Oh won't you please, please, please like me????

People like me...

I have a morning routine.  The first order of business is the bathroom, followed by feeding my feline mistress.  After this I pour myself a coffee, take a sip or two and then begin my morning yoga.  I write a few pages in my journal, do some sort of breathing exercise or a short stillness meditation.  During this process I am continually fighting the urge to pick up my phone to check for text message or Facebook notifications.  Generally, I do a fairly good job of resisting (putting the phone on Do Not Disturb helps) which means that by the time I finish the first thing I do see what’s happening in the world of social media.  

This morning was no different.  Well, mostly no different. 

I scrolled through my feed while sipping my coffee, clicking likes, making short comments, sharing stories I found interesting, moving along my Facebook feed at a steady pace until…

…I saw the post.  Not an offensive post.  Not a post by someone who is down in the dumps who I want to try to console.  Not a post of a horrific news story, or a funny cat picture, or a lost animal.  It wasn’t anything that was in the content of the post that made me stop.  It was who made it. 

I stared at it, my fingers hovering above the home keys, wanting to write a response to the post but unsure of what to say.  

I typed a sentence.  No, no, that won’t do it sounds too over thought.  Backspace, backspace, backspaaaaaace. 

Maybe just a like and a smiley face?  Uh uh.  That will seem like I couldn’t be bothered to actually write a real response. 

Tippity-tappity-tippity-tappity…a paragraph.  TWO paragraphs.  Oh I’m on a roll here!!!!!  Wait. No.  You can’t write that.  It comes across as trying to show how smart I am.  I definitely don’t want to sound like a douche. 

Time check.   Holy smokes I’ve been staring at this post for 20 minutes?  What is wrong with me?  Tap “Like” – move on.  Breathe.  

Do something!!!!!

Nothing.  I delete my paragraphs. Scroll down.  The post is soon lost in the depths of my feed. 

I think we all have someone like this in our lives.  Well, maybe not all of us do.  Maybe the rest of the world is perfectly secure in who they are and never craves or has a need for any sort of outside approval.  Maybe I just don’t want to be alone in my insecurities, but however together the rest of the world may or may not be, I do have someone like this in my life.  Someone who I admire and respect and who I really, really, really, really, really want to like me. 

This isn’t admiration from afar.  I cross paths with the person on a fairly regular basis.  We are friendly when we meet (though my tongue usually refuses to cooperate beyond, “Hello.”) and I manage to not jump up and down frantically screaming, “Notice ME!  Look, look I’m over here!  I think you are really awesome and I do awesome stuff too and can we please be friends?”  Instead, I agonize for twenty minutes over Facebook comments.

I know some of you will try to tell me I’m a great person and that I don’t need anyone else’s approval to be happy, and you are right; I don’t need it.  Logically I know this.  I know that if I just keep working on this self-love thing, that I’ll one day I won’t need anyone’s approval.  That I’ll be a super hero of self-esteem.  But today, today I’m terribly human.