You’re More Interesting Than You Think

Think your life is boring compared to everyone around you? You’re wrong.

The other day, a blast from my past showed up in my suggested friends list. It was someone whose face I hadn’t seen in many years, but who I always considered a super nice person who kind of beat to his own dream.

That’s code for being socially awkward.

I use that word kindly because I had my own socially awkward tendencies. So this person felt like kin to me, even if we weren’t very close. He didn’t have very many friends, and when we all graduated, he kind of disappeared.

So when I saw his face paired with a locked profile, I immediately requested his friendship and looked forward to reconnecting.

Ten minutes later, we were “friends.” But the person I saw…well, time was good to him in twenty years. He’d lost a ton of weight and looked pretty cute. But more than that — he was FUNNY. His feed is full of photos and commentary on a day in his life at his job, and every single post made me laugh. I mean, seriously, the guy needs his own show. And the comments on each post showed I was far from his only fan. I was happy for him, and was reminded again how much can change after high school. But a different feeling was also rearing its ugly head, a feeling I’m well acquainted with.

Jealousy.

In looking at his effortless humor over everyday stuff, I started feeling small. I began comparing myself to his wit and cleverness, thinking about how unfunny, uncool, and uninteresting I am. I made a mental list of all the ways I’m boring, starting with my predictable routine and ending with my very limited number of interests. I thought about the ways I was failing — my credit card debt, my unfashionable wardrobe, my twenty extra pounds, my aging looks, my unreached dreams…

The reason this is so familiar is that this is my routine. I scroll through Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, noting all the perfect lives, the funny tweets, the stunning vacations, the major accomplishments, the beautiful faces, the stress-free smiles…

And in comparison, I feel plain.

After looking at my friend’s profile and considering how much more interesting he was than I turned out to be, I decided to confirm my negative commentary about my life by visiting my own profile and seeing what everyone else saw. And you know what?

I realized I wasn’t that boring after all.

I mean, I know everything I do in the day to day, including the background story of each photo. For example, one of my most recent photos is this:

Meet Cleo.

To the public, this looks like a beautiful picture of my majestic spoiled cat. But I also know how much she sheds, how she’ll scratch at my door at 2 a.m. if she’s bored, how she keeps escaping outside, and how she might have fleas judging by how much she’s been itching lately. I also know that Cleo prefers my husband to me, even though I’m the one who brought her home, and this moment of rest on my chest is a rare occurrence because she’d rather hang with him. I see that because it’s my life. Everyone else sees a super calm, gorgeous cat just resting on my chest.

There’s more.

There are the gorgeous photos of the afternoon I spent at the coast with my husband (where we were fighting colds while bundled up and trying not to be obvious about our germs to everyone around us). There’s the memory of us on top of Mount Tam (when I was suffering from vertigo by the intense height and wide view). There’s the picture of me with an author friend after her book talk, where we look like two established writers just celebrating success (but she’d also called me the wrong name in front of the crowd, and I was thinking about the one book I’d sold that month versus the crowd of people buying hers). There’s the smiley picture of me with a group of friends at a music concert (where they all wore super casual flannels and jeans while I showed up with my cleavage and red lipstick, realizing OH, it’s not that kind of event).

Literally everyone else’s photos are the same way. The superposed influencer photos? A lot of planning, editing, and outtakes went into that photo. The one of your perfect friends doing something fun with a group of people? You’re not seeing her stress about debt or her body insecurities in her beautiful smile. That person in your feed on that super cool vacation? It’s not showing the overwhelming to-do list that’s waiting for them at home. That photo of your friend’s ultra-modern farmhouse kitchen you’re lusting after? Missing from that photo is their junk drawer or Monica Gellar-esque messy closet.

No one has it all together. No one is as perfect as their Insta-feed would have you believe. Everyone has something they’re insecure about, need to improve on, wish was different, or is just plain jealous over.

So what to do?

First, unfollow anyone who ignites powerful feelings of inadequacy in you.

I really like what Erica Layne, the blogger behind the “The Life On Purpose Movement,” has to say about this when comparing herself to someone she followed on social media: “In the strange way that only social media can foster, I’d become invested in her family’s success and happiness, even though I’d never met them and almost certainly never will. Unfollowing her would feel like stopping a movie in the middle. I needed to know the ending. But I knew I was comparing myself to her.”

“Permission to unfollow. It’s my responsibility to monitor what I let inside.” — Erica Layne

I’m not saying it’s their fault — it’s not — but there’s no use denying the jealousy, the illusions of being small, or the self-hatred you feel when you look at their feed. For me, this includes the people who constantly post life affirmations and share how amazing life is.

Sometimes life is NOT amazing, friend.

Second, reclaim reality in real life.

Call up a friend just to talk. Go outside and enjoy nature. Join a Meetup, or join a club. Do something in real life that can’t be enjoyed digitally. We get so swept up in digital life, believing a scroll through your social media newsfeed is like actual socializing, but IT’S NOT. You might see their faces, but you don’t know what they’re thinking, what they’re saying, what is actually behind those painted smiles. And they don’t see you. So click out of the browser and connect with the real world around you. Trust me, your spirit needs this.

Third, stop the comparisons.

Celebrate YOU and all the things that make you who you are. You’ve accomplished a lot that you’re not even giving yourself credit for. Hell, I don’t care if the biggest thing you did was drink a glass of water — good on you for keeping hydrated! But seriously, stop discounting your real life in comparison to someone else’s highlights reel.

Finally, be yourself.

Beautiful, filtered photos are fine. We all love to look at them. But are you hiding behind them? Are you afraid of showing who you really are? Are you afraid of what the world will think if they witness you without makeup, with a messy house, after a bad day, and in the worst light possible? Go ahead and post those gorgeous photos of you on a great hair day. But don’t forget to also be authentic. Post something that reveals who you are on any given day, not just the filtered photos of perfection. Be real. Be true. Be you.

Because you’re more interesting than you think.

I close with this:

While following celebrities and influencers, and even friends with seemingly perfect lives, on social media might be super fun, it can also feel draining to see someone else’s amazing life and try not to compare your own to it. Here is a list of my favorite well-known names on Instagram who don’t even try to pretend they have it all together, and who remind me how awesome it is to be human.

Glennon Doyle
Sarah Nicole Landry
Kristina Kuzmic
Celeste Barber
Your true circle of friends, people you’d see in real life

I don’t just write articles for Medium, I also write novels. My latest novel is Numbered, a dystopian romance set in 2050.