Hi everyone! It’s been a minute since I’ve written about my (and most people’s) relationship with social media. If you’ve been a follower for a while, you may remember that 2 summers ago, I went on a social media hiatus for the summer to recreate my social media usage habits. It was refreshing to take a break from social media and I would love to do it again.

However, all of my student organizations require social media, whether it be posting, replying, or simply keeping in contact with other students, so I really can’t take a break from it. I have been trying to limit my time on social media and especially minimizing my time on social media at night. It’s hard, especially when we are so dependent on it, but I’m doing my best to unplug as much as I can.

Something I wanted to do is share some things that I like, love, and hate about social media because I want to share AND I want to know your feelings about these things as well (and others I don’t mention as well). So, here are some things I like, love, and hate about social media.

---

Things I Like:

• Social Media is great for making connections. Whether it be LinkedIn, Facebook, or Instagram, making connections is easy. Whether you add someone to your connections, or DM a company or person you want to work with, the sky is the limit for who you can connect with.
• There is a different social media platform for every person. Sharing photos, witty jokes, DIYs, etc. there are TONS of social media sites to pick from which is great because everyone is different so your social media sites should be too.

Things I Love:

• Staying in contact with people is so easy. When I’m at school I can keep up with friends back home and when I’m back home, I can keep up with my school friends. It’s also a great way for me to keep up with everyone from San Diego since I haven’t been back to San Diego since I left.
• MEMES. I am a meme girl like no other and I wouldn’t be able to enjoy my memes if it weren’t for social media. I have thousands of pictures on my phone and almost half of them (and almost all of my happiness) are memes and they wouldn’t be possible were it not for social media.

Things I Hate:

• How likes and followers determine worth. The more likes and followers one has the more idolized they are on social media. People start obsessing on how many likes and comments they have on each post by buying those and followers and it creates this cycle of trying to get a certain number of likes, not reaching those and trying to get more followers and likes and then failing again.
• People are measured by their looks. Not only are girls criticized for every single they do/say/wear, we are now required to be flawless on social media. Now Instagram celebrities all over are facetuning and photoshopping themselves in photos which are causing their fans to feel far less than adequate because they don’t look like their idols when in reality their idols don’t even look like their idols.

---

What do you all like, love, and hate about social media?
❤ Alicia ❤