What is the relationship between media and society?

How was the society before social media was around? How did people share what they eat before Instagram was created? What did people do in their free time without their smartphones? How did people value themselves without looking at the numbers of followers they have and the likes that they get? Things have changed, and most likely not in a good way. I wrote this upon finish watching a Tedx talk by Jake Swayze.

One of the best ways to release stress is to disconnect ourselves from the world. It used to be possible before social media is around. Nowadays, we are somehow connected to the outside world even if we are physically alone. Ever thought of posting some pictures on Instagram when you are jungle-trekking, rock climbing or swimming? Those are some private time that we have with the mother nature but we cannot control ourselves but to post it online to show how interesting our lives are. We want others to think that we are amazing, and to create a good image for ourselves, which is hardly true because we "only post things that fit the image we want online," Come to think of it, it is very pathetic (because I do it too.) Unconsciously, we are craving for the attention from others, wanted to be taken care of, to be thought of constantly by others. We want to feel important. This, as said by Jake in the talk, has been taken advantage of by the engineers at the social media company.  We rate our self-worth by the likes we get compared to others. We feel bad because of how amazing people's lives are, which is not always true because they too do not post things that don't fit their virtual images well. 

Social media itself is neutral. It depends on the user of it to make use of the good side or the bad side of it. It's repetitive but true. We should not "evaluate our lives by looking at the highlight reel of other people's life." From now on, I will try my best to stay true to my real self online rather than creating a virtual image that I will never be. Maybe we should start to do that, together.

Link to the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BmV-4qx0sIs