LEARNING TO BE DELIBERATE ABOUT YOUR INTERNET SPACE
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There’s a saying that goes “show me your friend and I’d tell you who you are”, which holds true to this day no matter how much you want to argue it. An inspiring young lady I know(Nicole Egbogwu) once said “you are the average of the 3 people closest to you” and that stuck with me, another popular saying goes “be careful the company You keep”, true statement.
A lot of emphasis is placed on the people we surround ourselves with because they are huge influences in our lives. They determine a lot about who we are. You can always see the people around you in yourself. You probably learn catch phrases off them, have a similar sense of humor, and even closely related values. They play a big role in your life.
Today we have the opportunity of having so many people “in” our lives asides just those we have in our lives physically, and we spend a lot of time with these people. Who are these people you may ask? Well, they are the ones filling up your internet space. Your Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook, Pinterest, etc. We can agree a lot of us spend lots of time with these people. Reading and commenting on their opinions, viewing their pictures, updates and whatnot, allowing them to feed our minds.
I wonder how many of us are conscious of the people we surround ourselves with online.
Few years back I chose to be very deliberate about my internet space. The people I follow, the content I read. I knew what I wanted my life to be like, what I wanted to be reminded of on a daily basis and I streamlined my social media accordingly. You can easily tell what I like by my Instagram feed. I know lots of us follow many people for somewhat sentimental reasons, like knowing them in real life or because they already follow us, and we can’t control what they post, however it’s important that we evaluate these things or people and really ask ourselves if they are doing more harm than good to our mental health or general well being.
There was once a blog I followed religiously. At first I did it because the blogger posted amazing, well written stories that had me in tears from laughter but as time progressed it slowly became a gossip site. For someone that loves gist like me at first it was nice, I felt like oh wow, I get to be in the know of things, but soon I realized that all that gossip was not adding anything valuable to my life, I also knew with time all these things will begin to influence my views. Bottom line, it had to go, and it did.
I try my best to filter what makes it’s way to my internet space cause it influences my life. If I’m looking for motivation I follow pages that will motivate me, if I’m looking for inspiration I follow accounts that give what I’m looking for, if I want to avoid certain things I avoid them on social media too.
Point is your internet space plays a big part in your life so be deliberate about it. You control what you let in your personal space. You owe it to yourself to be protective of your mind and emotions and one way to easily do that is to clean up your internet space. learn to unfollow, unsubscribe, mute and yes even block people that do nothing to help who you are or who you even want to be.
Like I previously quoted, “be careful the company you keep”.
Do not be misled. Bad company corrupts good character.
- 1 Cor 15:33
