These days, appearances are everything. 

People are more concerned with proving to the rest of the world that they’re having the time of their lives than actually enjoying themselves. We are all guilty of it.

The 27 flawless “night out” pictures are more important than the night itself. If a girl purchases a new dress, it’s more likely for a new Facebook profile photo than an actual event.

Not to mention, going out without uploading a new Snapchat story or Instagram picture is inconceivable; without evidence of your escapades, as far as the world is concerned, they didn’t happen.

If you go to a bar, half the people in there will likely be on their phones. If they’re not taking selfies, they’re possibly on Tinder, happily meeting strangers through the Internet while scowling at the real-life ones around them who don’t even think about approaching for a real-life conversation.

As for who you’re actually talking to online, everyone on the Internet is selling you a dream. The thought of uploading a photo that is anything less than perfect is unimaginable, so every picture is taken with precision, the best lighting, best angle and most appealing filter.

Regarding first dates, well, thank God for restaurants with dim lighting. Plus, all that really matters is the hot profile picture he’ll show his friends of the girl he went on a date with, not so much what she actually looked like.

It’s not because his standards are low, but because when you remove the screen, you realize that little imperfections aren’t the end of the world; in fact, they are what make all of us human.

Then, of course, there are the people who have already found someone to love them. These are the ones who are in relationships, offline. For many of these couples, being in love is not enough and a relationship isn’t considered truly successful until it’s on Facebook.

If someone buys you flowers, in exchange, you have to take a picture and upload it. After all, what is the point of being happy if not everyone knows about it?

Singles begin to resent their newsfeeds because they just serve as reminders of an inability to find a partner, let alone someone who buys them flowers and takes them to Paris for the weekend.

Somehow, when faced with endless photos captioned “bae” and littered with love hearts, it’s easy to forget that people only post their best moments and choose to keep all their worst ones private. Your life may fall short of someone’s picture perfect one, but more often than not, so does the life of whomever posted it.

Logic aside, it seems that the success of any relationship is measured by how many pictures you each post with your significant other, and those who never post pictures are assumed to be in miserable relationships, leading unfulfilled lives.

And, it’s not just dating that’s the issue.

Sometimes I wonder if people arrange to meet up with their friends because they miss them or because they haven’t updated their Snapchat stories in six hours and need some new material to prove to the world they’re having a good time.

The fact of the matter is, brag culture has resulted in us being too busy narrating our lives online that we’re forgetting to live them. Trust me, no great story ever started with “Hey, remember that time we took 37 photos in your car…?”

Life is now a popularity contest, and it seems that the popularity is less dependent on how many good friends you have and is more a reflection of how many followers or likes you possess.

Girls upload Instagram pictures and then delete them the next day if they did not receive a sufficient number of “likes” because that alone is considered a reflection of how many people like them in real life.

Don’t let social media fool you. There are people who have hardly any likes on their Instagram pictures, but still have lots of friends, and others with hundreds of likes despite being the loneliest people of all.

There are couples who seldom upload pictures or share online declarations of their love, who are happier than the ones who share every “date night” in your Instagram feed.

There are people who don’t brag, who are halfway to a deposit on their first house and others who are pictured in VIP every Saturday night who don’t have a penny to their names.

So, don’t believe everything you see online because appearances are just that.

-xoxo, E

“Is he okay?” Followed with a head shaking "no". 

It was then that my world froze.  No child should ever have to be asked if they want to go see their parent's remains.  No child should ever have to shatter and fall broken to the ground.  The sound that I found resonating from the deepest depths of my being was not a cry or a scream.  It was a sound of utter anguish. It poured from me with such ferocity, I could feel the heat rise from my soul.  I felt a numbness overwhelm my body and expand in the crevices of my being. In that instant, our perfect family was shattered. Our perfect lives were destroyed. Normal was an illusion.

I lost myself in ’05. I lost my sense of discernment. I lost my purpose. I became two different people, co-existing in a turbulent state. My soul became ground-zero for a spiritual warfare so extreme, it left me exhausted and worn. My body completely shut down from shock. I had to be hospitalized because I wouldn't eat, sleep or drink. 

It’s difficult to recall specifics from that summer. Not simply due to the lapse in time since, but because of the overwhelming numbness that consumed me.  I was on auto-pilot. Unable to process through so many emotions as quickly as society demanded. I was helpless. Confused. Torn. 

A few things that later on happened gradually reignited a fire in my soul. A fire that soon gave me the strength to take a stand. Take a stand against the waging forces that were tearing me apart. Take a stand against the dark feelings that were pulling at my strings like a puppet-master. Take a stand against Satan…

No wound heals quickly. No gash is mended by freshly born skin as swiftly as we all would like.  Every scrape, cut, and burn scabs.  And many times, we find ourselves frustrated when, in our anxious movement after the pain has subsided, we tear those scabs wide open again. In our haste, we are again exposed to the slicing pain we first felt. But given time, and care and patience, those wounds scab again and eventually scar.  Allowing us to be sewn like new, but always leaving behind a mark of our misfortune.  A reminder of the pain we endured. A reminder of the lessons we learned.

Taking a stand against the spiritual warfare that was ripping me apart, I found myself scabbed.  I was tender and uncomfortable and often very vulnerable, but I was beginning to heal. As I was slowly gaining strength, Satan was quickly gaining fury.  As I began to deny him, he began to grow angry. I was not walking, yet, arm-in-arm again with my King, but I was trying to crawl from my captor. Trying to steal away in the night when Satan wouldn’t notice or see me leave. But he is keen, he is sharp–he is resentful. And he did notice. He was going to try anything to keep me captive. Anything to handicap my progress. Anything to keep me in his sinful snare.

I find it funny, at times, to sit back and look at the works of our God. To sit back and watch, how desperately, Satan tries to wage an un-winnable war. To sit back and watch the grace that God shows to those who seek Him. It’s amusing, truly. Amusing to watch the futile attempts the Devil makes. Painful, but amusing.

Everything we seek on this Earth to fill any part of us is so temporary. Unless it's the love of God. I didn't know that at that time. I couldn't feel it at that time. It hurt too bad to feel.It was so difficult to learn that lesson. I had to fail time and time again. Through all these failures and all this pain, guess who was knocking the whole time on my heart saying "please let me in. just please let me back in". 

-xoxo, E