BEYOND THE FEED

Episode one of Beyond the Feed, features my mother, Leslie Donovan, as she gives her perspective on dieting in today’s growing digital age. We cover diet trends in the 80’s, social media’s impact on youth and how Weight Watchers has helped my mom enforce healthy habits and find a community.

Dieting is not something that we wake up and decide to commit to. There is a moment that we recognize a need to watch what we eat and plan to exercise on a regular basis. It is important for those looking for diets to follow and trends to partake in that they consider the comparison trap that they might find themselves in when searching for these outlets.

“I think it has impacted young girls tremendously,” says Donovan. “[They} are so influenced by the images that they see on social media. We weren’t meant to be able to analyze, zoom in and look at every imperfection and flaw.”

Donovan has refrained from using social media but still realizes the implications it has on its users. Instead, Donovan uses community engagement threads like the one on the Weight Watchers app to stay connected to those with the same goals as her: maintain healthy habits.

“The problem is that if you compare your journey to someone else’s journey, it’s never going to be the same,” says Donovan. She presses that as easy as it is to hop on social media for inspiration, it can quickly turn to a detriment. Donovan urges those who rely on community for health goals to make the conscious effort to join the right communities and view peoples progress from different perspectives.

As difficult as it is to see the bright side to social media’s shiny comparison trap, there is a community for health gurus and those looking for motivation for self-improvement out there. Community is something that we innately look for, we just need to look in the right places.

Where have you found healthy communities?