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I CAN’T PINPOINT when or why exactly it started, but Instagram and the current trend of people we might follow running a highlight reel at the end of each month are stealing any ounce of joy left in my life.
The posts always start around the first of each month and do a recap of the previous weeks. They usually have some holiday pics, glamorous evenings, expensive new purchases and endless captions about how amazing and fulfilling the month was, the targets they smashed and how excited they are for the next month.
At the other end of the scale, I barely register the end of the month and need four or five days to adjust to the new one, mentally calculating each time how far away Christmas is.
I might be feeling fairly proud that I didn’t forget a bin collection last week, or I have found a sandwich filler that my kids will actually eat at lunch, and then I scroll past something which upends me.
What am I doing wrong? What kind of jobs do these people have? Where can I apply? Social media is supposed to be an easy way to pass five minutes with some empty mindlessly scrolling. It’s not supposed to make me feel terrible about where I am in life. I actively go out of my way to avoid anything that makes me feel terrible.
I Marie Kondo’d my feed last year and removed almost every influencer. I unfollowed and muted anyone who was intent on only showing perfection. I don’t need that in my life. It doesn’t bring any joy. It only brings misery. I mean, good for them, but also, no thank you.
I don’t want to compare myself to someone whose job is to look perfect.
Since social comparison theory first emerged in 1954, it has been argued that humans have an innate drive to make evaluations about themselves based on comparison with others. It makes sense that we would need to know who has the most resources, or who might pose a significant threat.
And for previous generations, this might not have meant much. My grandparents might have snuck a look over their neighbour’s fence to see how the other half lived, but I can see inside wardrobes, fridges and cupboards. I see people prepare breakfasts decorated with colourful fruits and flowers, while I sit bleary-eyed over a bowl of Rice Krispies. I get to watch the family vacations, but only the small snippets of everyone smiling and laughing. We share so much more with each other through social media, and it’s only ever the good stuff.
When our parents were parenting, they had no idea about how other people were living and they also had much more realistic standards. They might have seen the odd glimpse of the ideal and ‘perfect’ family life through TV shows but it was always very clear that this was scripted, and filmed on a set, and that no one actually was expected to live like this. No one was hot glueing their own Halloween decorations.
In fact, I don’t remember a single Halloween decoration! All the kids were black bin bag witches with sooty noses, all of the sweets came from the local shop, and everyone used the white plastic bags to carry their sweets.
I am usually good at spotting things that have been filtered or designed to make me feel inadequate so that I buy something. But we have to remember that there is a sneaky little algorithm at work behind it all, and it knows how to draw me back in, every single time.
Parenting. More specifically, if I am doing enough for my kids.
I just want them to have a happy childhood, with lovely memories to think back. But no matter how much I do, everyone else seems to do so much more. And they have the nerve to make it look so effortless.
My feeds are filled with ‘spooky snack ideas’ and ‘how to create a Halloween balloon arch for your front door’. Who has this the time, in all honesty? And the worst part, the absolute very worst part, is that it works. Every single time.
I spent my Saturday sticking 70-something Halloween bats up along our stairs (if our landlord is reading this, no I didn’t). All because I saw a video of an influencer from The States, and her staircase was like something from a movie set. Before I was even aware of what was happening, I had bought the items on Amazon.
The chain of misery reminds me of when I was first using the internet, back in the early 2000s using dial-up on a monstrous device in the kitchen. Inboxes were filled with chain mail. You remember them, forward to 15 people or something terrible will happen. It’s like we have come full circle back to these.
Someone makes a post, I feel like a terrible parent and worry my kids will have a brutal childhood if I don’t follow suit, I stick bats around the house till my fingers bleed, post the picture on my story where it targets other unsuspecting parents, and the cycle continues. I have forwarded the chain mail.
I always forwarded them back in the day too, just in case. So I really don’t know why I have all of this adult anxiety.
Sometimes I feel like the only person who isn’t waking up at 5 am to run 5K, blend a smoothie, make the kids a fresh organic breakfast and sing like the von Trapps as we head out the door. I feel like the only parent struggling to explain a housing crisis to my kids. I feel like the overwhelming thoughts of climate change and the kind of world we are leaving to our kids are mine alone.
World Mental Health Day is coming up on Tuesday 10 October, and I am going to use this one as an NCT. Obviously not the kind of NCT that ruins my mental and financial health, but one to just check in on how I am doing. Because if I’m not aware of my own weaknesses, then the algorithm will get me every time. And while panic buying 764 bats with express delivery might not appear on any list of symptoms, it’s probably something I should explore.
I don’t compare myself to influencers in an everyday sense, and I shouldn’t compare my parenting either.
I don’t want to make decisions from a place of feeling inferior. I don’t want to live a life of consumerism in a time of climate crisis (and I promise to reuse every single bat, each year, for as long as the planet will have me). I don’t have the answers for how we manage the impact of social media, or how to move towards portraying more authentic lives, and maybe we never will.
I know it’s easy to say ‘shut the phone down, delete the apps’ and that’s a fair point. Believe me, I’ve done it and held on for some time until the FOMO creeps in or there’s some reason to check in on something. I’m working on it, but for now, I can pay more attention to what I am looking at and the impact it has on me. And it probably wouldn’t hurt to lose my credit card for a few weeks, at least until Halloween and dare I say, Christmas madness passes.
Margaret Lynch is a busy, working mum of two, living in Kildare and wondering if Adulthood is really for her.
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The cheapest room in the premier inn in the UK will cost you about £40 so apply Dublin prices and you’ll probably be paying €100 plus a night for a basic hotel.
@Ben Dawkins: at the very least
@Ben Dawkins: If there is any kind of concert or sports event they’ll drive the prices through the roof like the rest of them.
@Ben Dawkins: that’s about €100 a night cheaper than the rest at the moment
@Ben Dawkins: thats business. Supply & demand. Not much will change that. Give it a year & their average prices will be 5% or less cheaper than average. Remember when Tesco started selling fuel?? It was 10c or more cheaper then competing stations. Its the same price now.
In fairness as hotels in the UK go,they do the job at reasonable prices, but as this is Dublin thats another story.
@Paul Mc: Might want to view the Doc on Channel 4 in How they treat the Cleaners no pay for hours at work this might be the Reasonable prices charges
@Johnny Mason: seen that. Horrible stuff
@Johnny Mason: well actually that wasn’t Premier inn! That was a different company.
Since the documentary Premier Inn have since returned to using its own in house teams at that hotel and are anywhere else it was outsourced.
I stay at the T5 and T4 Premier Inns at Heathrow on a regular basis with work. All the employees tend to enjoy the job, there’s a bit of a John Lewis feel to working for them. Staff are enabled to make decisions for themselves and take their careers further in a structured rewarding manner!
Looks like it could of been a suitable location for the Homeless
@Johnny Mason: always one
@Johnny Mason: free houses for everyone!!!
@Johnny Mason: so your saying give the people that don’t work a prime location for free and let the working people go to all lengths to travel to city Centre to work at big expense
@Johnny Mason: why didn’t our government think of that , ah but then again we only vote for boys club and they only think about themselves
@Shaun Gallagher: Yeah culchies out! Leave dublin for the honest dubs.
@Johnny Mason: Does everything have to be about the homeless ffs? Terrible situation but it doesn’t mean everything else in the country stops because of it.
@Paul Howlin: It is a Terrible situation that is why I made the Comment didn’t think it was a unchristian comment but my apologizes if it upsets people like Ye
@Anto Whelan: Fair enough.
@Johnny Mason: if everyone gave up their property to the council to build homeless shelters we would all be homeless. Homeless people are in a very difficult situation, agreed and I’m very supportive of homeless charities but the answer isn’t to give everything to them. The world doesn’t work like that. A solution is needed but suggesting every building sold should have been sold to the council so they could build a homeless shelter in prime real estate is ridiculous.
@Johnny Mason: not everything in Ireland is about or can solve the housing crisis. Yes it’s terrible that families are living in hotels but if that was London they’d be on the streets! This all stems from the policy change to let people in council houses buy them. Before that, there was no getting rich off of social housing. But getting mad because a hotel chain wants to build a hotel is just stupid. A. They will do what they want regardless and B. Would it really have been suitable on a very busy road with night clubs and bars alongside? I for one welcome premier inn into Dublin. It would be nice to be able to afford to stay in the city occasionally.
@Johnny Mason: who mentioned anything relating to christianity? Not ever business decision or story relates to homelessness and the constant linking of completely unrelated stories to homelessness is causing people to become desensitized to the plight of the homeless through sheer fatigue at the volume of stories
@Colm O’Leary: This Hotel Project is another Prime example that we have abundance of derelict Properties around the Country that can be renovated and make a huge impact on the Housing Crisis . Yet we continue to put big business and Commercials Properties First and move mountains to accommodate their Interests all I am highlighting is their must be and can be a Little Consideration towards this Housing Crisis in similar ways
@Colm O’Leary: absolutely! On a night out in the city recently, it was impossible to find any hotel in the city on a Saturday night for less than €190. If Premier Inn could charge a bit less, then great. But considering their close proximity to Temple Bar, I doubt that they will.
@Anto Whelan: You are wrong all Dubs are Culchies now.
@Johnny Mason: we need home and hotels too.
@Johnny Mason: You don’t think Premier Inn have thought of that too..Guaranteed they’ll get a contract to house some..
@Alan Scott: Other way around and we have sent missionaries out to populate the land and spread the word of The Dub. We have taken over towns and villages by sleath. No longer is it u to Dublin to get a job, it is down the country to teach the good word
@Johnny Mason: oh sweet baby Jesus there’s always one.
@Johnny Mason: oh sweet baby Yeezus there’s always one.
@Johnny Mason:
New hotels are needed in city centre to meet rising demand for rooms, mainly from overseas tourists, and to keep a lid on prices, and to lessen the chances of serious price gouging during crowd-drawing events.
Many jobs are created, during construction phase and upon commencement of hotel operations phase, including many for local residents with the necessary experience and motivation to take on the short walk.
@Shaun Gallagher: Why do you say that all homeless people don’t work? I know a few people that work and some college students that are homeless and live out of a car or on the streets and some of them are sleeping on friends sofas. Many people cannot afford the rents the average rent in Dublin is 1300 per month and down the country its nearing a 1000 a month their are some people that don’t earn that amount per month get real.
Delighted to see that building put to use, just a shame its a premier inn.
@David Linehan: yea, they’re comfortable, but not a fan. Anti-suicide windows and long corridors make you feel like an inmate rather than a guest. Nonetheless Dublin needs beds.
@Greg Blake: true on all accounts
I stay in Premier hotel when in the UK. Always clean and comfortable, just one thing though, they regularly advertise sales with ‘rooms from £35. Try and find one, impossible!
There are at least 3 more Premier Inns in Ireland already, in Belfast !
If you start regulating short term lettings we will need plenty of cheap hotels .
Want to clean the city center up first before they start planning all these new hotels especially around the board walk zero tolerance on these drug addicts
Few other Premier Inns already in Ireland, Belfast has at least 2 I know of…
@Brendan M: That is not Ireland that is the United Kingdom. Do you need a geography lesson.
@Brendan M: That’s Northern Ireland! As in part of the U.K. and it’s a U.K. brand so yeah, Belfast has been covered!
The only one in THIS country is in Swords!
@Tony Stanley: This island is called Ireland.
Good use of an empty building for a hotel – shame we’ve lost other amenities to this orgy of hotel building. Come to Dublin and stay for the er… hotels
@Ciaran Forde: I don’t visit Dublin anymore other than for business. It has nothing to do with the proliferation of hotels.
It’s dull and drab and heavily littered. It’s the only place in Europe, or the UK, that I visit that has locked toilet doors in eateries and coffee shops.
That has such an extreme level of aggressive beggars. That has open drug dealing and taking in broad daylight (as witnessed by my 9 year old).
I witnessed extreme violence at night on rugby weekends. I was even confronted myself for no reason. It’s prohibitively expensive, sprawling and hard to get around or through. Hotels are the least of Dublin’s worries.
@Etherman: Sums it up lovely
@lochinvar56: I take no pleasure in it. I used to love a visit to Dublin. We should all have a capital city to be proud of.
@Etherman: I’m pretty damn proud of it! I travel the world for a living and find Dublin to be one of the cleanest and easiest cities to get around with the best people, amazing food and great pubs!
I rarely feel intimidated by anything going on around me in it but like any major city you need to be street wise. The grass is not always greener!
Great city we have here!
@Tony Stanley: you must live in another Dublin. Etherman has it nailed.
@Etherman: Your experience is so far removed from the millions of visitors experiences that come here to Dublin every year. The overwhelming majority of tourists have amazing things to say about Dublin. As a Dub myself, I’m proud of our capital, it’s people, it’s culture, nightlife, music scene and food outlets. Is it perfect? No. Has it got issues like ALL capital cities? Yes. I travel for work and I’ve witnessed a shooting in New York, violence in Berlin and drug dealing in Madrid.
You can walk almost everywhere in Dublin city centre. Bus services are good, luas is good. Perhaps you’re driving in the city and struggling to get around???
Where is the paradise that you live?
I’ll take the amazing feedback of millions of annual visitors to Dublin over you any day.
@Etherman: stay away!….. I have lived in Dublin all my life and yes it has its problems but not nearly half as bad as the way country people describe it.and it’s about as dangerous as most of the cities towns and villages around Ireland. In fact I have seen more trouble outside chippers in country bumpkin villages than I have in Dublin. Fact.
@Patrick J. O’Rourke: what oasis are you living in Ireland paddy. Care to name it. Bet not.
@Ian Breathnach: these culchies will never name where they live, they just like tearing Dublin a new one in every article in here.
@John: Its a bleedin disgrace so it is.
@Etherman: Agreed on all accounts, I lived in the UK for 6 years and the contrast is stark.
In Cork at the moment and the infrastructure is equally underwhelming however much smaller and a few percentage points cheaper.
I may not stay in Ireland at all at the end of my contract, Dublin has so many negatives despite the draw of friends and family. Shame.
Great news:) hope they are reasonably priced. Premier inn are great for keeping the character of the buildings they occupy. I’ve stayed in many but the one in Albert Dock in Liverpool is fabulous inside and out. Red brick in the rooms etc.
Good to have the chain here. Always choose them when in England.
Yes. and they will be ripped off in the local area.
I am absolutely disgusted that yet another hotel is being built between the canal and the Liffey. How can yet another hotel go up when there aren’t enough beds in Dublin for people who actually live here?
Judging by some I’ve seen, they won’t have much to do with this building
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