That Moment Social Media Sets You Free

Now more than ever it seems that everywhere you look people are masking their insecurities on social media through filters and half-truths. This video from SoulPancake features Ashley, who shares her journey to ‘that moment when’ she realized being truly vulnerable can help others accept themselves exactly as they are.

Born with a rare bone disease called Ollier’s and Maffucci’s syndrome, Ashley describes key moments during her upbringing that had a lasting impact on the rest of her life. She vividly remembers her aunt commenting on her looking ‘normal’ when her body was covered up in a snowsuit and another time when a person was hemming her pants said that it was a shame she was born with the bone disease since she had such a pretty face.

She then describes the power that social media had in her life starting in 2005 when she started to draw more attention from guys. When she would crop the pictures in a certain way, they couldn’t tell that she had a bone disease and she felt normal.

“There was this sense of fear because I felt like if people knew the real me, or saw all of me, they wouldn’t be interested. Which sometimes was true”.

It wasn’t until she stumbled across a Facebook page that she found a group of other people just like her that were also living with the same rare bone disease. Having never met someone else with her disease before, you can imagine the shock she felt when finally realizing she wasn’t alone in her appearance.

Ashley saw herself in another young girl whose hand looked just like hers. It was at that moment when it dawned on her that the little girl wouldn’t be able to relate to the ‘social media cropped Ashley’, so she decided it was time to embrace her vulnerability and stop trying to hide herself.

“It’s ironic because here’s social media...this thing I was so terrified to be judged on. Now it’s the bridge for this sense of hope and inclusion”.

The next time you catch yourself getting hung up on your insecurities and wanting to hide those parts of you, you need to remind yourself that there are people just like you that are desperate to find someone else they can relate to. By embracing your flaws you have the opportunity to be someone’s role model to show them it’s normal to be imperfect, just like Ashley decided to do for this young girl.