What's the Truth Behind a Beautiful Image or Perfect Story?

Years ago, a friend and I were talking about how often we had to tell our young children “no.” Not only to protect them from hurting themselves—“no, you can’t climb on that bookshelf because it’s not attached to the wall and could fall over on you”—but also to manage what they ate—“no, you can’t have sugared cereal for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.” But she had an interesting take on the question of buying things advertised to young children on the backs of cereal boxes, the Saturday cartoons, and in the grocery store.

“Once in a while,” she told me, “I’ll let them talk me into buying something inexpensive that I know will fall apart the first time they play with it. I think it’s important that they have the actual experience of how badly made these things are. I want them to learn not to believe everything they see and read."

She said, "It’s important for them to learn to take advertising with a grain of salt.”

I sometimes think the world would be a much better place if we all applied that lesson we learned as children to our grown-up lives today.

Posts on social media only tell a tiny part of any story

For instance, in the interviews I conducted while researching women’s friendships, many women told me that they felt inadequate or embarrassed about themselves when they looked at friends’ posts on social media. When I delved into what troubled them, it became clear that they constructed stories about their friends based on those pictures. A gorgeous shot of a beach vacation, the friend posed in her bikini with a big smile on her face, meant that she was having a wonderful time, felt great about her body, and had met or was going to meet that special someone on this trip!

Similarly, a post of a couple smiling at the camera could mean they were happily enjoying their life together, without a problem in the world.

Source: PeopleImages/iStock

“I know that can’t be true,” one woman told me. “I’m sure that there are times when they’re hurting or unhappy. In fact, I know that one friend who posts great photos of her hot body hates herself when she gains a few pounds. She’s always dieting, always sure she looks awful. The truth is that she’s miserably insecure. But I forget that when I see her looking so gorgeous and happy.”

Another woman told me that a friend had recently posted a picture of herself soulfully smiling into her husband’s adoring eyes. “But she’s involved in a mad love affair with someone else, that her husband doesn’t know about. He would be devastated if he found out.” Even so, she told me, when she saw the post, she felt envious of what looked like love, even though she knew the happiness was fake.

A grain of salt, or a touch of healthy skepticism, can give you a more realistic picture

It would have been helpful for this woman to remember to take these images with a grain of salt. In other words, it’s good for your mental health to be skeptical about what you see on Facebook, Instagram, or any other social media platform.

While it's important to appreciate good things, it's also important to learn "reality testing."

One problem with believing that what you see is the whole picture, whether it’s a Facebook image or an advertisement on your computer, is that you start to see things from an “either/or” perspective. For example, you might think that either you’ll be happily married with a wonderful family, or you’ll be lonely and sad for the rest of your life. Or you might believe that if you could only lose 10 pounds, all your problems would be gone. In psychotherapy, we call this idea that things can be only one way or another “binary thinking.” The reality is that life is complex. No job is perfect, no relationship is going to solve all your problems, and losing weight is not going to make everything in your life go well. Recognizing that even the most appealing story or scenario likely includes some of the complexities and difficulties of life can make it much easier to enjoy what you have.

A while ago, I wrote about the phenomenon of FOMO, or fear of missing out, in college students. I talked about the importance of using your “inner wisdom” to rethink your ideas about what you’re seeing. My friend who let her children buy toys she knew were going to be junk was trying to help them develop that inner wisdom. Therapists call this wisdom "reality testing," or the ability to be realistic about emotions and experiences.

Life can be complicated and relationships can be complex

Most of us have learned this lesson from personal experience with our own parents, siblings, and friends. We know that getting married doesn’t lead to lifelong happiness. Yet, when many of us see a couple that appears happy, we automatically think, “That’s what I want. Then I’ll be happy forever.” Reality testing would help explain that it isn't possible to be happy forever, but that we can all have times of great happiness and joy.

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I have found in my work that people who recognize that nothing is pure are often more content than those who believe that a perfect picture is a true reflection of life.

Beneath the surface of a beautiful woman or handsome man, under the image of an adoring couple, and in even the most loving, happy family, difficulties also exist. Because, in truth, life is difficult. But if you work at appreciating the good within the bad and recognizing the bad within the good, you have a much better chance of finding a life of contentment than you would if you keep searching for the perfect, unblemished, always happy—and ultimately nonexistent—life.