When Your Life Doesn’t Feel Social Media Worthy

Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, blogs.

Vacations, kids, houses, cars, everyday life.

I like to follow it all too. The older I get, the more I realize that we are built for community, authenticity, and relationships. All things we often desire, but when we look around us, we just don’t feel worthy. We don’t feel honest enough. We don’t feel worthy enough. We don’t have the guts to genuinely share our lives, for fear that they don’t measure up to someone else’s.

I can guarantee that at some point, you have compared yourself, your life, or your surroundings to someone else’s, and out of that, reaps some sort of envy or desire for our lives to look like their’s. I’m sure someone comes quickly to mind:

• • I wish I could on a vacation like…
  • I wish I drove a vehicle like…
  • I wish my house looked like…
  • I wish my body looked like…
  • I wish my kids would…like…
  • I wish my life looked like…
  • I wish my job was…like…

We often see pictures on Instagram, Facebook, or even quickly view one on Snapchat and only wish that our lives looked the same. And we are left saying…”But my life doesn’t look like that…”

And so we pile on the guilt and the shame. I’m not pretty enough. I’m too fat. My house is a disaster. My life is so boring. My vehicle is older than I am. We start to feel bad for ourselves, and the pit grows deeper and deeper…

Until it starts to effect our relationships, our desire for community, and in the end, our authenticity.

What if we started to use God’s Word, His character, and His love, as our measure of acceptance, and not our social media accounts? What if we looked to the true giver of life and everything good, and stopped looking around, but up?

I have a sign in our house that says, “Gratitude turns what we have into enough.”

As I typed that, tears started to well up in my eyes because truthfully, I have SO MUCH to be thankful for! Do we constantly wish for a different life than what we have? Is it our dream to portray a certain life? If I start to think I can’t post something on Instagram, on the blog, or Facebook, for fear of shame that the picture isn’t “good enough” or not being worthy, well, I’ve gotta problem on the inside. And I think we often find ourselves in this place.

My favorite: seeing someone ready to Snapchat someone else, as they fix their hair, angle their phone just right, and ensure their face looks like what they want it to look like. My that is a process!

All to ensure we feel social media worthy.

What if we just posted a pic, to post a pic? What if we Snapchatted, AS WE ARE. What if we stopped worrying about if we are worthy in social media’s eyes, and started to ask ourselves if we are worthy in God’s eyes?

And ya know what? I already know the answer to that – YOU ARE. YOU ARE WORTHY and YOU ARE WORTH IT. I remember there was a Facebook challenge or string going on of people posting pictures of themselves with no make-up. Forgive me that I don’t even remember what it was supporting! But could you do that? Could I do that?

Well I can’t advocate for authenticity without being a part of it myself! So here’s my no hair done and no make up look: