Everything is embarrassing

People do not care about you as much as you think they do.

In a world where technology provides everyone with an outlet to be the center of attention, it is easy to fall into the habit of thinking that everything you do is picked apart by the viewer. With social media apps providing the ability to have a defined number of people you “know” through a follower count, it makes every story, post or comment in the digital sphere susceptible to overanalysis by the person posting.

We are all victims of this to an extent. I find myself wondering if the song I chose for my Instagram story is just right or whether the order I put my photos in for a post is the “best order,” and then I remember: nobody is thinking about me as much as I think about me.

Social media has created a toxic culture of comparison where everyone is seeing everything you do, and you are seeing everything everyone else is doing. It is easy to fall into a trap of self-consciousness and self-deprecation.

These bad habits picked up by access to an endless feed filled with beautiful people with interesting lives can affect you beyond the screen. It is common to fall into a constant cycle of disillusionment with your own world, where your life dulls in comparison to those who have successfully curated their day-to-day for the world to see.

Margaret Atwood’s statement, “You are your own voyeur,” could not be truer in today’s digital age. Social media can feel like an unwanted microscope, so it is important to remember: there are more than 8.3 billion people on earth.

When you are eating alone in a dining hall, no one is watching you. When the professor asks a question in class, no one is going to care if you answer. If you trip and fall in public, people will forget in the next five minutes.

To have your life be dictated by perceived embarrassment crafted through an online persona is to give up what makes you human. We are social creatures, and we all do things that we perceive as “embarrassing” from time to time.

It is ok to do things that make you uncomfortable because no one is paying more attention to you than you are.

Editor: Sydney Annis