IMPACT? VALUED OR FABRICATED VALUE

DISCOVERIES

IMPACT ON YOU (Collage2021-08-05 09_37_08.jpg MKKhalsa)

Since I have been engaged in this course on social media, the body of knowledge that I gave acquired has grown exponentially. Wow!

Most people of my generation, no I am not a Millennial, but one of those middle range (age wise) Baby Boomers (oh please do not cringe and hold it against me) think that social media is bad news and has taken over the younger generations’ minds. Well, that can happen but it is not necessarily age related. Social media is here to stay and my thoughts were why not learn more about what this creature is.

I have discovered that its use can be simple on the surface, but when you ‘unpack’ it there really is a whole new world exposed. In my past blogs, I discussed WORDS MATTER (check it out here) and look at why this is so by demonstrating misunderstanding and misinterpretations, then in WATCH YOUR WORDS I went a little deeper into how we can clearly and efficiently communicate.

AUTOBAHN?

This blog takes us from the consciousness and awareness of our words, to our ‘real presence’ on social media. In other words, what is your impact and why this is important to know. Obviously, if you have been using social media or even read about it, you know that it is not just a one-way street culminating onto a cul-de-sac (dead end).

It is not only an amazing two-way tool for sharing, but it is the ‘Autobahnen’ (read super highways) of communication. So, if you do not know where you are going, why and with whom, you may end up disappointed or disillusioned.

The impact of social media has touched every sphere of society: politics, work, commerce, education, personal, globalization and every type of relationships. Read this interesting article on Understanding the Impacts of Social Media (Pros and Cons) from April 2021 Digital Marketing.

WHAT YOU SEE IS IT REALLY WHAT YOU GET?

Discussion #3 Ways and Means Sherlock! talks about the ‘external aspects of your presence’ on social media through monitoring strategies to understand the impact of our posts or tweets. Today’s blog is an ‘internal’ journey about our presence on social media. There are so many reasons that we open ourselves up on social media and ‘for’ social media. Of course, it is about communicating with friends, relatives, special interest groups, and promoting our wares.

According to Forbes in 7 ways to value yourself beyond social mediaby Glenn LLopis (2013), states that people approach the use of social media in two ways – ‘real’ or ‘packaged’.  The real is genuine – what you see is what you get – there is no fabrication. The packaged version supports the need to be seen as someone different than what one is in reality. The impact is built on a perception of how one would like to be seen and ‘valued’ – you can say a ‘fake persona’ or ‘gift-wrapped persona’. 

We have learned that this kind of approach can be deleterious to reputation, trust, and overall persuasion factor related to one’s personal brand. So even if your apparent ‘leadership’ seems great, based on the measurements of conversations and other metrics, it will not have a sustainable social media life, if even just one person catches on to your ruse.

This comes down to how much do you value yourself? It is true that you can get caught in the moment, in the glory of having received a great number of likes, and comments, but this emotional decision to post in that time and space does it really tell your readers how authentic you are? That you are trust worthy in what you present through your expertise?

SELF-WORTH

Being true to your real nature is the best impact you can have. Knowing yourself with all the strengths and weaknesses make you genuine in how you communicate on social media and in life, for whatever the motivation and how you are received and remembered.  It becomes, to a certain extent, your legacy – even if short term on the platform – the imprint of you stays in the memory of the viewers, and that maybe for a long time.

LLopis (2013, 7 ways to value yourself beyond social media) explains that:

“People use perception as their reality even when it represents no real value at all. The perceptual power of social media has allowed people o position themselves as experts – while in many cases the real experts have yet to be discovered or have decided to share their content and leadership with others in private communities with no social media presence at all.”

When we come across true, we are saying to the readers that you value yourself for being who you are and not because they ‘like’ you. They may like your content, but ‘you’ well maybe not.

If I value myself, I will value you. MK Khalsa

7 WAYS TO VALUE YOURSELF (adapted from 7 ways to value yourself beyond social media)

1- SELF-WORTH – Social media is a great thing for communicating ideas and sharing content, but it is not what gives you the capacity to value yourself, or give you your true power of confidence in yourself or self-esteem. You need to find that elsewhere than on social media.

2-YOU ARE UNIQUE – Today you are you, that is truer than true. There is no one alive who is Youer than You – Dr. Seuss.  Simply put, this quote is well expressed in this House Kraft blog:

When you change who you are to impress others, you’re still being yourself – you are just being the you that is scared of what others think. When you sacrifice your values to fit in, it’s still you – it’s just the you you probably don’t want to be.

Don’t compare yourself to others, this minimizes you being you, in your own way at your own time. Be comfortable with yourself. Remember that you are a precious manifestation of the laws of nature. You deserve to be where you are.

3- YOU ARE VALUABLE – BELIEVE IT: Take a step back. Look at your talents, the courage you mustered up to face the challenges in your life. You got this!

4- HONESTY IS THE BEST POLICY – BUT SOMETIMES IT HURTS: Take another step back and assess how your regard and respect yourself through different eyes, with patience, with compassion, with appreciation and gratitude.  You have come so far!

5-PERSONAL BRAND – TAKE THE TIME TO GET ACQUAINTED WITH YOU: Ask yourself: what are my values? What uplifts me? What are the 5 things that really bring deep joy in my life? When do I know that my heart is open? Sit quietly anywhere you feel at ease and away from distractions and answer these questions. Manage it and stand by it authentically with the greatest regard for you.

6-TELL ME WHO YOUR FRIENDS ARE AND I WILL TELL YOU WHO YOU ARE[1]: This quote has been attributed to many people, from Miguel de Cervantes (16^th century Spanish writer) to Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (18^th century German poet), it suggests that like-minded people connect because the people in their environment help to shape them. Use your intuition or your gut instinct, investigate, explore the people you associate with and explore if they are the best fit to encourage and support you toward your goals.

7-TRUST YOURSELF – BALANCE YOUR HEART OVER YOUR HEAD: Trust your inner authority. Do not let your mind manipulate you and take you into a doubtful state, stay in your heart. When you can create this balance, you will tap into the opportunities around you to live creatively to your own potential.

I will add a few more to this list:

8- PERSONAL PHILOSOPHY: Take time to gain clarity of what you are striving for in your life before you reveal yourself. Remind yourself that adopting a manner of being like enjoying clean living, reducing distraction to gain clarity which helps you live well and not in expectations and fear will bring you so much more than the shadow version of you.

9- EMPOWERED TO CREATE CHANGE:  You have a story. Everyone has a story that they think defines them. But maybe that story does not serve you any more. It does not really say who you are in your uniqueness. You have the power to change that story, so the suffering perhaps that was covered by that story can become a strength. You can do it! Try this on for size – no change can occur if there is not movement – movement of the body, movement of the breath, movement of the thought. What are you waiting for? Move!

10- CREATE SPACE: Creating space means that you give yourself time away from the job at hand at the appropriate time. Not because you are running away from the busy-ness of life, but you value your relationship with you. To achieve success and honour You as You: exercise, rest, eat, sleep, play and laugh well.  The following quote means that if you can calm your mind, make yourself empty, you create that space to live and to intuit the ways for effortless living and true success.

The Tao is empty but inexhaustible, bottomless, the ancestor of it all.

Within in, the sharp edges become smooth;

The twisted knots loosen;

The sun is softened by a cloud;

The dust settles into place.

It is hidden but always present.

I do not know who gave birth to it.

It sems to be the common ancestor of all, the father of things.

Tao Té Jing, verse 4

(Source: Dyer, Wayne, W., Change Your Thoughts, Change Your Life: Living the Wisdom of the Tao, Hay House, 2007, page 20)

TAKEWAYS

We have touched many aspects that guide you to connect with your true self. In doing so, your capacity to achieve your goals and have a greater impact becomes more accessible to you in life in general but certainly on social media. Here is a synoptic list:

• Know yourself before you reveal yourself on social media.
• Assess your environment and nurture the relationships that are equally authentic.
• Remember you are unique.
• Recognize your self-worth.
• Know whose got your back.
• Be clear on what you are striving for.
• Get up and move.
• Make time to be with yourself, enjoy life beyond social media.
• VALUE YOU. Be real, genuine, authentic You.

ONE MORE THING…CALL TO ACTION

Dr Seuss https://images.app.goo.gl/3UBK1ZDK7s5xLhtf7

A few last words on the subject presented.

As we recognize the benefits and the drawbacks of social media use, each and everyone of us engaged in making the world a better place can take action in supporting each other in staying real, in dealing with outstanding self-esteem issues, etc.  Here are a few questions to open up the conversation:

How do you deal with inauthentic personas on the social media tools that you use?

How do you keep yourself from falling into your shadow persona?

How do you keep yourself inspired to be true to what you value?

Please let me know what you think.

I appreciate the time you spent reading this blog and hope that you enjoyed it.

Please stay tuned for the up-coming blog on persuasion.

Cheers, Meherbani Kaur

Facebook:  What do you value in you?  Check out my blog on Impact? valued or fabricated value.  http://bitly.ws/fVLx

Twitter:  Are you ‘staged’ or authentic. Check out my blob on Impact? valued or fabricated value #selfworth  http://bitly.ws/fVLx

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[1] Source : https://quoteinvestigator.com/2020/04/04/company-keep/

It’s Not Easy to Be Genuinely Funny

A Genuine Problem

One of the great challenges of social media is to be genuine – in your posts, in your views, in what you say and write and share, and in your overall engagement – and yet, to do so without being hated. Why is this challenging? Well, think of it: in your everyday life outside of social media, in face-to-face interactions and engagements, how often are people truly genuine with one another? Think of the retail and service-industry experiences you have had, parties you have attended, even some friends or family you interact with. Finding people who are truly genuine can be truly, genuinely challenging.

This of course begs the question: if we can’t always expect to be genuine in face-to-face engagement, why should we expect it when given the added distancing of social media?

Well, for one: I find it is helpful to stop expecting things, in general. That way, if something good happens, it comes as a pleasant surprise, a break from the usual sad, depressing consistency of failed expectations. However, having said that, it is beneficial to be genuine through social media, for the simple reason that it is more easily relatable to others. Perhaps it is because we are accustomed to a certain degree of falsity in human interactions that we have come to more easily recognize and appreciate genuine conduct when we come across it. That, and it’s also just pleasant, no?

There is no lack of articles, experts, observers, and practitioners of social media who have written and advised that whether you are using it for personal or professional purposes, being genuine and authentic through social media is important. These qualities create trust, and trust can lead to closer connections, future business, or more.

The struggle, at least from my own perspective, is in managing how to be genuine – in being honest with what you think and say – and yet, somehow, avoid being hated. There’s a reason why most of what goes on in your mind should stay there. Just imagine, if you will, going to a café or a restaurant where everyone – notably the employees – were genuine and authentic in all their interactions. Having worked in a restaurant as a bus boy, I can honestly say, this would not go well. I’ve had managers instruct me to take a five minute break because they could see that a rude customer was challenging my sense of self-control to not serve them their food face-first. I’ve had customers say obscene and racist things to me, and had to bite my lip and not respond with a verbal lashing, which feels like the most authentic response to me.

So, clearly, there are limits to authenticity. But one general rule of thumb I adhere to (especially when trying to get away with a lie), is that, being honest doesn’t mean saying everything, it just means being truthful with what you choose to say. The same could apply to most human interactions, and, notably, to social media. You don’t have to say what you genuinely think and feel all the time, but it is a good strategy to be genuine with what you choose to say and how you say it.

That Funny Feeling

I use social media for a number of things. I use it in a professional capacity, through my employer, a non-profit focused on educational advancement. I also use it for myself, both personally and in terms of advancing my own side projects as a writer. Increasingly, I find that an effective means of being genuine on social media and managing to avoid being hated is to be funny (or try to be, rather). After all, people genuinely enjoy funny things. I mean, someone who doesn’t like to laugh is clearly someone with a cold, dead heart, not someone who should be a typical target of any social media campaign, unless of course your target audience are members of the Republican Party (ooooh, just got political!).

But truly, a great way to engage others is to use humour. After all, for social media to be engaging, you have to offer something to your ‘followers’: information, accessibility, authenticity, entertainment, etc. And you don’t need to be “selling” humour in order to justify using it through social media. Of course, for comedians, being funny on social media is a must, however, many brands and businesses have chosen to use humour to engage and ultimately advertise and promote themselves through social media, regardless of how “serious” a company they may be.

Humour is multi-purpose. I personally prefer to use humour to deal with most of the challenges of life. I don’t know how I would have gotten through life without it. And as I am currently trying to cultivate the skill set to do some comedic writing, I have chosen social media as the platform for experimentation, character development, and subject matter. One of the main subjects of the experiment (and the planned writing project) is that of online dating, and notably, for gay men using apps and experiencing that specific ‘social media’ world.

Dating is hard enough, and the advent of apps and modern technology have made it simultaneously – and contradictorily – more accessible and more distant, easier to connect and harder to remain connected. I have learned to navigate through this world of contradictions with humour, and I find, as I curate and share comedic content on this subject matter through Facebook and Instagram, the levels of engagement accelerate, particularly with my own demographic.

A very effective means of using humour through social media is to share – or create – memes and gifs. I recently started creating my own. Giphy is an easy-to-use site to upload and add text to existing gifs, or to create your own from scratch. MakeAMeme is fairly self-explanatory for its purpose, and serves it well. And there are meme styles that are more popular through some platforms, such as the following style on Instagram, where you can have a good deal of text above the image instead of simply appearing over top of the image. A good site to make those memes is through Dankland.

An example of an Instagram-style meme that I created can be seen below:

The power of humour is not simply in making people laugh, it’s in finding something that people can relate to in real life, in bringing out or commenting on something genuine – an experience, an emotion, a state of being, a thought, an action, or behaviour – and twisting it around to look at it in a different way, a way that allows yourself and others to find humour in the circumstance, and in themselves.

So, for example, here are a few gifs that I created which tended to get a little more active engagement from my followers:

 

 

And it really wouldn’t be complete without including this:

In Concussion

I generally despise advertisements, especially when they are directed at me. I try my best to ignore them, to not pay attention, to not click or engage at all. I assume that a lot of people are similar. No one likes to be beaten over the head repeatedly, with advertisement or, presumably, with anything, really.

But if something makes me laugh, I don’t care if it is an advertisement and is ultimately just trying to get my money. If I am made to laugh, then I am happy to engage.

It’s not a flawless strategy, and not one without risk (after all, not everyone has the same sense of humour), but, it might just be worth the risk. Surely, it’s better to try to be funny and fail than to just be boring.

   Click here if you absolutely, definitely, do NOT want to laugh and learn something at the same time! 

   Ever tried to be honest AND still be liked? There’s a #funny trick to it! 

 

COM0014 Post #7 – Have I learned to be a better storyteller?

The answer is yes. I have become a better storyteller and I have this course to thank.

Source: Rosenfeld Media Flickr

I have learned the digital storytelling is the process of oral storytelling with multi-media elements. Digital storytelling helps to create and build communities, to learn to communicate effectively and to help those reflect on their pasts.

But the question you must continue to ask yourself is, is your content strategy guided by audience intent or simply your intent? When it comes to content strategy your purpose should be to target your audience effectively with the intention that your audience should benefit from your story. The old-school content strategies are always around keywords, but what about audience  intent? There’s a lot of focus on Search Engine Optimization (SEO) around optimized landing pages (as there should be). Content, on the other hand, is more than just optimized website pages. Content is a means of communicating and building a relationship with an audience.  So, you should understand the audience intent. What would they consider useful? What would they consider interesting or engaging? What would they consider shareable? A great piece of content requires all of the things.

Source: Stories from the storytelling dog meme

I know that there is a variety of stories that I want to tell, even shout from the digital mountain. I know that moving forward, I will continue to tell the story of our Waterfront Campus of Algonquin College including, our successes, our amazing and enthusiastic student body, and our lesser know stories – the diamonds in the rough so to speak. I hope that my passion for the college is seen as genuine and authentic – that I am engaging enough to cultivate an online audience.

What have your learned about digital storytelling? I want to know!