I had another post planned and scheduled for today – but when I tell you that life comes at you fast, I mean it! It all started on Tuesday morning when I woke up and realized I had 3 missed calls and a few text messages from my husband, who’s in France. Naturally, I called him back before I looked at the text messages and he informed me that a young lady had photoshopped my face out of one of our photos and inserted herself. When I looked at the screenshot, I was shocked at how good the photoshop job was. If you didn’t know, you honestly couldn’t necessarily tell which photo was the original and which was the fake. My husband and I immediately started laughing and created a side by side of the images to share with our friends. The whole thing was absolutely hilarious and it was the perfect way to share a little Valentine’s Day humor to lighten the mood for those who dread the day. Our friends and family members shared our sentiments and we all had a really great laugh. I went on with my day and when I checked my social media pages a few hours later, I was in utter shock. The post had gone completely viral and had been picked up by some major Instagram pages, such as Baller Alert and a few others. My comments and DMs were going crazy and for the first time in a long time, something I shared had gone completely viral.
What started out as a joke quickly grew into so much more. The funniest part about it was that it wasn’t planned. If I’m honest, there are quite a few posts that I’ve shared that I would have LOVED to have gone viral, but this wasn’t necessarily one of them. Although this came as a total surprise, going viral did teach me 3 important lessons about social media that I’ll aways hold with me:
Once a post is out there, you have no control: The invention of the screenshot has totally changed the game when it comes to social media. Things escalate in a matter of minutes and, as soon as you share something with even 1 person (let alone all of your followers), you lose all control. Something that was only meant to reach friends and family ended up reaching literally thousands of people and it made me realize that once you put something out there, it takes on a life of its own and there’s nothing you can do to stop it.
Everyone on social media has an opinion: Once my post went viral, everyone started questioning the young lady’s motive for photoshopping the image. Was she just a fan making a joke? Was she trying to convince her followers that my husband was actually her boyfriend? The world may never know… Similarly, everyone started questioning my motives for sharing. Although I meant it as a joke, some people assumed that I was insecure about my relationship or trying to hurt the girl’s feelings. At the end of the day, everyone on social media has an opinion, and they all think that their opinions should be shared.
It’s not for the faint of heart: If your social media pages are public, you cannot wear your heart on your sleeve. There is always a risk that people will have negative things to say and you have to accept that it comes along with the territory. Luckily for me, appearing on My Super Sweet 16 years ago gave me pretty tough skin. Negative comments by people that don’t actually know me don’t really bother me, and I was able to just ignore them. When the notifications got extra annoying, I deleted the post. If you’re someone who doesn’t want any negativity, you have to be really careful what you post and private pages are best.
One thing that I always remind myself about social media is that it’s not real life. When my post went viral, the world didn’t stop spinning. Honestly, regardless of what may be going on in cyber space, my life has gone on as normal. On top of that, what’s viral today will likely be forgotten tomorrow when people move on to the next thing. Social media is fun, but we should never let it distract us from what really matters – our real relationships with real people who know who we really are and genuinely care about our well being.
Have you ever had a post go viral? If so, what did you learn?
Welcome to the Thursday Three Link Up. Who doesn’t love sharing lists on their blogs?? Whether it’s 3 reasons you love your husband, 3 things you hate about graduate school, or 3 awesome birthday gift ideas, the Thursday Three Link Up is a place where you can share your posts and interact with other bloggers. Create an amazing post listing three things of your choosing and link up on LiveLifeWell or Royalty in Reality each and every Thursday! This week’s featured post is right on time! Marriage gets such a bad rap and with divorce rates soaring,hearing about happy marriages is a breath of fresh air. If you need some proof that happy marriages are possible, check out this post by Provocative Joy.
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<h2 style=”text-align: center;”>The Thursday Three</h2><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />
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