Turns out that a lot of people I knew posted huge life updates that I completely missed out on. I asked them why they didn’t tell me and they were confused. They said the posted it on social media. I can’t speak for everyone, but I know a lack of social media meant that I have lost touch with old acquaintances completely. I have a few close friends and that’s it.
Maybe that’s an ok tradeoff to make, but it’s worth knowing that before getting into it.
This doesn't really seem that important if your only method of knowing this was a post blasted to hundreds (or thousands) of people. Or, to put it another way: if you mattered, you would've gotten a direct message or call from them.
I'd argue that social media has normalized keeping up with people who aren't supposed to be part of your life forever. But, we should take a step back and realize that not everything should or will last forever. If you cross paths again then you can catch up, but having life updates constantly? No thanks.
The landscape of human relationships is deep and broad an varied, and if making bold assumptions about what other people should value is your starting point, you're liable to miss a lot of potential connections.
are you really? If you only notice that it's Bob's birthday because you get a FB reminder and the only form of communication is a post on their timeline once a year that's not a connection, that's like talking to your neighbor about the weather out of courtesy because it's awkward to say nothing at all.
The reason a lot of people miss out on life nowadays is not because they have too few connections but because they waste their time on fake ones. Life's short, instead of trying to warm up some high school friendship that's going nowhere, focus everything you have on the few people around you that matter. Cutting connections is as valuable a skill as making them, and an increasingly lost art.