Unique Times

The Precious Gift in Social Media

My struggle with social media continues as I wade through posts, making mine, trying to figure out why I’m on Face Book in the first place and what I want to say. I’ve avoided it for this long and swore I would never get on and now in an instant I’m on Instagram and Linked In as well. I missed the window my friends talked about of spying on their kids or seeing what they were up to. 3 of my 4 kids won’t even accept me as a friend now and barely do F.B. anymore since all of us oldies are on it. Go figure. So I can only imagine way back then, they would definitely not want me knowing anything they were up to.
They have moved on to Twitter, Snap Chat and Instagram to get away from us no doubt.

My writing has been my driving force of deciding to sign up, but I’m not certain this is the right forum for that. That and my staffs request of getting on board in the new century. Apparently, I can’t just sign up as a business page anymore without a personal page. Besides, I’m told people want to know what I’m up to before they look at my business page or it looks too promoting.

Well, the truth is I want my business page to be promoting. Isn’t that why you would have a business page in the first place? This all seems a little cat and mouse to me and I’m perplexed and confused by this whole thing which seems like a game where I can’t figure out the rules. And being liked is more important than being who you are, even if someone doesn’t know you but are” your friends.”  Hmmm……. 

In trying to understand the concept more, I asked my son what he thought I should do and how to get my head around this.

He said “Mom, I don’t know what to tell you, it’s the world I grew up in and I don’t like it. But Mom, it’s the way it is”.

Further more, he said, “if you want to know something Google it, you don’t ask people about this stuff, it’s the way the world works now. You can be whoever you want to be. It doesn’t really matter. Say whatever you want to say and you will be portrayed as that even if it isn’t true. He continued to say, I have 2 fictitious accounts”.

Call me old fashion but I come from an era of being who I am matters and I spent a long time to find out who that is. I’m not keen and quick to pretend to be someone else. I rather like who I am. It has taken me a long time to like the person I am today. I’m not interested in being some identity I can turn myself into that I haven’t worked for, for better or worse.
We were a generation whose work ethics mattered, our word was our bond and what we did was an extension of who we were.
We talked about life, our values, we meant in person, talked on the phone, talked about philosophy, ate dinner together, hashed over different opinions.
Worked up the ladder.

In talking to head hunters the new generation wants instant gratification. Where we had one or 2 jobs in our lifetime, they will have 6-10 and furthermore they have to be able to shift gears with the ever changing demands the world is putting upon them. Those of us that don’t make adjustments and change get left behind. As the saying goes “The only constant in life is change.
If they don’t like the terms, they quit and reinvent themselves.
We are now a society that has been immersed in social media for better or worse and in a snap of a finger we can find out anything about any subject or scarily anyone. Leads in business are developed from here and if you don’t know how to navigate these systems, you will be left behind. We are stuck between a rock and a hard place and learning to sift through what is necessary and what isn’t is vital to our peace of mind.

In my struggle to figure this out, I sat in mediation asking the question how can I make peace with this? How do I move forward?
I can delete the whole bloody thing for that matter.

I picked my angel cards because at a time like this they’re as certain as anything else. LOL.

I closed my eyes and asked the question, how do I deal with this social media stuff and picked my card.

The quote Precious Gift was what I drew.

“Friendship, family and love are precious gifts. Do not lose sight
of what is most important”.
And so they are.

As I continue to struggle through this process one thing became clear and that is social media does not replace family, friends or relationships and they are meant to be shared and talked to and seen face to face. Not an enigma of our imagination.

We celebrated my son’s 28th birthday last night with 11 of his friends around the table where they sat around the bonfire talking about their lives. The bond they have was so heartwarming to witness. He shared how grateful he was to have such special people in his life and thanked each of us for being an important part of his life and how much he appreciated the support he has gotten from each of us. This birthday dinner was his gift of thanks and giving back to those he loves and cares about. It was so touching we were moved to tears. We are all craving connection and to be understood and this was a testament of friendship that isn’t found on Face Book with 300 plus friends.

One thing became clear and that is my posts will be whatever is important to me and I find value in and will be the real deal for better or worse.

I promise to stay open to change while I hold fast to values that are tried and true and not sell out to what is popular at the moment.

To Precious Moments,

Cindy

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