Tag: facebook

the longest facebook post ever.

~ NewBeginnings ~ Leave a comment

Now don’t get upset, but this won’t be about the longest fb post ever.

Honestly, I’m partially happy that I didn’t go fb-happy during the holidays this year and here’s why..

I was too busy actually spending time with people.

And let me tell you, I tried! Hahaha I did.. part of me started getting frustrated at the fact that I was unable to post all the pictures and all my annoying Christmas, i.e. Jesus’ Birthday, cheer and New Years hopefulness. For the first time in a long time, I felt it was more important to actually absorb everything around me instead of trying to let people (who could prob care less anyway) know what I was doing, and how exciting! it all was.

I totally understand the concept and the importance of social media so don’t get me wrong. I understand that without it, friendships may not have been saved, or long-distance family time would be more than scarce. Trust me, it helps me everyday keep in touch with my long-distance loves ❤ I also know many a people who have met loves of their lives on social networks. But I also know how it has ruined relationships and hindered actual social lives.

If you have read anything of mine, you will know that I feel the spirit of any holiday (and/or birthday) should carry throughout the year, not just that day, or time; because we should be celebrating life and all it brings everyday. However, “reality” for most, isn’t my way of thinking. Knowing this, we should be more diligent in taking the time during those holidays that focus on family, friends, and sharing, and actually spend the time doing it vs telling internet people about it. And per usual, I am sorry that I always seem to get a little bit morbid.. But, the time we waste during those crucial moments, even just minutes, are minutes not spent with people we apparently love. Those minutes may come in handy one day.. when you are counting them down.

So my Christmas? If you’re still wondering.. was spent in NYC.. with family.. a new family at that, and even though they weren’t my own, they deserved all the love and magic.. and cupcakes! Christmas had to offer. Because that’s what Christmas is all about. Jesus.. (had to!) and family. (Which really go hand-in-hand if you know anything about Christianity) Anyway -rant.over- the entire time I was there, it wasn’t so much about what we were doing anyway, but who was doing what. Were we all together? Was someone still sleeping? And honestly, the best moments were the conversations around the kitchen table.. or possibly playing Heads Up (no, not 7up) because karaoke and karate are pretty similar.. just sayin.

And New Years? I might add.. Was also spent with family, mine this time, and some friends with lots of food and drink. Nothing too crazy, which is out-of-the-ordinary for me, but still splendid all the same.

This past year was another crazy chapter in my life-book. There were plenty roller-coaster moments.. some over-exaggerations, lots of emoji faces.. I laughed, I cried, and had more than enough learning-mistakes. I met several amazing people – two of which, keep me on my toes, and refuse to let me live by a plan.. and more in the moment ❤ – and I made some overly-amazing friends. I survived my first year back in the sate of my birth and full-circled back to one of the best companies out there that was so gracious to offer me a new, great job. I survived the darkest of times, a mechanical bull accident, my new job transition.. in the middle of the holidays, mind you.. which included a business trip two weeks before Christmas! and I even survived meeting my boyfriends’ family. AH!

My annoying optimism will admit, this was a perfect year.. just like all the rest. Because how can any year not be perfect if I’m still standing?

So here’s to another frustratingly-exciting, magically-wild, overly-emotional, and crazily-awesome year.

Cheers!

writing has feelings too.

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Writing. It is such a powerful thing to be able to do. It provides new ideas, explains situations, tells a story, and in some instances, inflicts emotion.

Emotion: n. A state of feeling. A conscious mental reaction subjectively experienced as strong feeling usually directed toward a specific object and typically accompanied by physiological and behavioral changes in the body.

Emotion is a crazy thing. It allows you to feel out a situation and express yourself. Emotion can change your perspective on life, it can even make or break you. It is the very aspect of our being that allows us to connect to others.

Now.. writing and emotion.. this is a tricky thing. As stated, in some instances writing can inflict emotion.. however, unless you are reading a very well written novel, you can’t find proper expressions of emotion. Classic novels aside, lets talk about everyday writing. Like this blog, it is difficult to see exactly how a writer feels from their words. Even some novels, (which is why I stated ‘some instances’) one cannot tell the emotion from the writer. In this entire post for example, I could be sitting here laughing hysterically reading out the definition of Emotion, over enunciating certain words, and making a mockery of my ideas.. Even with as many emojis 🙂 , underlines, italics, bold letters, or even bold italic underlines, expressing emotion through writing is difficult. You can’t hear tone, you can’t see a facial expression. And that is what emotion is.. ‘a strong feeling.. typically accompanied by behavioral changes in the body.’

So in all our Facebook statues, all our tweets, and all the blogs we read.. all we have in interpreting writing from someone, is our knowledge of them. It’s knowing what they sound like, knowing their tone, knowing facial expressions, eyebrow raises, smirks.. Without that, the perception idea comes back to mind.. writing becomes part of the world of assumptions. We have to remember that what we think the emotions are of what someone writes, may not be what the writer intended, or even what other people are thinking. And not to throw this into a 3rd dimension again, but what we respond with is also under the same discretion since those who do not know us will read without knowing how we feel. They are just words on a screen. I have seen many internet fights because of this, even on my own pages. I myself have had to reach out to the people who know me to remind them that other people will not understand my ideas, never mind their comments, so to be prepared for back lash..

And then I bring myself down to reality and think.. ‘It doesn’t matter what these people think of my words.. they don’t know me!’ But it does matter. Why?! Because even people who know me best still mis-interpret my words.. because again, they still can’t see me. They sometimes can’t determine if I’m serious, or sarcastic. I have to literally say ‘I’m serious.’ Now those situations are not common, but even still, it makes me think of the people I don’t know very well that I am getting to know now. Especially here, in what some people like to call LALA Land.. where drama is hiding behind every corner.. the entertainment and media industry focusing on every word, spoken, sung, or written.. I sometimes forget these people do not know me yet.. They’ve only tasted the icing.. and I’m a whole lot of cake!

Maybe it’s because I am in a new world, with little connections, as well as being recently single.. that I am more aware of what my messages interpret as. I can’t stand having to explain myself.. so I try to be more careful. But in all our writings, whether it be Facebook, twitter, texting, messaging.. remember that all the emoji in the world won’t be able to express your actual emotion. I don’t think its anything we can change, or fix..(unless we all just start posting video of ourselves) we can just be aware of it.

So, if I offend anyone, or give off the impression that I’m interested.. NO. No, I’m not sorry. You just don’t know me and there is not much I can do about interpretations of my written word. I can do my best, but it will never be perfect to everyone. But maybe, just maybe, one day everyone will be able to know and experience the honest-fun-enthusiastic-craziness that is Posh.. Maybe. And then all the critics can suck it.

“Those who know, don’t talk. And those who talk, don’t know.” -@CoffeeCocktail

PSA

~ NewBeginnings ~ 1 Comment

reason #3895 why having a blog is great:

You can vent about anything to the general public knowing only a handful of people know what you are talking about, then receive unsolicited constructive criticism, advice, and sometimes even appreciation for discussing everyday angst.

And now I present to you, my vent of the week:

First and foremost, I would like to apologize because I feel it was because of my ignorance that this had to happen to me, however, in situations that are similar, I do not do this type of behavior because I feel I’m socially aware of people’s personal space.

What I did wrong was update my relationship status on facebook. As normal as this sounds, I actually did NOT want it to be public so I deleted it off my feed on my personal page. Unfortunately, I did not realize that in doing so, it does not delete it off the regular news feed as well. As much as I love my facebook community, old and new friends.. I have my own group of close friends who I talk to everyday.. you know, like most people.

So, in a public service-style announcement, I would like to say.. the answer is.. NO. No, I don’t need anyone to talk to because I have friends who I have talked to already. No, I don’t want to hang out. No, I don’t want to explain anything to anyone because frankly, it’s none of anyone business unless I say it is. No, I don’t need all this random attention just because I’m single. I’m single NOT lonely, or depressed, or incapable of living everyday life. No, I don’t need help. So enough with all the messages and allow me to be the celebrity who enjoys their privacy.

And, if you are really concerned, the only attention I would like at this time is one from a knight in shining armor, approx 6″1′, preferably with a swimmer-esque build, no chest hair, and in his mid-late 20s. (we all know how much of a cougar I am). I also don’t like horses, so if you can be a sort of Chris Hemsworth-style knight who just runs around mostly, and can let the horse be, that would be awesome. A wine offering would also be accepted, again, only if you are what is described above. That’s it. I hope this helps.

Thank you for your time.

when did social networking become anti-social?

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Its been a while since I last blogged..

In these last few months.. I attended 4 weddings and a concert.. during PEAK time at work. Needless to say, I was relatively non-existent from society aside from the occasional catch-up sessions with friends.. and my twitter and facebook.. obvi.
With my coming-back-to-reality in these recent weeks.. a lot has happened.. Glee is back for season 3, (you all knew that Glee would be mentioned 🙂 ) I personally have had a lot of changes at work, I had a dream with Cory Monteith in it and all we did was talk about canadian coins.. (yah my subconscious clearly needs a glass of wine.) and most importantly.. facebook got a ‘facelift’.
Now, really. This whole facebook debacle was even on the news. Seriously?! A facebook update is newsworthy compared to war, the economy, local murders, even new health developments, or even the weather?! That is just as ridiculous as dreaming about chatting with Cory Monteith about canadian coins.. my dream probably was more entertaining.. and THAT ddnt make it to the 6 oclock spot.. not even the 11p.
As the people of the world complained about this new, almost terrifying (apparently) look of facebook.. these same people also began taking away the whole reason facebook initially came to be. Within the new ‘facelift’ of FB, there are new tools to help streamline feeds if one chooses to do so. One feature in particular, that is getting a little more attention then most, is this ‘subscribe’ and ‘unsubscribe’ feature. This feature apparently gives a list of items in which we can decide to make more private. Any posts/comments, life events, etc. we make. This provides the option to choose only certain friends who can see these things, not ‘all’ friends (which is odd to me that users have started to use this, mainly because the whole purpose of the new FB layout was to create a streamline of posts in order of what we view most anyway. i.e. close friends or relatives, so we are not automatically seeing ‘all’ friends’ feeds. This is what I personally DON’T understand, because isn’t the point of FB to network and keep in touch with those we don’t see everyday? Hence the timeline.. because I KNOW where to find my friends.. AND.. we are ‘friends’ with ‘all’ these people on purpose arent we?!).
I really hope there is someone out there who can back me up on this.. but.. users who post this new ‘subscribe’ feature and complain, some of the exact verbiage being “..I’d rather that my comments on friends’ posts not be public, thank you! Then re-post this if you don’t want your EVERY MOVE to appear in the “Ticker Box”, on the right, for everyone to see.”, do they remember why FB was created?! To meet people.. NEW people.. For college students to NETWORK, OUTSIDE their normal groups. Do we even remember the MySpace days!? (meaning when MySpace was all we had) Everyone was setting up personal blogs, layouts, and music.. for the WORLD to see. Yes, you could make it private, so ‘outsiders’ couldnt see your whole profile without being friends.. but you can also do this on FB. Also, there were no extra, list-requiring, privacy set up for extra-extra security. Mind you, I salute you FB for allowing this as an option, because, I myself like having options, even if I dont use them, its nice to know its there.. but really.. people.. arent we getting a little out of control?
The whole point of all this social networking was.. exactly what its called. To network socially. By going wild and streamlining your info only to the people who “matter” on a social networking site, kind of defeats the purpose dont you think? If you only want your close family and friends to know things, why dont you CALL them? Or meet up, have a coffee, have a REAL conversation. OR, only have close family and friends on your FB. I know there is a whole other conversation out there about people feeling bad about denying friend requests, or being picky. (I also think this issue was on the news once). Honestly, if you are feeling bad, adding these people then taking away their view of your info.. Again, kind of defeats the purpose. why even add them at all?
I know people who have hundreds.. some over a thousand friends. I also know people who have about thirty-five, and I know people who dont have a social network at all. They are just as happy. I did notice it is fairly consistent that people with the thirty-five(ish) friends also felt the same way as these FB users who are asking friends to modify the ‘subscribe’ list. the difference is that these people I know, (mind you its only a few) took it upon themselves to explain to family and friends that they use their social network a certain way, so if you are not ‘friends’, not to fear.. its nothing personal. If there was a complaint or argument against it, it is clearly a personal issue.
I myself, use a few social networking tools, and I have friends on some and not on another. I have had to explain myself a few times, but I understand that we are all different, so I try and have others understand that too. We cant control who we have stronger connections to. That is why we have various circles of friends. It’s normal in life. The WORLD can’t be your bff, or your mother, or your sibling.. Knowing this, why is it so difficult for us to understand that social networking is the same way?
In all, social networks were created for us to be social with one another, friends, co-workers, pen pals from Japan.. And when they first emerged, we were all excited to get out there in the world and meet and to experience new people, to network, help others find jobs, even explain how to do a french braid. But now all of a sudden, no one wants to be social anymore. walls are being put up, and there are cries for privacy. Don’t get me wrong, I totally understand that with the electronic age, there is more risk. But there was also a risk when cars were invented.. and there is still a risk every minute we drive. But do we stop? No, we take precaution. We wear seat belts. At home, I shred every little, tiny receipt I find.. and almost all my mail. I take precaution so I can continue to shop with my debit card.. But do I use my debit card only at certain stores? Certain gas stations? Do we only drive around our block? No.
So we take precautions if we are concerned and make our profiles private. But once we have people in our little social network circle why are we limiting them? didn’t WE choose to add them? We need to stop complaining about what others see (because WE have control over that) and use the networks for what they were intended for, to reach out, and network.
If all we are doing is limiting ourselves socially, then really whats the point?!
*on a side note, on 20/20 this past weekend, they had a whole hour dedicated to YouTube and its effects on todays culture and on connecting with people across the world. There was also a segment on how YouTube has helped with jobs, blogging, and making people famous. Now.. none of those people complained about privacy settings.. and some (which were very amazing.. one in particular was a professor who posted math, science, and history work for others to learn.. all for free.) have helped people in tremendous ways. Some help was as little as learning how to make dinner. And THAT my friends, is the point of social networks. To connect, reach out, and if youre lucky, you help make a difference in others lives.