The false intimacy of social media making you lonelier
Social media creates an illusion of closeness and false intimacy, leading to feelings of loneliness and confusion about real friendships. It's important to invest in personal, face-to-face connections to avoid the energy drain of false intimacy.
“My brother thinks I’m always busy on my phone speaking to my friends,” says a 37-year-old male client in therapy. “I may come across as busy, but I don’t know if I’m necessarily feeling connected. A lot of people who I considered friends consistently send me reels and videos, and they comment on my posts but I haven’t met many of these so-called ‘good friends’ for more than a year. Even, when I tried to initiate plans they didn’t work out and it was always me who was taking the lead. Social media has confused my sense of who a real friend is and who is not.” He then goes on to wonder whether all these ‘friends’ of his would disappear from his life if he quits social media.
The disillusionment and the confusion my client is talking about is something that comes up surprisingly often in therapy sessions. Some clients can articulate this clearly while others bring it up in the context of their feelings and the language they use to describe their inner state saying things like, ‘It feels like an empty conversation’ or ‘The relationship feels strange, almost artificial and yet I spend so much time on it’. From teenagers to adults, this narrative is common in relation to intimacy, flirtation, love, friendship and even in relation to their own siblings and cousins.
Social media has undoubtedly changed how we interact with others and how much we interact with others. What clients are pointing to is while there is energy invested in these chats, there is an illusion of connection and yet most people are still feeling lonely and sometimes even betrayed as they find it hard to fathom the depth of these relationships. My sense is that social media is creating an illusion of closeness, almost a false intimacy that comes from interactions and conversations one has shared virtually. We do know that getting to know people, whether it’s love or friendship or even closeness with a sibling requires spending time and investing in their wellbeing, meeting them in person, making a mindful choice to engage with people, listening and being interested in their life, not just their milestones or opinions. However, since we spend so much of our time online, we are confusing connections, acquaintances, and people who may share similar interests or politics on social media as friends, when in fact they are people who are part of a larger network in your life. If, in fact, there is a potential for friendship with them, it requires then to make the choice to interact and get to know them beyond the common areas of interest and to invest in the person. We feel a sense of sustained connection when we spend time knowing people.
Social media allows for convenient conversation which can be almost non-committal where you can comment on a story when you want to and choose to completely ignore it for days should you so decide. The rules of engagement don’t really exist so there is no accountability to people who are your connections on social media. At the same time, as human beings, we as people begin to form expectations and that’s exactly where false intimacy lies. Your social media friends can sometimes feel like an ex with avoidant attachments who show up when they want. Still, when they show up you feel a glimmer of hope, but it soon fizzles out as there is no promise of a real engagement. At the same time, you know they would be lurking around and making their appearance again and hence the dissonance.
My sense is that in this age of social media, we are at risk of becoming commentators on each other’s life rather than engaging with people at a personal intimate level. So, while adulting is hard and we are spending a lot of time online, do pick up the phone and meet a friend or cousin and build a relationship of reciprocity in which you feel seen and heard beyond social media.
Remember, false intimacy can consume our energy too, so choose wisely where and on whom you want to spend your social energy.
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