Yeah... I Use Filters Too...

_{Yeah... I use filters too...}

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Personally, I have nothing against the use of filters. Issues arise only when it becomes our identity and without them, we are unable to truly be ourselves.

Filters are just like make-up used by women, they are not designed to make us beautiful, instead, they are designed to enhance the beauty we already have. This is why it’s always best to use it in moderation. But then, people being people will decide to use it as a way to improve their image.

Filter has become a part of our everyday lives, to the point that many of us no longer notice it. When we take professional pictures, you don’t think the photographers just give you the photos raw, do you? No, they have to be touched and you have to be presented in your best image. If not, why bother with them? You could have just as easily used your phone instead.

But then, the level that technology has taken modern filters to is outstanding. The things you can do with your smartphone alone are just mind-blowing. You can give yourself more hips, more muscles and make your face as smooth as a baby’s. If you need height, you could add that as well. You can tailor your image to someone’s spec.

But that doesn’t change anything, does it? You’re still who you are in real life, with all those things you consider as flaws. Sadly, the only thing all this will bring to you is disappointment because when people realize the real you, whatever attraction they had for you will fizzle away like smoke.

It’s just funny the lengths people go to impress others, even to the detriment of their physical and mental health. Many of us just want to show the world that we’re making it and we’re beautiful and gorgeous, even if deep inside, we believe we are not all this. And that, my friends, is the problem!

As long as you need filters and a makeover to fill up a need you believe you have, it would never be enough for you! You believe that in real life you’re not beautiful, but with the filter, you’re beautiful and sexy. This leads to an unhealthy attachment to the app, and no picture of yours will ever be uploaded without going through the grueling procedure in the filter applications.

I think this is a similar reason to why many of us love to take pictures in front of other people’s cars, gates, and only when we go to exotic places or fancy houses. We just want to show a particular image of us and anything else will be tantamount to sacrilege.

Sadly though, none of these is for us. It would have made sense a little if we did all these for ourselves, but no. Make-up and filter, just like the clothes we wear, no matter what we tell ourselves, is not for our benefit. But for others. It shows the way we want other people to see us. It shows the level we can only be comfortable with being seen.

If clothes were just for us and not for others, we wouldn’t care so much about looking good. The only reason “looking good” makes us “feel good” is because others see us in the exact way we want to be seen. It shows that we hit the very message we were trying to send. If not, many of us would wear baggy clothes, or rags and be walking about in the streets.

If you’re told to wear clothes too big for you, they’re clean and have not been worn. However, they’re not even a top brand. Wearing them makes you look like a potato buried underneath a heap of vegetables. If you’re told to wear something like that and move around every day, one of your first thoughts will be; what will people think when they see me in this?

When we start doing things for ourselves and not because we need some validation from others, we’ll realize that we won’t have to be told to be moderate. That will just come naturally. We are all beautiful as we are, but if we decide to let an app decide our identity, then we are really in trouble.

As I said, I have no problem with filters. Hell, I use them in the pictures I take all the time. I don’t take a lot of personal pictures though, so most of all the filter use goes to my other forms of pictures. They give me a cooler picture and bring out the color I’m after in startling quality.

So, in a nutshell, we need to learn to be comfortable in our shells and not have to rely on the edited images people have of us. That is not our identity, we choose what we identify as. And that’s why we need to choose wisely.

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_{Thank you for reading. Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments below, I would love to know what you’re thinking. Till we meet in the next post.}

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_{This post is inspired by the first topic of the week which is Filters. Feel free to try it out.}

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_{N.B: All images are mine.}

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