And as their mother it’s my responsibility to guide them in this world, so the more aware I am the better.

Conscious consumer. I think that’s what it all boils down to. And that doesn’t just mean with social media. I guess I never really thought about it, but we all have to be conscious consumers. Sometimes we allow media in general to direct our decisions. I know I’m guilty of it. So many times I have fallen for the hype of a new place to eat to only be let down. We convince ourselves that these ideas the media tells us are true. Music, movies, blogs, podcasts, books, you name it they all sell ideas that we have to decide if they are the truth or not. And what I think is even more important is we decided what our standard is to compare these ideas to. I guess that’s the real question. What is your standard of truth? Recently I have dug a little deeper into the Bible and for once in my life the stories have leapt off the pages and come to life. So much so that I can truly identify with the stories. But as I begin to grasp the truth I can see how so much of this media issue is directly related to the fact that we believe whatever they are selling instead of seeking out the truth.