Nobody has it all together!

Hi lovely people, happy first of December!! A month full of festive joy and hot drinks coming up. Love it or hate it. I had a bit of an awakening moment last week concerning online versus real life comparisons.

I often need to guard myself these darker months, especially when I am not feeling well, that I don’t slip into a negative mind set. I often have the tendency to compare myself to other’s online perfect life and career success and this is not helping my mood in anyway. Of course, everybody’s online life is so much better than the real one.

I had a bit of an awakening moment last week concerning online versus real life comparisons. I made a lovely trip to London last week, as one of my good coaching friends celebrated her birthday there. It was amazing as so many people travelled from all nooks and crannies of the country to see her. We were a very large group of mainly coaches, hanging out in a very beautiful fancy hotel lobby on a top location sharing life and work experiences.

It was very special as most of these people I never met in real life. We shared plenty of online presence and video calls and talked over Zoom, but never seen or met up for real. It was very special indeed.

Zoom has many positives, but as an intuitive coach I feel for me it is more powerful meeting people in real life. One of the most shocking realisation was for me that most of us don’t have it all together at all! We often look at other people’s profiles online and think they have it all together. We are all guilty of presenting the perfect life online. We share smiling family snaps, amazing dinners, loving husbands, and a top career where we are appreciated and wanted. We present to the world how we want others to see us. It’s an alternative reality online. We create an avatar version of ourselves with filters and fake smiles.  

We can get carried away by social comparison and looking at others perfect lives online. Zoom calls are carefully constructed. Best lighting for even skin tone, extra filters for even better skin, clean and tidy back grounds, more filters if needed, nobody wants to see your dirty laundry in the background. Lovely top on, smile, Tada, done. Perfect life. But it is not the representation of the truth and I want you to remember this when you are feeling low, and you make the mistake to think others have it all together. But they don’t.

I find it very difficult to feel people’s energy over a video call. When I am in the room with someone however, I immediately get a vibe if something is wrong or not. This is what I realised at the party. These were real people with real thoughts, feelings, and insecurities. It was huge realisation, that really, we are all pretending in a way, and nobody has it all together, no matter how perfect their life is presented online.

This is the power of making real connections, seeing real people.

This December months is a big month full of extra meetings, dinners, Christmas socials. Shake hands, hug people, talk to strangers and don’t ever be afraid o show others your vulnerability. Mental health in the winter is important and we are in this together.

Online has it benefits, but its not the full picture. Remember this when you scroll through a friend’s perfect life online. We are human, none of us has it all together all the time. And that is ok. The imperfections and life battles make us grow and exciting.

Love, Tineke