Let's Be Real
7/10/2019
Disclaimer: Each of my client anecdotes are fictional. They are compilations of hundreds of client situations I have encountered throughout my career. This is to protect the confidentiality of my clients. Anything that may resemble a real person or family is simply a coincidence.
Long blonde hair. Sparkly blue eyes. Strong athletic build and a beautiful smile. She walks into my office and within moments is in tears. She is telling me how social media dictates her life. She is either constantly comparing herself to all of the beautiful people she sees in photos or figuring out how to post a selfie that doesn’t make her look fat.
An handsome, smart, fun, young college boy shares that he is getting to know a girl. In a vulnerable moment he asks her “why are you talking to me, the ugly guy?”
A long, lean, beautiful middle school girl. She, too, is comparing herself to her peers, insisting they are all prettier than her and confused as to why they would want to spend their time with her.
These conversations tear at my heart. My job is not to convince them that they are good looking (which they all are), but to help them to love both their insides and their outsides and to place less value on how people look and more on how the people in their lives make them feel.
Can you laugh with your friends? Can you share with your friends? Is it safe to cry with your friends or be honest with them?
One teen shared that when she is with one of her friends she is so comfortable with her that she can be herself. They can laugh and be silly and she forgets to worry about how she looks. I praised her for noticing the richness of this friendship and we joked that this friendship, unlike Instagram, is free of filters.
I often tell the teens that as they walk through the halls of school they are comparing their insides with everyone's outsides. ‘I feel sad/anxious/ugly/lonely and everyone looks happy and carefree.’ I remind them that what they don’t know is that those that look happy may be feeling hopeless, struggling with their parents or failing out of school, and by the way, they look at you and think you look like you have it all together.
Social media has upped the ante on the high school hallway experience. It is no longer just walking from Spanish to Math that these kids get to compare themselves with their peers, it is a constant flow of pictures (altered and misrepresenting reality) that makes it really difficult to let go of those perfect lives they perceive are happening around them and not to them.
It is our job, as the adults, who are also besieged by perfectly looking lives on social media, to remind the youngsters that a genuine life happens in community and in real time with real people, not necessarily through a screen.