In today’s society we worry so much about how others see us and the opinions of people we barely know. We live for the “so cute” comments and the likes on photos but there is no reality in this life that is perceived through social media. It has become increasingly apparent that social media puts unrealistic standards on many aspects of life, including money. The chase for money, fame and glamour has always been prevalent but continues to be exacerbated through many of these so called ‘social media influencers.’ I wanted to see the difference between what people believed their future to hold versus what their ideal life consisted of. 

I began by asking what their dream life consisted of and almost all of them included cars, private planes, big houses, material aspects of life. One student even said, “I just want to have the life the Tik Tokers are having.” Without even bringing it up, the topic of social media was brought into a conversation that should be free of it. Someone’s ideal life should not be based on the perfectly crafted instagrams or fifteen second videos that people post to show off the best parts of their life. I hoped that I would get responses that included a family, a stable job, or anything that is not superficial but all of them were these warped senses of success. Why can’t you be successful if you have a stable job, a good family, but maybe not all the money in the world. 

When I changed the question to what they believe their lives will actually be, the responses greatly changed. The materialistic things were quickly forgotten and genuine things came. “Well I think I will have at least two kids,” “A good paying job,” “the ability to support a family” were the responses of three of the students. I questioned them, well why are these not your ideal life? Many of them seemed perplexed, one said “well all of the famous people that I follow seem to be living their best life and they have money to just throw away.” While I understand the appeal of that life, it is not anywhere near what their real lives are and is scary that people are shaping their ideal lives around it. 

I continued the conversation by asking how much they thought social media influenced their idea of a perfect life. The first student I interviewed said “well that’s all I see and am always told that their lives are perfect, so yeah it’s gonna make me want it more.” This simply shows how much social media has integrated itself into all of our lives. So many parts of our lives are  controlled by social media and people now have a warped sense of stability because of it.