Constructing happiness

One of the great things about social media is that we can construct our own public identities: the fun-loving adventurer, the deep-thinking poet, the wealth-driven salesperson. In real life we are pushed around by competing forces and conflicting feelings, but online we are in control, bravely writing our own cyber-destinies, one post at a time.
 
It’s not just the things we post that create our online identities, though. It’s also the things we don’t post. The things that go unsaid, that remain hidden, locked up, kept safely where no one can judge us for them.
 
In real life, people notice such gaps. They notice our absences, even in our presence. They see the darkness behind our smiles and the emptiness in our eyes. But in cyberspace we can fill those gaps, covering them over with cat videos and inspirational quotes so our friends remain none the wiser. Or so we think.
 
But our friends aren’t stupid. Our friends do the same thing, carefully applying layers of pretty wallpaper over the bits they think we won’t like, filling their gaps with what they want us to see, what they think we want to see.
 
Our friends see through our careful constructions in exactly the same way we see through theirs, so it’s all to no avail — they just don’t buy it. Which leads me to ask: if you’re spending all your time on social media, trying to show the world how happy and in-love you are, who are you really trying to convince?