When I was in high school (I want to say it was my senior year), I started a Facebook account. My page was active until the beginning of my junior year of college. By that point I felt like I was pretty much out of witty status updates. I didn't post a lot of pictures or do much chatting. About the only thing I did was wish friends and acquaintances a happy birthday. Since I wasn't really using Facebook, I figured there was no point in keeping it.
That was my last great social media adventure. I've never reactivated my Facebook account; I've never jumped into Twitter or Instagram or Snapchat or even dabbled with something smaller like Vero. (I think I technically have a Google+ account with my Gmail, but I don't remember ever doing anything with it.) I won't say I've never thought about getting back into social media, but I've never seriously considered it.
I think the main reason I continue to avoid social media comes out of a desire to avoid assumptions. Despite serving in a fairly public role, I'm a pretty private person overall. By not having social media, I reduce other people's ability to form opinions about me before they meet me. There aren't so many pictures and twelve-word thoughts floating around with little or no context for interpretation. The less you know about me, the more I'm able to control the narrative. That probably sounds scary or sinister, but I'm not trying to hide things or keep secrets. What I want is for the people who know me to evaluate me based on their real-life interactions with me, not based on other people's opinons of me or even tiny digital snapshots. I guess I think I come across best and most authentically in person. If I'm going to be judged, that's how I'd like to be judged. (Now I realize this is a little bit of a ridiculous thing to write on a blog that anyone can find online. I guess I'm not totally committed to this privacy thing. But I also do agonize over what I write here, and I think this format gives me more space to explain myself more clearly.)
When I was in high school I regularly attended a community drop-in night at my church. Most of the kids that came weren't members of my church, and almost all of them attended a different school than I did. There was something very freeing about going to those drop-in nights. For better or worse, my other friends expected certain things of me. They knew my strengths and weaknesses, my family background, embarrassing things I had done in the past. It can be hard to grow or at least feel like you're growing, when you're around the same people all the time. But at drop-in nights I was pretty much just Brian. My friends there didn't remember a less mature me. They didn't have many assumptions about me. They just knew me as I was at the time. As they got to know me, I think I also learned quite a bit more about who I had become and maybe who I was becoming.
Now don't take all this to mean that I want to ignore my past or cut off all my old friends that I don't see as much anymore. I'll gladly talk about things I remember doing or what I used to be like. As you can probably tell from my blogging, I enjoying reminiscing and am pretty comfortable with self-reflection. Feel free to ask me some questions. But my request is this: if you want to get to know me, please let me tell my story my way and in my own words. Give me as much time as I need. And I will do my best to treat you the way I'd like to be treated. Just know we'll probably have to do it face-to-face.
Grace and peace,
BMH
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