External Validation

Why do we post on social media? Why do we feel a need to receive external validation from others about the events that we live in our life? Is social media helping to create a society that views others opinions to be more important than our own?

Why do we post on Instagram? Why do we tweet on twitter? Why do we create streaks or post videos to our private or public story on Snapchat? Why do we post or repost photos and videos on Facebook? Why do we post on Tik Tok?

These are some of the questions I ask and here are some of the most prevalent social media sites that people use today. If people are active on twitter, instagram and snapchat which I find to be the most prevalent three that generation Z uses, it baffles me how this doesn’t become a second job for people. For many, I think it does become a second job where your mind constantly is going to these sites if there is a down minute. Instead of being able to just sit and think, you instantly go to these sites to receive some immediate stimulation that your brain has to process. Through programming your brain to need constant stimulation and infiltrating it with other people’s lives, you yourself start to think and act in this way. Your mind revolves around this idea of sharing your life with others instead of living presently for yourself. I’m at the beach with friends… let me take a video where I show people playing spikeball, music playing, and then flip the camera and smile with my friend. Why do we feel a need to show others that we are having fun? Why can’t we just enjoy the moment because we are actually having a good time. We as a society perpetuate this warped sense of living life, fulfilling the need to project and show others the good times that we are having, posting it all on multiple social media sites so everyone in their life is up to date on what they are doing at the present moment. To me, this seems like an exhausting lifestyle. Yet, social media will always be ever present in our lives and so the question still stands: Why do we post on social media? Why do we feel a need to receive external validation from others about the events that we live in our life? Is social media helping to create a society that views others opinions to be more important than our own?

When examining the second question more closely, this concept of intrinsic versus extrinsic motivation comes into play. When we ask ourselves about the importance behind our actions, everything boils down to intrinsic versus extrinsic motivation. Intrinsic motivation is the doing of an activity for its inherent satisfaction rather than for some separable consequence. Extrinsic motivation is doing an activity that is focused purely on outside rewards. These two types of motivation drive the actions that we do on a day-to-day basis. From these two places of motivation, there is also internal versus external validation. Internal validation means that you gain self-worth about yourself and build self-efficacy based on the things you accomplish and the opinions you form about yourself. External validation means that you derive your self-worth based off of the opinions of others. These ideas of intrinsic versus extrinsic and internal versus external are all becoming very blurred with the addition of social media. Do you like going to the gym because you internally feel better after you workout, or does posting that you just worked out make you feel better than the actual workout because you see and receive others feedback saying you look jacked? This is just one example to help propose and shine light on a possible belief.

If people continue to live their lives for extrinsic motivation and external validation, they will come to realize that they are not happy. Social media is a carcinogen, helping to enforce habits that lead to your self-destruction where you are seeking external validation rather than finding happiness within yourself. People will also argue that they post on social media because it allows them a way to document their life, allowing them to see memories and good times that they had throughout their life. My rebuttal is that photos and videos that you find in your camera roll serve the same purpose. If the memories internally make you happy, why do you need to post them on social media? The next time you go to post a photo, or tweet out a statement, or repost someone else’s ideas, ask yourself, am I doing this for myself or am I looking for some external validation from someone else? You might just rethink and choose to just live in the present, enjoying the moment for what it is rather than the responses you receive about it.