Everyone gets anxious from time to time—when speaking in public, for instance, or when going through financial difficulty. For some people, however, anxiety becomes so frequent, or so forceful, that it begins to take over their lives. How can we tell if our everyday anxiety has crossed the line into a disorder? It’s not easy. In “general anxiety disorder” the worrying becomes excessive, intrusive, persistent and debilitating. It not only significantly disrupts our job, activities, or social life but becomes uncontrollable, extremely upsetting and stressful. We worry about all sorts of things, and tend to expect the worst worrying everyday for months on end.
In recent years doctors have become aware of what is called the “social media anxiety disorder”. It can happen to the best of us. We send an email at night when we’re tired or angry and realize it went to the wrong person or there was an obvious typo. We post the wrong photo on Facebook or Twitter and realize it when we wake up the next day after it’s already been shared 50 times. We become digitally devastated. We stare at our inbox after sending an important email and wonder why the person hasn’t responded in two hours. While the need to connect and engage is so powerful and instant, we often have expectations that the recipient has immediately seen our digital correspondence. When there’s no retort we assume they’re either ignoring us or are mad at us. More often than not, we are not prepared to accept that people are just busy and can’t always get back to us in a digital minute.
What should we do if we can relate to any of the above issues? Cristina Ferare and Mark Steines in a booklet entitled, “The Rules of Netiquette” come up with helpful tips: “Remember that no text is worth dying for, so we mustn’t Tweet and drive. If something is important, let’s pull over to the side of the road where we know we can respond safely. Let’s take a deep breath when we’re feeling anxious, turn off our computer, and take a walk without the smart phone. Sometimes a breath of fresh air will put everything in perspective and, what is more, the shelf life of our latest post may have already expired. At the end of the digital day, we must understand that we live in a busy world that operates 24/7. All we need is to relax with a warm bath and go to sleep. We would feel better the next morning. If we still feel anxious we can always pick up the phone to connect.
The social media has also generated a new breed of people called “smoasters” or “social media boasters.” J. P Vaswani in his book. “Ego Goes: Divinity Grows” writes, “Popular social media sites nowadays make even normal people boast, brag and show-off with their “status updates”. And it seems so easy because we are not really boasting to anyone’s face. It’s all so anonymous to click a picture of ourselves in front of the Vatican, Statue of Liberty or Eiffel Tower and to brag, “Enjoying myself at this great place!”
A recent survey carried out in Britain confirms that many people click themselves at famous landmarks or upload smug shots of themselves at fancy restaurants – to show off to their friends. All they want is to boast about themselves. They admit it is fine to do so because everyone else does it. “Why do people boast? Boasting is a part of human nature, which for some of us can turn ugly, if not kept under control. You need not suppress totally your instinctive expression, but it is prudent to learn to respect others and curb excessive self-promotion. Boasting comes from a basic insecurity, a low self-esteem that makes us “blow our own trumpets”. In need of validation boasting becomes our way of ensuring our worth and value in our social circle. Little do we realise that it might have the opposite effect by making people dismiss us as boastful braggarts.”
It goes without saying, we all need to share the good things we have done; we obviously need recognition, love and appreciation. But we must do it with a modicum of restraint; over enthusiasm to boast before all and sundry must be curbed. This business of selfies on the Facebook has already turned into an addiction for some. The American Psychiatric Association opines that if you’ve taken up to three selfies in a day it can be indicative of a mental disorder.
To conclude, here is the story of Danny Bowman, a 19-year-old British teen who exemplifies the worst case scenario of a selfie addiction – living proof that a new vice may currently be emerging. How far did he take his obsession? Snapping over 200 photos a day, he didn’t leave his house for six months, during which time he lost 30 pounds and dropped out of school. Growing increasingly frustrated with his inability to capture the perfect selfie, he eventually tried to commit suicide. Fortunately, much like his failed attempts for a picture perfect image, his bid to end his life came a cropper.
(Dr. Francisco Colaço is a seniormost consulting physician, pioneer of Echocardiography in Goa.)
