As a ‘90’s kid’ I went through a lot of changes. When I was younger I didn’t grow up to have internet until I was 14 years old, I didn’t have my laptop until I was 18 years old and started university. I saw the Fresh Prince of Bel Air and Rocket Power. And when that wasn’t on television, I went outside to play with my neighbours and build camps. I didn’t have a phone until I was 13 years old (which is early enough in my opinion) and it was a black and white one that had one game on it: Tetris. How happy I was that I had my own cell phone, even though it was my sister’s old one. 

Before I went to university, I didn’t feel a lot of pressure from social media and society, at least not as much as I do now. In the past 20 years so much has changed and so much has been invented. At this point in my life I kind of lost track of it all. I feel like everything is going way to fast and I’m not following at the right tempo at all.

When I was 16, Facebook became popular. I just used it as a communication canal rather then being influenced by certain messages. Nowadays we have Instagram, Tumblr, Pinterest, Twitter, … If you are my age, it’s expected to have these kind of social media accounts, at least a few of them. And what if you don’t? Then you are sometimes considered as being ‘out of this world’.

Even though I'm pro social media, since it can spread messages to a big group very quickly, I feel like the last two years it has developed way too fast.

When I scroll through my Instagram and see pictures of bloggers and models with fabulous outfits, perfect hair, perfect make-up of looking perfectly 'natural', it is easy to think that those people are flawless- at that you are not. It is hard to be as ‘perfect’ as they are, but it is even harder stand up against it and act as if you don’t care.

I can put all of those things in perspective; at least I try to do so. But I wonder what it must be for people who grew up with Facebook and Instagram and who had a smartphone almost right after jumping out of their mummy’s womb. What if they only get to see all those perfect boys and girls that seem to have everything we can only dream of?

Would that even make us happy? It’s OK to have flaws, right?

Even though I do get insecure sometimes when I look at all those ‘picture perfect people’, I am happy with how I look and even more happy about who I am. Why? Because Photoshop doesn’t exist in the real world, it’s just a virtual thing. I still prefer real life above virtual (sometimes fake) life; I’d rather miss the perfect picture than miss the perfect moment.

Imperfections make us unique -and unique is what we should go for!