I think it’s safe to say that Facebook is here to stay, in full force, and I need to get on it.
So here I am, beginning again, for real this time.
Believe it or not, I have had 2 Facebook accounts. Yes 2! Neither of which I embraced, but instead, hid from.
8 years ago, my sisters ambushed me and decided I needed to get this thing they called Facebook. What the heck is that? MySpace?
They said that I would just love it! Reluctantly I allowed them to set me up, as they assuringly said it was the best way for me to share family pictures–and again that I would really love all of it!
So I played with it a little bit on the day that they hooked me up, but I have to say that I didn’t understand it, so it fell by the wayside. I was busy, in the thick of young children, dealing with my own world, and I felt surprisingly nervous. Nervous about how others would perceive me.
Strange, right? Especially coming from the person who writes a column every week that I share with all of you. We all have our quirks 🙂 The writing part comes easy.
And then life changed, and Facebook just wasn’t the right thing for me at all. Too much pain at having to change the “married” status to “single” and to look back at family pictures. I felt like a failure. So I went underground and turned away.
In 2013 I bought my Morning Ag Clips. We needed a Facebook business page, and it needed to be tied to someone’s account. It’s always funny how things come around, and we are forced to face things that we so badly want to forget.
But I am smart, I had a solution: I opened a new Facebook account–I could start fresh. My colleagues added state Morning Ag Clips pages for me because I didn’t know how. They did some posting, and slowly and miraculously some of my friends and acquaintances found me, thank heavens. I didn’t have the capacity to “friend,” it seemed too daunting. As a matter of fact, I would still be sitting with an empty account if it weren’t for them. (Thank you friends.)
This fear of posting and conquering Facebook, I know, all stems from my own insecurities. I have to own them.
I have tried to put these fears upon my very New England Puritan upbringing of not, shall I say, “tooting my own horn.” Maybe? But that doesn’t quite work because my sisters grew up in the same house as I did and they aren’t afraid, they just Facebook and love it.
Or maybe it is because I am so busy with everything else? Definitely part of it, but I can’t put it all on that.
In all truth, I think for me, it is a fear of facing all of the failures that I have perceived myself to have at staying in touch. I could have done better. During the early years of my marriage, having kids, going through a divorce, all of it. I feel badly, like I let my friends down, and fear that they think I don’t care–which is so very far from the truth. But we all know how those little voices inside of us seem to be the instigators of these issues that we make huge in our heads.
So if it wasn’t for Stephanie, earlier this week, sitting beside me, holding my hand, I wouldn’t have been able to hit “publish” when I updated my personal photo. And again, as I hit it to broadcast to my (soon-to-be) old Facebook account friends that I was going to be closing my account, and that they would need to connect through the “new” one.
Yikes. The rush of anxiety that I felt in hitting that button was very ridiculous. I know Stephanie was shocked at how such an outgoing, people-person that I am could be so afraid to touch Facebook and how badly I really did need her hand-holding.
But, in the past 24 hours, I have connected with people that I haven’t heard from in a very, very long time. It was nice to know that they are still out there and know who I am–they haven’t forgotten those good times that we shared. I still have many more to reach out to, and I will. It’s just time.
In my own way and on my own clock, I will figure out this relationship with Facebook and all of my friends and family who have embraced it and who are ready to connect. I really do want interaction with all of them, and all of you.
So, I am ready to embark on a new adventure and will, hopefully, find the balance between posting and reading, and not getting addicted–I have so much going on that it’s hard to have the time for addiction. 🙂
I want you all to know that Rome wasn’t built in a day, as I still haven’t figured out the waving thing and what Messenger is compared to sending someone a message, news feeds and liking, but I figure the more I use it, the more I will get it. And the more I face my fear, the easier it will become. See you soon!
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