Social Media Amnesia

I am often amused when going back over family photos and seeing some where I don’t remember “being there” when the photos were taken.  Almost without exception, those photos turn out to be ones where I was the “official photographer” of some event and I was so consumed with capturing the moment that I wasn’t actually living it, thus creating a strange sense of localized amnesia.

I wonder if social media will produce similar events on a larger scale in the future.

I see so many people who can’t wait to “get away from it all” and once they do, they spend all their time tweeting updates, sharing photos on FB and Pinterest or performing other “sharing” tasks.  Some of my friends, while “resting”, post photos every 10 minutes or so (some with even greater frequency) for the entire duration of their vacation.

In fact, some post so many updates that the rest of us become exhausted by their vacation. :-)

I wonder what their families think of their social media presence or, from their perspective, their “social media absence”.

It seems that once they had a chance to “get away from it all”, that they merely shifted from one thing that consumed them (work or other source of pressure) to another thing (sharing).

What happened to “getting away from it all”?

We Need To Unplug

It’s a known psychological / physiological fact that time to truly unplug and recharge is an essential part of the human experience.

I wonder how social media and our inordinate need to share photos and updates of everything we experience will play out in terms of our need to rest once in a while in order to return to a sense of optimal performance.

For some people, they probably think “Thank goodness for social media.”, otherwise they wouldn’t have any memory of where they were.

Personally I’d rather truly immerse myself in a moment than worry about sharing it with others who may or may not even care about it.  Otherwise, in a few years I may not be able to tell when looking at old photos whether I am looking at my vacation or someone else’s. :-)

Do you prefer to truly experience your Life or do you put more emphasis on making sure that others are experiencing it?

What do you think the impact of such a decision will be on your Life in the future?

More importantly, what do you think the impact of such a decision will be on the Life of others who were with you when you were focused on being “somewhere else” mentally / electronically?

Are you sure?

How do you know?

In service and servanthood,

Harry