You decided to go onto your phone and open your favorite social media app. Then you watch a video: someone surfing in the turquoise waves of Fiji, living in a shack along the beach. Swipe. Someone making their way up on the corporate ladder earning six figures. Swipe. A backpacker traveling across Europe and visiting the world. Swipe. Someone living in a small cabin deep into the woods. Swipe, swipe, swipe.
Today, social media is constantly promoting all the different types of lifestyles, endorsing and often glorifying all the possible ways someone can live. Social media presents these sources as a type of motivation, nudging on the fact that the fulfillment comes from constant movement, novelty and validation from others.
But, one of the only things social media rarely does is ask their users what they actually want to do. Instead of promoting internal growth, social media pushes “the grind” and aesthetic achievements. Platforms hype up getting external validation from others which is now dressed as “growth.”
As social media influencer Hamish Charlton explains in a video “Social media tells you to chase everyone else’s lifestyles, except your own.”
Many may not realize this yet, but this scenario is an example of the slow process of social media replacing someone’s instincts and intuition with inspiration.
But, being validated by others should not mean someone has really grown, especially if they don’t truly enjoy what they’re doing or achieving. So, even though social media sells the lifestyle of constant movement and “improvement,” true improvement comes from slowing down.
By focusing on internal growth and self improvement, people can replace being told what to do and think, with doing what they genuinely enjoy.
On top of that, by trying to advertise to its users hundreds of lifestyles a day, social media can cause the “Paradox of Choice.”
This psychological phenomenon, developed by Barry Schwartz, is defined as the idea “that while some choices are good, an excess of options leads to anxiety, decision paralysis, and less satisfaction with the final choice, as people become overwhelmed, fear missing out, and regret their decisions more.”
As a result of being constantly exposed to other’s curated lifestyles, many start to compare their own lives to the superficial ones they see online and begin to question if they are making the “right” choices in life. This transforms inspiration into pressure and curiosity into self-doubt.
So, the next time you open social media again and start to feel overwhelmed from all the possibilities of life, remember what Charlton says: “you are paying too much attention in a world built to distract you.”