What does your Instagram and TikTok use say about you?
What can you learn about yourself from your social media use? I am fascinated by the dynamics at play when using social media. Aaron Balick writes in The Psychodynamics of Social Networking about the many dimensions of self that are reflected, hidden, and amplified in the course of our interactions with social media. In my past work with teenagers, I heard how much was happening in the negative space of their minds beneath statements like “she liked her photo, but she didn’t like mine” and “I got 1,500 views on my TikTok.”
Our selves develop from others
Throughout life, we come to understand ourselves by relating to others. Many theories of psychotherapy grow from the root fact that humans are social. We live in groups and communicate with each other. As a human communicates with another human, and that human communicates back, there is a process of internalization of that exchange. That conversation or event transmogrifies into your internal experience and digests into some part of your life, whether as tiny as a conversation with a grocery store clerk or a death in your family. We live in families, in communities, and in societies with which we are in a constant exchange of energy. Each of these interactions is a micro-event in an enormous volume of exchanges that compose the development of a human’s identity in the social context.
Modern psychotherapy pre-existed social media by about 100 years. If humans’ selves developed into exquisite complexity through social exchanges without social media, I can’t help but wonder how the addition of social media can affect development of the self in a social context?
Your relationship with social media as your relationship with yourself
As in our “real life,” in our online lives, we are likewise in a social exchange. Online, the exchange is much different from sitting in person across from a friend sharing a bottle of wine. Online, our words are flattened, misunderstood, our images softened, our selves edited into parts. What is the conversation you have with yourself when you are posting an image or a blurb to your friends? I imagine there may be rich content about your sense of self just in those thoughts.
“In many ways . . . the online environment operates as an extension of the self where aspects of the self are put online and then responded to by others,” writes Balick. These pieces of the self are displayed to seek recognition. Social network use comes from a basic social need for recognition, however the risk of using the online world for recognition is that it is unpredictable and distant. The use of social media as a space for the self to be held is an experience that is “both present and distant, real and unreal, interpersonal and intrapsychic.”
How is self-hood impacted by social media use?
Another element of consideration is the intensity of the hyperconnectivity of social networking. The immense volume and immediate availability of social network communications is very much unlike in-person communication and relationships. Yet, particularly for younger people, most of the expression of self and social exchanges occur within social networking – this vast, instantly-gratifying, boundary-free space. While social networking may be criticized for being “fake,” there is real human relating happening in every exchange. If you read any account of the tragic impact of online bullying, it is evident that social networking contains real social exchanges with real consequences.
Throughout our lives, our selves are displayed, distilled, edited, and modulated. Consider how you would behave differently at a party than at a house of worship. We behave differently in different physical contexts and understands ourselves differently in kind. However, within the world of social networking, the hyperconnectivity, lack of boundaries, and unpredictability make online life a rich, rapid, area for self development. I don’t mean to make any value judgment on the use of social media. Social media is not going anywhere and it is a growing portion of our lived experience as humans. I’m wondering what impact its use makes on your selfhood. Is there growth to be had in examining our relationships with our selves as we use social media? If a portion of our selves lives and grows through social media interactions, this is an area for exploration that could lead to great insight. As a starting point to explore your sense of self in the online environment, consider the following questions:
- Before you make a post, what is the conversation you’re having with yourself beforehand? What is in your self-talk?
- Explore that self-talk. How are you speaking to yourself?
- What do you imagine the outcomes of the post will be?
- In looking at past interactions online, what felt good about them? What did not feel good about them?
- Take some time away from one of your apps. What does the absence feel like? What is missing?
- If your favorite app was a friend of yours, what would your relationship with them be like? Are you close? Are they a good friend?
- What does it feel like to be with a friend in person? What does it feel like to chat with a friend online?