I keep thinking about the different identities we all have. How we act around friends, family and who we are on social media can be drastically different – hopefully, none of which is a murderous persona, but I digress.

We are all learning how to act online. Sharing a post on Facebook or Instagram used to be for friends and family but nothing on the internet is private. Yet, we have this intense desire to share our most intimate moments and thoughts even if it is with the whole world. We are judged by what we post and strangers seem to think they know you, even if it is only a fraction of who you are. Employers can snoop on your social medias and run background checks for all your mistakes and terrible jokes. Social media can feel like a circus cage in which we are expected to perform in but one wrong move and you could be *gasp* cancelled.

Though we feel the desire to share our intimate moments, there is a part of us that understands the repercussions that oversharing can cause. It makes us feel trapped. Silenced. Should I share this? Is this too political? Is it too raunchy? Will my current or future employer see this? Where can we find a space to freely connect and allow our angry, sad and vulnerable states to express themselves without judgement and consequences? Probably a therapist’s office but that is not the intimate connections we desire.

I remember reading a theory about how we should hide our personal life from our work life and that revealing one to the other could cause chaos to ensue. That couldn’t be more different today. How can you make a joke on Facebook that your closest friends would find funny but not your coworkers? We are stuck in between not sharing enough and sharing too much. That is why the rise of anonymous Instagram and Twitter accounts are so prevalent today. These accounts are created to share our thoughts and moments without the anxiety of it being attached to our online reputation.

We all feel this social media anxiety. I do not have the solution to what we should do but I wanted to discuss this social media anxiety we all feel. Sometimes all we want is to feel like we are not alone in what we are feeling.

It is an ironic desire to want intimate online connections but nothing shared online is intimate.