What makes me jealous, and it’s so completely irrational, is when I see others getting together. But these “others” aren’t necessarily my close friends and I’ve never been part of that particular group. It’s so ridiculous!
I do get jealous of other things, but I’m guilty of posting jealous enticing photos myself.
I’ve often thought of taking it down, but that’s how I communicate with friends, and do enjoy seeing what others are doing.
I used to use Facebook to communicate more with people, then as time evolved, I found that what I really use it for is more like a diary for myself… things I want to remember when I get older and can’t remember those things so easily… like what the dog did that was so funny, or the steep trail I managed six weeks after a serious hospitalization. Most of the time I’m looking at it is on my phone anyway, and I hate typing on my phone, so I just don’t post that often. It’s easier to ‘like’ something than reply back… speaking of which, can anyone here tell me why, when I look at Facebook on my iPhone, I see things that, when I look on my laptop they don’t show up, and visa versa?
When I first got on Facebook (probably against my kids’ wishes), I promised to keep posts about them to a minimum - they were in high school and it wasn’t cool then to have your parents constantly posting about you on Facebook. I NEVER friended any of their friends - any friends of theirs I have now, they requested me, and I just never moved away from that practice. My kids also thought it was really creepy to respond to/about people I’d never met or had a personal email or conversation with, so from very early on, I very rarely responded to posts about someone’s child if I’ve never met them or had any personal interaction with them. And on the few occasions when I post something about my kids, they don’t seem to care that someone they’ve never met is responding - they just prefer to manage their own social media and not have me intrude on it. And of their friends I am FB friends with, I really try to keep the posts to an absolute minimum. So with all these ‘rules’ I/we set up, I realized FB was more for my own record.
So I do post a good number of pictures when we’re traveling, and I’ve referred back to them many times when people ask me about the places we’ve gone to. Yes, we might spend more than the average person on travel (although I often tell my H we are no where NEAR what some people spend on travel), but there are plenty of other things we don’t do… like have a vacation home, spend a lot on food or alcohol, have a boat, or expensive hobbies etc. So we can splurge sometimes for travel and after many years of saving so we had enough for the kids’ colleges, it’s nice to be able to do that now. But I’m also not one of those people who has to approve of every picture I’m in before I ‘allow’ it to go on FB - I can look sweaty and dirty if I’m in the middle of a hike and not care what people think of me, because what’s important to me, is to be able to look back months and years later, and remember what that particular hike was like for me… and many times it was sweaty and dirty! That’s not to say if we’ve gotten a particularly good family picture, I won’t post it, but those are usually in conjunction with some sort of special event, and something I’d like to note on my timeline. So for all I know, there are plenty of people like me, who mostly post for themselves, and who am I to judge (or be jealous) what it is they choose?
I don’t participate on facebook, but follow a lot of fashion, decorating, lifestyle blogs. I enjoy reading about lives that seem organized and calm
One blog is written by a young woman who renovated a farmhouse with her husband, gardened extensively, and gave birth to healthy twins. In one post she shows her babies lying on a blanket in their beautiful, renovated parlor. Then she steps back and widens the angle of the photo, so you see all the toys, laundry, clutter and on-going construction not in the shot. That was my favorite post on any blog ever!
I’ve never been jealous about anything I’ve read on CC. And I’ve spent more time rolling my eyes than feeling jealous on Facebook.
Facebook has been a series of life lessons to me. I am much, much (excruciatingly) more aware of the wide range of points of view of my far flung friends than I was years ago. This is both a good thing and a source of some sadness on my part. There are a lot of people who I liked a lot more before I learned what they felt in their deepest hearts. There is ugliness out there.
I learned an excellent lesson from a friend after I posted something semi political (I didn’t think it was, but apparently it was) many years ago. I just assumed that whatever it was wasn’t even an arguable point. This friend posted a scathing comment under it, which I took more personally than I should have. I commented something like: “Why do you need to comment so negatively about this? Just scroll on past if you don’t agree.”
His response was: “Don’t post things if you don’t want a response. My assumption is that any post is an invitation to a discussion.”
So I personally try to keep controversy and politics off of my own wall. I have cleaned house through the years. My friends on Facebook are only people I know. There were a few very distant relatives of my husband and friends of friends who I unfriended, and more recently I have unfollowed a few people who I need to… How shall I put it? Spend less time in their heads. I just need a break.
Never discuss politics and religion. What ever happened to that good advice?
@eastcoascrazy, that advice has been swirling in my head for months. Perhaps it’s time to go back to it, especially online, where people seem more free to try to hammer their opinions into others’ heads and react angrily and with superiority (all of which just turns me off, personally)! I’ve always thought that the saying was antiquated, and that discussion helps people of all stances if done correctly, but “doing it correctly” seems to be so rare–again, especially online–that I think it’d perhaps be nice to go back to that advice.
It’s why I also unfollowed (not unfriended–I’ll follow them again sometime) a bunch of people on FB.
To get back on topic, I’m obviously not jealous of the people I unfollowed–just annoyed and overwhelmed.
I unfriended someone for the first time. It was someone who went to my high school–wasn’t a close friend of mine, but I recognized the name. Last year–around reunion time–the reunion organizers started getting people from our class to friend one another, and this guy friended me.
I know I did not talk to him at the reunion (last year) which means we haven’t spoken in 46 years!! Anyway, he made really inappropriate remarks in response to a post I made about the Hamilton/Trump thing. I don’t usually post political stuff but I had strong views this election season and posted a few things. I have blocked people, but never unfriended them. Do people you unfriend know that you unfriended them?
@Bromfield2 - The are not notified, but eventually they may figure it out when they don’t see your posts anymore (or only see one when a mutual friend comments on it). Or if they happen to go to your timeline and discover they aren’t friends with you anymore.
By the way, there are 3 levels of “getting rid of someone”
1- Staying friends but limiting what you see or what they see:
-- Unfollow - You are still friends, but their posts don't appear on your feed (good for someone who you want to be friends with but maybe posts a little too often)
-- Categorizing a friend - If you use the different categories (for example "friend" vs "acquaintance") you can post to a certain category of friend and some people won't see your posts.
2 - Unfriending - just getting rid of them, but still being able to see some things…for example comments on a mutual friend’s post
3 - Blocking - cannot message, won’t see comments on mutual friend’s posts—really stopping any and all interaction
This has been my experience in recent months, too. I had a lot of old high school friends on my FB page as a result of helping to organize a reunion several years ago. People who I had not really kept in touch with through the years, and who, clearly, had changed a lot from their youthful days! So much ugliness and hate expressed, that I just couldn’t continue to expose myself to that on a daily basis. I went through and unfriended close to 30 of them, and I think my blood pressure dropped significantly. 
I never really feel jealous. I have such a blessed, wonderful life and we have more than we could ever have hoped for, both in material and non-material ways. Even this fall when I’ve been dealing with cancer and radiation treatments, I honestly have had no feelings of jealousy for those who haven’t had health issues. I think the reason for this is that I know two young people in their 30s who are dealing with cancer, chemo, radiation and it is disrupting their lives in ways that make my own experience seem like nothing.
It’s funny, I guess there was a recent instance when my H and I were a bit jealous. We read about an individual who won a huge lottery prize, and we both talked about how much fun it would have been to have all that money and what causes we would donate it to if we had won. We give a lot of $$ away every year, and always have, but to have $50+ million to spread around would have been the best Christmas present for us in a long time.
Jealous? Not at all. I usually find what my friends post to be amusing more than anything else, especially the attention-getting “vaguebook” updates. “Ok, I get what you are saying, but seriously???”
8-| 
@Onward, I have grandchild envy big time. Don’t have any and it’s highly unlikely I ever will. Dh and I keep our feelings to ourselves so as to not upset our kids.
@conmama, I tend to get jealous when I see posts about relatives getting together because we live so far away from ours. Also, I learned years ago that I’m not considered “family” by dh’s siblings. The only time I was ever included in a conversation about a get-together they were planning was when they wanted to have it at our new house. Dh told them it wasn’t possible due to ongoing remodeling, but the reality was he was upset that they only wanted to use me/our home for a free bed & breakfast (+ bar & dinners) for a large group.
I’ll admit that I do get a little grandchild envy, but this is because of my D’s particular medical traumas in the past year. I so wish things hadn’t gone so wrong. She’d be eight months pregnant now, instead of a very uncertain future in that regard. So the cute kids get to me, partially on my account, but mostly for her.
@silpat:
Your DH’s family sounds like mine to a T, which is why I haven’t had much to do with them in many years, not worth being used…
It is very easy to get jealous of other people, or see what they are doing, how happy they (supposedly are), and look at your own life and wish more things were happening. I wish I had the kind of family where it really was a family, people got together for the joy of it, where they treated the spouses of family members as family and so forth, I would have loved to shared my son’s recitals and such with them, shared their lives, been there for the triumphs (and tragedies), but it isn’t the way my family was or is…
Likewise, I could be jealous of people who go on vacations all the time (haven’t had a get away vacation in many years), I could wish I had the time and energy to buy an old car and restore it or build my dream train layout, but that isn’t my life. On the other hand, the hard work and long hours (and doing it with all the financial burden on myself, my DW does not work outside the home), also meant I could support my son’s dreams without him going into debt for conservatory, it means I don’t have a lot of debt other than my mortgage (that is somewhat large only because of things that needed to be done to the house, like when the Chimney needed a total rebuild along with the front steps or when I was out of work and there were things to pay for…), and if luck holds and this job lasts, I should be able to pay off the mortgage, build up enough retirement funds, to retire, or at least semi retire (might like to have a retirment job for the little things). There are sacrifices I made in my life, things I could regret (and I do, not perfect), things I did for love that probably weren’t the smartest decision I could have made but also enriched my life. I also am blessed we haven’t faced any major illnesses, our S is healthy (okay, he is a musician/music student, so slightly deranged lol),so yes there is a lot to be thankful for, even with the things I could wish I had.
The other thing is to keep in mind FB is kind of la la land, as others have said you don’t know the backstory. That person that jets off on those vacations, has the fancy car and clothing, etc, might be up to their eyeballs in debt, that is quite common. That person that brags about their kid who got into that top level program might not talk about issues they have had with that kid, the possible bad behavior, problems, etc. That woman who brags about her perfect life might have a cold as ice spouse, nasty kids and be living on anti depressants and scotch to get through the day…when I see people put that kind of stuff up, I’ll congratulate them on their good fortune and tell them to enjoy, but knowing I dont’ know the whole picture I find it very hard to be that jealous of them, because I don’t know the pain or other things they experience on a daily basis:). (Okay, I lied a little, I do get mad when I read about someone who is fit and in shape who eats junk food and doesn’t exercise, whereas I look at a potato chip I put on 10 pounds, I dream of them getting abducted by aliens a la the Twilight Zone episode “To Serve Man” and they get force fed like geese to make foi gras…)
Ok, Silpat and Musicprnt, we can be honorary siblings…
FB doesn’t make me jealous. I’m usually interested in what is going on in the lives of “Friends,” provided they don’t get too mundane. I think vacation pics are just fine, and it doesn’t bother me if someone’s vacation was grander or more exotic than mine. I went where I wanted to go - limited only by my energy and my budget. If someone else has more energy or a bigger wallet, well good for them. Maybe their pics will inspire me to put say riding a zip-line over the Costa Rican rain forest on my bucket list.
I do post a few pics of my own travels or experiences, but I always try to make it a little bit informative - adding explanatory text or historical context to the pictures. Sort of a mini-blog attempt to inform rather than an effort to show-off. I’m sure not everyone takes time to read my posts, but the same 10 or 20 Friends who do seem to appreciate them.
I like FB as a way to keep up with the doings of my friends and relatives - far-flung nieces and nephews that I seldom get to see for example. Things on FB that I really don’t get are pictures of people’s meals. I mean what is the point? What am I supposed to think or conclude about a photo of a lasagna someone baked or the dessert they ordered at a restaurant last night? Can anyone explain this pictures-of-food phenomenon to me?
The things I find boring are long or multiple posts and pics of some job around the house or other entirely mundane activity - say putting in a new backyard fence for example. I’m sure it will turn out to be a very fine fence, but I don’t need updates two or three times a day for two weeks on how the work is going.
The thing I really dislike on FB is being bombed by endless political memes, posts, and fake news - of either political persuasion. I can put up with the occasional political post from anyone, but the only Friends I’ve unfollowed were ones (again of either persuasion) who put up 5, 10, 20, or more political posts every day. Enough already! And tied into the political stuff is the disappointment of sometimes seeing what obsessed, angry, and apparently unpleasant people some of my old HS classmates turned into over the decades. They were nothing like that back in the day. That’s what I find most dispiriting about FB.
But overall I view it as a net positive. I don’t get jealous and the positives outweigh the negatives.
@Bromfield2 - people may know if you’ve unfriended them. I run something called FB purity (fluff busting purity) and it takes all the ads off my newsfeed. It does other things and one thing is send me notifications if anyone unfriends me. It happened with a restaurant that had changed its status (from having friends to being “liked”) and from a cousin whose account had been compromised and she had two accounts for a while. It doesn’t work on the phone app.
Scipio, you bring up a point that is a little sad, regarding posting photos and explaining the historic context or situation. Wonderful that you take the time to do this! The online experience over the years seems to be increasingly visual rather than verbal. I miss the verbal, the nuanced information and details that were more part of live journal and email back in the day. Fortunately, CC seems to provide plenty of nuanced this and that to keep me happy.
Regarding FB photos of meals, in my experience it is an Asian thing, as well as perhaps more generationally based. My Asian family and friends post a lot of food photos. My kids do occasionally, especially when overseas. Sometimes it is about novelty, sometimes about aesthetics or a bit of a brag.
The political posts are endless these days, as that is the season. I block those of a particularly nasty persuasion, however it is instructive to read them on occasion, just to put an individual face on those who align themselves in that manner. They are not people I know in person, more friends from elementary school. Even by HS I’d found my tribe!
Every once in a while someone does not seem to get how FB is best used. A close relative used FB to argue fine points of posted details endlessly. He finally left FB, to my relief.
I can see why people post pictures of food, since it is something that has aesthetic value and can require creative efforts to make, but is completely ethereal. Besides, people are interested in food, so it seems like a perfectly reasonable thing to post. As I mentioned, I’m not on Facebook so maybe I’d get sick of seeing the pictures after a while but it makes sense to me.
I don’t like food posts either…or rather a plate of someone’s dinner. The food might be gorgeously presented IRL, but unless it’s a work of art of some kind ( shaped like an animal or object), it doesn’t come across as interesting at all…just a plate of food.
It is not an Asian thing to post food. I have quite a few Asian friends and they do not post food (I think they are too busy eating). It is a foodie thing. I have a Jewish friend (a CC’er) who is living in France now, she posts the most delicious food on FB. I feel like I am getting fat just looking at her pictures. I am also a bit of a foodie, so if I am eating something interesting or if the food is presented in an especially nice way then I would also post on FB.
FB is about shraing, and it is mostly visual. I feel like I am sharing a friend album when I look at FB.
You have to let this stuff go. You never fully know ones situation and finances. The end game is determined by life’s prior choices. Seeing vacation posts by DINK’s traveling the world is possible for them because they had no kids and did not spend $200K per child sending them to college. The choice to have kids was made by us all. No reason to regret it. The joy they brought us is worth the sacrifice and living with less money once we retire.