Edition Thirty Seven

The power of photos - The selfie.

The selfie.

The age of social media catapulted the selfie into immortality. From it’s humble beginnings on Myspace to the modern versions finding homes on TikTok and Instagram.

Its become more important for you to be validated by people you have never met.

Seeing people taking a selfie with their latte, or someone posing with a friend or two, pulling weird faces. The ever popular duckface. If you arrived from the past as a time traveler you’d be astonished by this type of behavior. Seeing people bending over, tilting their phones skyward and taking a photo.

Not my photo. Clearly from iStock : )

Selfies have changed the way people see themselves.

It gave people confidence and inflated a few egos along the way. Selfie photography has become such a popular trend that phone manufacturers jumped on the bandwagon looking to improve their devices and add the options where a simple gesture will let the camera know you want to take a photo of yourself.

The word was used so much after 2012, Oxford Dictionaries named it word of the year in 2013. Someone made a song about it. Presidents and even the Pope decided to partake in this phenomenon.

Clearly selfies are here to stay.

The impact of the selfie culture.

Social media has already altered our ideas about self-perception. We have things like imposter syndrome, FOMO and other great things we can look forward to. Add to the mix the impact which selfies has on our self-perception.

Let’s look at a few positive and negative aspects around selfies.

Self-expression & empowerment and documenting your personal journey.

Many people think the selfie is a stupid trend which adds little to no value. Unless you think a big ego is valuable.¹

Yet this type of self-portrait can be a very exposing image. It’s you and a camera depicting to the world how you see yourself. Your choice in clothes, perhaps even things like your political orientation. Or deeper still.

With this in mind your selfie becomes a powerful way to express yourself. It tells people more about you. You make a strong statement when you decide to post an image.

For many people the selfie is a form of empowerment.

You might have red hair with plenty of freckles and suddenly you sharing images online makes your look very popular. Verena’s profile is a great example of how using selfies for good can impact the lives of other people.

verenaaschulz

A post shared by @verenaaschulz

Perhaps you have a birthmark which you consider to be ugly. By sharing your images of this you gain confidence in yourself and even inspire others to share their own insecurities with the world.

Selfies are also way to document your life or parts of your life. Perhaps you start taking photos in the gym. You want to see how you progress. The photos you take form a great basis. This helps you to figure out what work for you in terms of your diet, your exercise choices.

This visual diary helps you to capture highlights and successes. It is a visual history of your progress. When you started, the uncertainty, the mistakes and learning from them. Where you are now, how things have changed.

Looking at this examples it shows selfies can add some value if you aren’t purely looking for attention or consistent validation, which leads me to the next section.

Social comparison & addiction to validation.

Social media has done us in.

It gave us a lot of good things but it left us with a bad taste in our mouths. We constantly compare ourselves to strangers online. I mentioned our fear of missing out because people we don’t know tell us what they think will make our lives, which they have no idea about, better.

People have always been comparing themselves but it has never be on this type of scale. It used to be “My circle of 5 friends are all lucky to have rich parents”. This you can work with but suddenly its you VS everyone on the planet. You see a pop star doing something and get upset because life is so unfair and why can’t I do all these things. *stomps foot and pouts for effect*

This tends to leave you depressed.

As you browse through the hashtags you might see selfies of the Kardashians or other celebrities and thinks different things. You compare yourself to people who operate on a different level. Apples and oranges. They have people who post for them, they have a team of make-up artists ready. They plan the selfies. You wonder why you can’t be this lucky but you don’t really know what it’s like living their lives. You rarely see the downside.

And when you hear about how much it can suck you might be happy it’s not your life, right?

The next curse we got from social media is the addiction to validation. If you don’t get a certain amount of likes or comments then life is over. Sounds familiar?

It has become more important for you to be validated by people you have never met.

Let it sink in. People who you are unlikely to ever meet. The people who don’t know you has more sway over you. They define how you feel, what you wear, how you talk. In extreme cases they even tell you how you should act. Or what you should eat.

If you arrive at this point I would suggest cutting all ties with social media. Focus on real people in your life. Make an effort to touch grass and hang out with someone who you can talk to, someone who you can see face to face.

How social media shapes the selfie culture.

Take away social media and you take away to power of the selfie to multiply.

Smartphones and high quality cameras is one component of the selfie culture. Social media provided the method of delivery. You can send your image to thousands of people all over the world and see their images.

Validation on social media is the water which nourishes the selfie culture. Likes, shares, views. It’s the same as hearing a bell ring around dinner time.

Communities form on social media around a variety of topics. Politics, religions, music, art, etc. It would be unheard of if a community around selfies didn’t exist. People can share their tips and tricks for getting the best shots. How to light your face, the best poses.

Social media platforms are excellent places to express yourself. Anyone who is into selfies and part of a community around selfies will find it amazing. Upload your image to your social media platform of choice and sit back.

Constant validation isn’t as good as you think. The reward system in your brain gets overloaded and soon you might just start to go to extremes to get the same level of validation.

Social media platforms have turned away from their roots. They wanted us to connect with people, make friends and share photos. Today, social media wants you to spend time online and monetize your attention.

In closing.

The key to life is balance.

Selfies, or the idea of taking photos of yourself isn’t the problem. It’s the reason driving you to do so which needs to be examined. If you feel it’s adding value to your life then more power to you. If the opposite is true - you can’t get through the day without checking your feed or wishing for more likes it might be time to cut back on the selfies.

Thanks for reading : )

PS

1. Sometimes there are instances were taking a selfie is just plain stupid.