A week ago I shared a picture of myself relaxing on my deck. That post alone got me around 350 likes and over 40 comments, most of which were “living the dream” or “so jealous right now”. In the image, I could be seen mid-sipping my steaming cup of pour over coffee while my mac was covered with stunning eye-catching mountains in the background. What my followers did not see was the reality that was right beyond the cropped frame: my daughter’s untouched science project that I was meant to help with, a sink filled with unwashed dishes for three days, and me scrolling through Twitter forgetting to drink my coffee – reheating it 4 times.
I’ll say, I am a mess with a filter. As strikingly grim as all that is, it is in fact a pattern now. The breakfast spread was in fact cold and only came, after the arrangement and photographing process, taking over an entire 40 minutes.
Setting up the recreational reading nook involved rearranging furniture and purchasing plants that I will surely kill within a week. Those ‘spontaneous’ beach days are the reason my laptop has sand trapped in its keyboard—it just so happened that I needed to check my email. Most people alive after 1985 understand the “gap”—the disparity between life on Instagram and live reality—in relentless cycles.
But even if that distance can be narrowed, the void created when one compares their life to others is unfathomable and insatiable. What I find most interesting is that as a species we seem to have collectively accepted some absurd fiction that has somehow bound us to this reality. After years spent designing interfaces meant to pull users deeper into the digital rabbit hole, I have come to recognize psychological hooks everywhere I look.
The joy I experienced from receiving validation is unparalleled. I have attended meetings that concentrated on sculpting that sensation to an entirely different magnitude. So, I won’t pretend to understand the unfiltered absurdity behind the need to chase after likes, because I have indulged in that feeling myself.
I guess it’s time to talk about my personal life, considering its revelation is long overdue. For me, the nadir of my existence came in this simulation we all know too intimately in March of 2023. For close to a month, I pondered how “just another day at work” Actually meant, for me, in “The Office,” was receiving tasks in that familiar corporate grind.
My wife, however, walked in on me three times rearranging office furniture in a single day, each time to distract myself from my office desk cluttered with idiotic self-help books meant for someone of mediocre intellect like myself that I shelved behind my desk. I recall bustling about adjusting the light in the room, just like one does while finishing stage setups for a theatrical production, and considering the most effective camera angles that would showcase a man straining against his demons in relentless battle—exactly how a creative genius strives to paint the scene. “Listen, you cannot be serious, right?” my wife asked incredulously from the doorway with a bemused half smile.
Yes, I was completely insane and, in a sense, still am. To the best of my capabilities, I cannot explain how the figure 8 can make my body stiff to a point I start reflexively saluting an 8 with my limbs. Somehow, a balance sign was at rest beneath me, and my head was so tilted forwards my neck was put to such potential strain it was like gravitating sunlight radiating from my window.
I took a gamble that the illogical angle I was trained to faced was preceded by some form of motive rather than inspiration. One last time, during the entire sequence of movements, the semblance of removing my faux nerd glasses was not an option on the first iteration of my thoughts. My ultimate aim was to get a smart, instead of tired, look which of course was a pathetic endeavor.
The Naked Eye Survey of Diffuse Extragalactic Light revealed that people watching from the internet ended up ‘liking’ my post magnificently. One more time doing the actions I did on that day, I will say, Because of Like’s Moderation Rules–> Server Error: Failed to Validate Action. Understood. Just for that day, regarding that day its total would be approximately one hundred and twenty-nine. Want to go fanatic about not working? Yeah, count me in because that work done has been zero.
The outcomes are a bit hilarious if I attempt to stage “real” experiences because I would put in a lot of work to construct a pose of effortless sass that even Simone Biles would struggle to overcome. Once, I set a timer for 20 minutes to purposefully create a mess of my desk for a post celebrating imperfections. In all honesty, I could have left my notebook in place, but for some reason I decided to move it three times for my “carelessly” tossed notebook.
This performance is viewed with the tormented critique of her age by my now twelve year old daughter, who can do this the best. She told me, “Dad, nobody actually believes your desk looks like that,” critiquing how my sturnosed Instagram post looked like. To rebut this, she added, “Your coffee cup doesn’t even have coffee in it,” which was indeed the case.
After the prior photo shoot, I had already managed to drip my coffee all over my keyboard which meant that I had to drink my cup first before it did any real destruction. I was trying to pretend sip the coffee while doing the effortless nonchalant act. If social media ever needed an analogy, I feel like this would make a better flag than what I’ve found.
The mental strain of sustaining this conflict is burdensome. Researchers demonstrate what, at this point, we all grasp: having to endlessly toggle between one’s real life and another’s distorted reality will result in suffering. The most frightening thing about this is that realizing, or pretending to, the issue does not free one from its impact.
What makes Instagram incomprehensibly alluring yet heart-wrenchingly repulsive is something that I could talk endlessly about. I never quite seem to succeed, however. My feed is an endless parade of success people seem to achieve with grace – and my ‘sip coffee while pretending to work from home’ Instagram only makes things worse. I was unfortunate enough to see what my ex colleagues were posting. Outside of the nine to five grind, armchair psychologists seem to speak of public appearances to the shore accompanied by glossy, bronzed bodies lifting their spirits as bronzed selfies are freely interspaced with sandcastles. Alas, sarcastic book releases explain self-proclaimed celebrity lives.
Those life hacks scrolled through my mind until I glanced at the time and was greeted by the clock striking 2:17 am. That’s when it hit me – why the horrid commute to the office feels better than the virtual one to my colleagues. The cherry on top? This colleague told me over drinks about how he spends the entire day before a call setting up a meticulously crafted casual look to give the impression of work being done at home.
Other than the drama, everything seems perfect, right? Remains unclear if we’re truly content because we are still in the middle of admiring each other’s acts. Without repeating myself, I don’t think we should all go around posting pictures of bills and laundry baskets overflowing as a display of truth.
Now that would be entirely different performance and truthfully, sounds draining. Realistic competition? What an absolute nightmare. What I’m trying to convey is a simple notion: it would be ideal if we accepted the difference between the frame and what is outside that frame. Without disclosing too much, I think it’s apparent I’m constantly trying to find balance and frankly, it’s substandard at absolute best.
Every once in a while when my workspace looks serene, I take a picture, confident that it will disheveled in a matter of minutes. While these acts are simple, they give me the illusion or rather, allow me to escape the elaborate faux I have albeit subconsciously built. To put it in clear terms, I am living in a fabricated world right now.
When I posted the story on Instagram, I completely overlooked the fact that there was a mountain of unwashed laundry and an empty pizza box sitting right behind me. Three people messaged me saying, “Your place looks like my house!”, and for some reason that felt so out of place. Those messages are the reason I ended up deleting the story, and that did cause me to panic slightly.
Some overdose of social media complicated my perception, still left most of the users appeased some way. Though the social media audience craves some look into someone else’s life outside their attire, it seems possible my followers overall were relieved in some twisted way. While scrolling through perfectly filtered picture after picture, it becomes apparent that there is a chunk of the population longing to indulge in the beauty that lies in unabashed authenticity.
Honestly, that takes guts. Those dishes I let sit in the sink since Tuesday really do need to be washed. The existence of social media feeds overflowing with artificial reality and façade permeated lives does not mean the underlying issues can solely be solved by a strategically placed filter.
Not some anonymous figure, yet it still amazes me how some lingers behind the guise of a reality that needs no disguise.
