Digital Campfire – Self-love and responsibility in the 21st century

Humanity has drastically evolved over the thousands of years of its existence. Long gone are the times of cavemen huddling together around a campfire. Or the times during which survival depended on prehistoric communities, for a single person did not stand a chance against the dangers of a prehistoric world.
The development of language closed a significant loophole and changed the lives of our ancestors forever. Learning curves became collaborative challenges, significantly minimizing an individual's risk of dying. Furthermore, survival was no longer just a communal but a generational effort turning the world and its parts into recognizable patterns. Responsibility was of utmost importance for these processes. But what exactly is responsibility?

Responsibility is the ability to evaluate the consequences of one's behavior and adjust it based on such analysis that the outcome has the highest possibility of being positive. Our ancestors, for example, could not afford to eat all their food without planning ahead. What if a drought were imminent? In the same way, they could not simply leave their cave's protection and wander into the forest. What would have happened if a single individual, probably without any weapon or skill, encountered a sabertooth tiger in the middle of a forest? Therefore, responsibility means thinking about one's actions. In our examples, responsible behavior would be rationing the available food or having a whole group scout the forest and its surroundings.

Nowadays, however, the answer to what responsibility is no longer seems as clear. The world is a different one. We live faster, more efficiently, and more connected. Famine and other dangers no longer pose a threat in industrialized parts of the world. The concept of "community" took on a new meaning as well. So how do I take responsibility, and for what exactly? To answer this question, we need to evaluate the world's situation and understand that the biggest threat to modern humans is negative self-esteem.

Digital Campfires

In the globalized world of the 21st century, we seem to have seen it all and know it all. Protection from natural dangers and a sense of community are part of society's basic security. The meaning of said community has changed, however. Smartphones and social media make physical contact almost obsolete as the satisfaction of our social needs now only requires us to push a few buttons. In addition, our history of knowledge is no longer a tool necessary for survival. There is no danger we cannot eliminate with the help of the internet because search engines transform our lives into digital maps of researchable facts.

We have left the existential needs of our ancestors behind and cater to other wants now. In 1943, Abraham Maslow, a renowned psychologist, structured those needs into a hierarchy of needs. At the top of this hierarchy, he put humanity's drive for self-realization with the bottom consisting of physiological necessities such as hunger or sleep.
Large parts of humanity have arrived at the top of the pyramid and experience self-realization as the defining mantra of their time. It describes the exhaustion of all available materials and opportunities to realize one's wishes and goals with maximized content.
Only seldom, however, are the things I want and what others expect of me the same. Our individuality is often in contrast to our community and requires us to adapt to specific ground rules.

Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok are new, modern forms of community that make any form of communal compromise obsolete. Our social existence is no longer bound to one place as millions of people from around the world come together at digital campfires. But staring through the pixelated smoke can make it hard to recognize the others around us. Strict anonymity governs the unlimited connections between digital worlds. The question "Who am I?" is no longer limited to our body, but is defined by our avatars and profile pics. The degree of individuation is almost infinite, as they are neither static nor necessarily a direct representation of ourselves. We manipulate and filter our digital appearance until the much-hated tooth gap or love handles are gone. Such manipulation is not limited to our body, however. As we remove, expand and distort parts of our lives as we please, it is no surprise that the internet is a mecca of success stories.

Every corner seems filled with people who made it and acquired wealth, success, and this mystery called happiness. We buy into their fantasies and apply the same standards of maximum success and immaculate beauty to our own lives. We risk a rude awakening, though, once we realize just how far we seem to be away from achieving the colorful dreams we saw on social media. But what do we expect when the world of successful entrepreneurs, top models, and high-profile artists becomes the standard in the small living rooms of our society? The slightest setback now seems to point to an existential failure, causing our tolerance for frustration to be almost inexistent. The invisible effort, referring to the hours and days of work it takes to curate digital content, is no secret. But all we as the consumer see is expensive luxury or the perfect body, seemingly acquired overnight. It makes us push ourselves to peak performance within an already stressful environment, ignoring our physical and mental health. All I need to do is work hard enough to be guaranteed instant success.

Day in and day out, such thought patterns threaten our self-worth and happiness. So we reside in the digital dreamworlds of other people. The simplicity with which we can externalize failure makes it easier to hand over responsibility. In addition, it supplies us with an adequate justification for why something did not go as planned. Everyone else seems to win because their living conditions are just right. Mine aren't, which is why I fail. With such an approach, our lives will continue to ripple along. We won't die from it, but our existence remains between unfulfilled dreams and constant disappointment. No change will occur because we are not taking responsibility for ourselves. But how does one take responsibility and gain control over one's life?

How to take responsibility?

To understand responsibility, we should look at what happens if it is missing. In that case, negative thought patterns, the incapability to make decisions, stagnation, or victim mentality drastically decrease our happiness. The integration of positive thoughts and behavior, on the other hand, can help us maneuver out of this dead-end and regain life quality.

(1) Self-love: Self-love is the basis for a happy life, yet we constantly put it at risk by comparing ourselves on social media. We use the success of others to put us down and feel less deserving of a happy life. Instead of working on our dreams, we lose ourselves in digital distractions that remind us of the dissatisfaction with our own life.
Luckily, many small and simple activities can improve our self-worth step by step and help us develop long-term confidence. Self-love means taking time for yourself, so when we journal, meditate or take a hot bath, we allow ourselves to think about who we are and what we want to do. Positive affirmations, walking, or exercise further push out any negative thoughts and motivate us to tackle life's challenges. Only those that love themselves and worship who they are will allow themselves to follow their dreams.

(2) Self-sabotage: Most of us constantly expect to be letting ourselves down and often formulate such dislike in negative affirmations. The probability of sabotaging ourselves instead of cultivating self-love and compassion is very high. Not living up to our expectations is painful. So instead of acknowledging our own mistakes and reflecting on why our paper got a bad grade, we assign fault to external circumstances. "The task was too vague and used a lot of wishy-washy wording." As soon as we accept our flaws and stop making excuses, we will be able to change our attitude and the results we achieve.

(3) Self-reflection: Self-reflection is not just an abstract concept thrown around by psychologists but describes consciously perceiving our feelings, thoughts, and actions. It is an often-overlooked tool to take action against the constant self-sabotage we practice during our hectic daily routines. By asking ourselves questions and writing down the answers, we can look at our feelings and get in contact with ourselves. You might be surprised by the thoughts and feelings that rise to the surface. Many of us approach life feeling overwhelmed by simply existing, a source for many pessimistic thought patterns. Such emotions lose complexity if we use painting, writing, or other forms of creative expression to visualize what is going on within and around us. I might recognize that it is not my obligations that keep me from applying for that new job, but the fear of it going wrong or being successful. There is no limit to what questions and how many we ask ourselves. A simple "How are you" or "How was your day" is often enough to inspire a fruitful monologue. You will be surprised at the emotions such a simple question can trigger.

(4) Self-image: If we integrate self-reflection as a regular ritual into our lives, we will be able to cultivate a healthy self-image. The closer we listen to ourselves, the better we can recognize who we are. We learn to appreciate our good and seemingly bad sides, just like we understand what makes us feel good and what doesn't. Understanding oneself allows us to differentiate habit from necessity and outside influence from our wishes. Once we achieve such clarity, we can take responsibility for ourselves and our actions. We know who we are and what we are capable of, a healthy basis to make informed decisions about what we want to do in life and how we will achieve it. The magnetic pull of social media loses a lot of its power. The lives of unfamiliar internet personalities lose their magic when you recognize how much your desires differ from what is presented to you online. Once the glamor of modern world distractions tarnishes, we see how much time we have for ourselves and our dreams.

Humanity has changed drastically since the stone age. Basic needs like hunger, sleep, security, and community are a given in many societies, and self-realization has become the new mantra of modernity. Yet the one thing that has never changed is the necessity to take responsibility. Indeed, death is no longer a consequence of its absence. In its place, however, is the misery of unfulfilled potential. It lurks around like secret dreams that suffocate in dusty cupboards. It is on us to find the keys and open them up. For sure not an easy undertaking with the leviathan of modern-day distractions and inferiority feelings stalking behind every corner, ready to take us down. Despite the utopia of digital communities, we are more isolated than ever before. Even though we share experiences and moments, it is an individual's responsibility to integrate them into their lives in a way that makes sense. Not an easy task, with powerful technology assisting us just as much as it tries to hijack us into its loud and colorful worlds of entertainment. It seems as though the responsibility of the 21st-century is getting to know ourselves. Learn to differentiate white noise from music, acknowledge our fears, and cultivate self-love. Self-love is our private campfire lighting up the night and igniting the torches with which we explore it.