How Social Media Teaches You Illusion Versus Truth

by Ryan Biddulph

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I live a pretty cool life.

I circled the globe for a decade as a professional blogger. I post pictures of me living in places like Fiji, Bali, New Zealand and Costa Rica to my Facebook, Twitter and Instagram profiles. I also freely share to social media the struggles encountered during my 10 year, globe-trotting journey.

I do not dwell on my struggles often. When you live your dreams, you do not focus obsessively on all of your past nightmares because you officially outgrow being that person – and need to do so – in order to live your dreams. But I share highs and lows, love and fear and all in between to tell you the truth about living your dreams.

Some folks do the exact opposite of what I do. Being filled with fear, seemingly crippled by the terror of being rejected or ignored, or criticized, some people publish only the highlights of their lives on social media. Posting only smiling family pictures, images of you on the beach in Bali and business success creates an untrue illusion. Making matters worse, most people down their lives, feeling depressed, because through their fear prisms they actually believe the illusion is true.

How many times have you observed someone's posts on Facebook or Instagram and have envied their seemingly perfect, flawless life? The moment you face, feel and release more of your intimately personal fears you begin to see the illusion created by a scared person is not true, genuine or authentic.

Enlightened beings live in a state of serenity, peace, calm and acceptance 100% of the time. Every other human being has moments (sometimes or most of the time) of:

deep fear
anger
frustration
rage
embarrassment
shame
terror
anxiety
grief
pain

because living a worldly life with attachments demands you experience these emotions some or most of the time. The always smiling couple on Facebook screams at each other, of course, and may even scream at their kids, but is so scared to share these truths – for fears of criticism-rejection and also for fears of feeling ashamed, embarrassed or mortified at their less than perfect personality flaws – that they hide their fears, share only the highlights and create an absurd illusion that fools buy into as being true.

Guys like me cannot be fooled because I was the same envying fool a decade ago during my less evolved days and I also personally experienced the heartache one suffers following their dreams. I do most bloggers one better; I actually share the fears, pains, suffering and low points through my blog and social media from time to time. I share the truth; not an illusion.

Being transparent about my struggles, tough times and flaws gives me peace of mind, a genuine feel and a level of credibility that drew a loyal tribe appreciative of honesty to me.

Stop creating a perfect illusion on social media because you only fool yourself and fellow fools who follow you. Be honest. Be vulnerable. Love and accept yourself as you really are to step out of illusion and its suffering nature into truth.

Never judge a person's entire existence on a 10 second scan of someone's seemingly flawless social media images, strung together over months on their profile. The truth is a much different story so there's no need to compare yourself to something or someone who's not telling you the full truth, anyway.