MUMBAI : Youth of India is going through a big transition phase where technology, social media and opportunities are all happening at the same time. There is a lot of confusion be it regarding career choices or relationships or personal life. In fact, we all are exposed to too much of everything irrespective of the age bracket. Bollywood actor turned humanitarian Somy Ali, who now runs her NGO No More Tears, shares her opinion.
“Yes, I couldn't agree more with that viewpoint because there is way too much of everything and it makes it difficult to prioritize what should be on the top of their agenda. I hold all social media platforms responsible when they are used inappropriately, while they have so much potential to do good. Our brains do not have the emotional capacity to pick and choose when we are presented with a barrage of various opportunities. Also, how does one know for certain whether he/she is making the right choice and is picking wisely be it a post or something they buy via an ad they see on a social medium. Then there is the constant stress of competitiveness and inevitable comparison of who's post is better. People are making money via posts, be it a celebrity or an influencer. It's become such a norm that it's close to absurdity,” she says.
Everyone is complaining about the shortage of time. The stress level has also increased among people in general.
“It's all about discipline and subjective solely to the individual themselves and their wants and needs to make the right choices. Unfortunately due to immense saturation with countless platforms and being used universally, things will only get worse. What I miss the most is actual interaction in person and getting together like we used to do as kids. I miss those days of having real life conversations rather than family Whatsapp groups, texting videos/pictures and conversing solely via texts. All this is a slippery slope relevant to social interactions with family and friends,” she says.
Agreeing that it has its perks if people live in different countries or states and a couple wants to share their pictures of their grandchildren or text videos of their vacations, all that is fine, according to Somy.
“But any kind of overindulgence is not healthy for any of us. Balance and stability is required in life. Here I can think of actors like Mark Wahlberg and Akshay [Kumar] who go to sleep at 9:30pm and wake at 4am to workout. Now that's called discipline because it's a routine that will only help them and there are literally only benefits to this ritual. Conclusively any kind of extremism is dangerous to our mental and physical health. But what these actors follow mentioned above is not extremism, it is beneficial to them both, physically and psychologically,” she shares.
In the entertainment industry, the pressure to be better and the best is more visible in the public domain, is also something that is raising concern.
“It’s an extremely unhealthy pressure because in the end we are all humans and have emotions which are at risk of giving us panic and anxiety attacks. Particularly, for women, it's far too much pressure on their psyche to maintain an unreasonable size zero. And every single day they have to come up with a post which has to be better than their contemporaries. That would drive anyone insane or at least cause them to have anxiety. There is a flip side to this too where people are quitting social media platforms all together. Even the youngsters deem it to be the right thing to do because they found themselves addicted to scrolling nonstop. This gives me hope that at least there is a realization no matter what age one is that it's best to quit it completely because walks in nature take precedence over scrolling to see what others are wearing. That understanding does exist which makes me optimistic for certain,” she ends.
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