Facebook Ke Side Effects?

Heard this a few days ago…
X : I will be off Facebook from now on!
Y : Why, sweety?? Any issue??
X : Yeah, an issue of sorts… It’s just that after looking at the pictures and updates of my Facebook ‘Friends’, I go into depression!
Y : Depression??!!
X : I find that everybody has a rocking life, except me!
A look at any Facebook wall and you see…
  • Friends have been to exotic locations for vacations and some seem to be going so very frequently. A million pictures are the proof to that!
  • Friends are having a great time with family and friends… there is so much of laughter and smiles all around.
  • Friends have such beautiful families and they all seem so much in love…
  • Friends dine out at wonderful restaurants, go to high profile pubs and discotheques. The Places option on the Facebook is always ticking away… And the pictures of the food and the colourful drinks look so very enticing.
  • Friends are achieving big in life… somebody’s got a High Performer certificate from the office, somebody has won a badminton match at the club, somebody met a celebrity at the airport, somebody spotted a tiger at the wild life sanctuary, a mention in the newspaper…
  • Friends are buying so much… almost everybody seems to be having the latest and the best in technology… mobiles, laptops, tabs, SLR cameras, cars…
  • Friends watch all the new movies in the theaters, almost everybody watched the recently concluded IPL matches live at the stadium…

Almost everybody has more than 200 ‘Friends’ on Facebook and you are bombarded with this news every second. Even if you are not on your laptop or computer for long, the smart phone keeps you connected with your Facebook Friends 24×7 and it’s an open secret that you are so very possessive of your smart phone, so much so, that a beep on the phone and you will not waste a second to check it and most of the times, you are anyways busy with it!

 So, all the happening happenings in your Friends’ lives should make you feel happy, proud, motivated…? But all you get is a feeling of inadequacy, being left out, sad and gloomy and even depression!!
Psychologists call this feeling as FOMO or Fear of Missing Out. It begins with a pang of envy. Next comes the anxiety, the self-doubt, the gnawing sense of inadequacy. Finally, those feelings fizzle, leaving you full of bilious irritation!

It’s like, you are suddenly not happy with the way your life is going, you wonder why those good things are not happening in your life and then comes the feeling of being left out or missing something real big in life, as compared to others!

They say that all the wonderful pictures and updates are nothing but impression management! As nobody would post pictures in which they not looking the best, nobody would post dull and drab state of affairs, so it’s all the good and the positive, interesting and new things that get shared with Facebook ‘Friends’. It’s like you choose what to share and not to share with the world!
While there are many who suffer from FOMO, there are many who are not at all affected by this deluge of happy happenings in other people’s lives! For them, it’s just networking and sharing of information, without any comparisons with anybody’s life!!
So, what is Facebook for you?? FOMO or No FOMO!!??

And of course, there are so many good things about Facebook too… See what Susan has to say about it, here!

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