A Penny for your Thoughts: Opinion Not Required
I’m rolling my eyes here, I hope you do, too.
Every morning at six a.m. sharp my alarm goes off. More often than not, I hit the button on my phone to snooze it and snuggle back into the warmth of my comforter. Today I did just that.
Then I listen as the notifications, denied during the night thanks to the Do Not Disturb feature, begin to roll in. I ignore them.
My alarm goes off again at 6:05. Sometimes I get up, other times I hit snooze. It depends on how I’m feeling, how I slept, and if my brain has clicked on or not. This morning, I hit the snooze button again. Peanut hopped up onto the bed and mrrowd at me. I pulled him over and forced snuggling and love upon him. He purred and pulled away when he had enough.
Then my alarm went off again so I sighed and got up. I recently moved my bedroom around and I’m still getting used to it. I grab the phone, make the bed, and head across the hall to the bathroom.
After putting my eyeballs contacts in and so forth, I go looking for clothes. While doing this, I slide down to see what notifications are worth looking at. I tend to ignore most email (newsletters) and look at social media.
Twitter, as I always state, is my primary outlet. I open notifications I want to retweet and then open my notifications tab on the app. Scrolling down I find that someone has decided my kissy-face in my profile picture is me making duck-face and compares me to something called a Greedo.
(After a Google, I realize this is a Star Wars character. While I’ve seen most of the movies I’m not someone who keeps details in their head for the saga. Kudos to those who do, my head is full of Supernatural.)
Now, this person didn’t state anything in the tweet, just tagged me with this image:
I laughed snorted with derision because this person doesn’t follow me, has never interacted with me (unless it was with a different account), and has no idea who I am. I also raised a daughter during the “duck-face era” of social media. Today, she makes the pucker Bret Michaels made famous. Me? I make a kissy face. I’m sure this is all nonsensical to you. This is me giving background and not the point of my post at all. All three “faces” look different to me, but I’m not a professional photographer, so I’m sure my thoughts don’t have merit. Right?
So let’s get to it.
The real reason behind this post is (drum roll): No one has a right to say anything about anyone else without being prompted. Ta-Da! This person somehow happened upon my profile pic and decided to tag me in the above meme to the left. I retweeted it, told them they were incorrect and that their opinion was not asked for and then told them to have a nice day. (I was actually polite, they did not reply. Pffbt.)
A few others replied to this person and subsequently, they blocked me and the others. Hey, if you don’t want people commenting to you that you’re an ass, perhaps don’t come onto someone else’s timeline and troll them?
The lesson I want to teach: my social media profiles are mine. I do my damnedest to cultivate them so that I see what I want to see. I want to see what’s important to me. I’m not going to go onto someone else’s social media because I’ve decided I’m some kind of expert in something and find a way to insult them.
There are real people behind profiles more often than not. I am a real person. I have confidence in who I am and therefore I have no need to seek out compliments of others about how I look. (Besides, I know what I look l on an off-day and… ugh.) Now writing? That’s a whole different arena. I, like other creatives, need that feedback. Did I do well? Do I need to change anything? Is it going to trigger someone? I should just quit writing, right? Luckily, I have an honest author-tribe to help me.
My emotional and mental well-being has a strong foundation built upon the crushed and mutilated emotions and issues created when I allowed the opinions of everyone else affect who I am, how I look, and oh gee, what I should think and feel. I’ve conquered most of my former insecurities. Otherwise, I’d probably be in another bad relationship with someone who treats me like shit, instead of living my life on my terms and pleasing myself while following my writer-dreams.
My advice (take it or leave it): See someone sharing a photo of themselves? Don’t have anything nice to say? Then keep your mouth shut and your fingers off the keyboard. They aren’t putting themselves out there for you. They did it for themselves. Don’t go seeking people on the internet to try and hurt them. Because I am sure Karma is watching.
