When did I start reaching for my phone instead of a book before bed?

I cannot say exactly when or why I began choosing Best Vines over Lord of The Flies. I grew up in a world in which books began to slowly slide from my hands, into some wooden drawer in my room.Those papercut giving companions were gradually replaced with (usually) technology powered entertainment, in my case, particularly social media.I soon found myself guilty of a couple duckface posts on instagram, and yes, I do use hashtags. Social media takes up a huge part of my life. I’m not sure whether this should necessarily be a negative thing.

I mean, I know it sounds rough, social media replacing vintage classics. However, I think we should give social media a break. If we think about it, Twitter’s first chirp was in 2006, Facebook has been helping me stalk my middle school crushes since 2004, and finally, Instagram birthed the infamous #selfie in 2010. These social outlets are like us, young (I’m talking to you Instagram). I believe that as soon as we learn to interact with social media responsibly, we will be able to experience it to its full potential. Basically, social media is still in its awkward stage.

Social media leaves those with access to it, without excuses. It’s a networking system that overflows with opportunities, more than people in a mall on Black Friday. The world is shifting even more, from a who-you-know type of success, to one that requires hard work, ingenuity, and  luck. Social media allows us a near infinite access to people from all around the world, giving us the ability to realize the “American Dream”, through a touch screen(no more ink stains), from almost anywhere in the world. Before, aspiring to be known or even being able to share our ideas or opinions without belonging to a certain political or societal status would’ve been naive for some and extremely difficult for most. Now, we have platforms that can be seen as agents to a “power to the people” stance. The power of the voice that social media gives us is seen in the Arab Spring in 2010, when people used social communication outlets as a way of empowerment.

For example, I follow @jackharries on Instagram, a young british guy that has about 1.8 million followers. More than taking pictures of awesome trips, many of his videos and posts are socially conscious. When he posts, he takes us on those trips with him, broadening our perspectives. Some could argue that social media results in a uniform culture, but I prefer cable to the local T.V. network.

All in all, there’s no question that social media is effective. It’s virtually everywhere we go. Whether this effectiveness impacts us in negative or positive ways is up to us, and how we develop it in the years to come. I’ve realized that I still need to work on curling up with a good book more often, even if it’s on a kindle.There’s no harm in a little selfie action here and there. However, we should take into account how social media can open doors for us and give us a voice, even if it’s through #hashtags.