To want this sort of life

[Blahdeblahh]

I follow a set of people I know through friends of friends on Instagram and just really envy their lives. There’s a big group of friends whose kids all play together, the mums all regularly have lunches/nights out and they’ve all just gone away to an island with partners/husbands too. They’re all really wealthy and good looking and their lives just look perfect
Anyone have a life like this 🤷🏻‍♀️

I couldn't think of anything worse than a group holiday to an island.

I’m on the edges of a group like this. I don’t go to the main clique activities but I would be invited if one of them had a larger party etc.

Yes on the surface it looks amazing and it’s easy to be envious of the helicopters down to Cornwall, regular expensive trips to london, lunches that cost hundreds of pounds and constant drunken socialising. They do all look beautiful and glamorous on their photos.

But I know them in real life. The relationships between the women are actually very superficial and self serving in terms of profile raising, none of them really look like their Instagram pictures since they are heavily filtered and most of the women have had a lot of work done and many of their marriages are pretty rubbish which I know both from the fact that the women confide and quite a few of the men have tried it on with me! I suspect quite a few will end in divorce once children leave. Most drink to excess and can’t function well without it and there are a lot of drugs. There is also a lot of debt there.

Some of the parties are fabulous though and I like my place on the very edges.

try to think about the positives in your life OP. I can assure you they are unlikely to all be living perfect lives in reality.

I envied a woman I'd known from childhood. Perfect life. Husband a builder, built their dream home with pool. Kids, pets, endless holidays with first class travel. Clothes, cars, restaurants. Without warning last year the husband took his own life. I'll never envy anyone again

Long before social media we were friends with a family. The father had an interesting and at the time glamorous but not particularly well paid job, she was an artist who had vague royal connections. Both had inherited wealth.
These friends had a big London house and a house in the country and abroad. Very bohemian, always full of some quite glamorous people, lots of lovely dinners under the stars, lots of house guests abroad, group outings to local restaurants and they just had the air about them that everything was lovely and wonderful and nothing could touch them.
But as a late teen I started to realise while that was indeed part of their life, they also had a child with agonising mental health problems , had lost another very early on in his life, found the constant entertaining exhausting (there wasn't staff or anything but there was always sn expectation that these people would provide a good time) and had been financially taken advantage of several times by so called friends due to their generosity.
On the outside: glamorous and privileged, behind closed doors: tragedy and anxiety and disillusionment.
I'm sure there are golden people out there, but probably not as solid as you think.

such a good point illustrating the perils of social comparison - always someone better off, always the door to misery.
.

'Comparison is the thief of joy'

Your feelings are valid but you need to take action.

Have you considered unfriending these people from social media or deactivating your accounts altogether?

You sound like a spectator in their lives - not good at all.

At present we are having to pull the purse strings so no;
coffees/lunches out
new clothes or shoes for the parents
eating out unless an occasion
holidays or UK family breaks
Hair/nail appointments
Magazines/newspapers

As selfish as it sounds, it would be unhealthy for me to follow people online who appear to be living very comfortably indeed. I already feel like shit and the poor relation amongst a number of friends - do not need to further enhance that feeling.

@2bazookas << what they said.

Don't be so stupid.

Why would you envy people you don't even know? That is silly.

For you know nothing 'real' about them.

But are they "really" happy.
Personally I'd not be thinking about updating social media if I was having fun.
I think you need to concentrate on your own life.

As many previous posters have said, much of what you see on Instagram is fake / carefully curated, and even if it’s not, these seemingly wonderful people rarely have ‘it all’ or perfect lives. Under the glossy surface, there’s still death, illness, addiction, coping with difficult children, coping with difficult family members, etc, just like everyone else.

of the very most glamorous and ‘insta’ perfect people I know - where their lives look incredible from what you see on there, they’re actually the people I know, with very sad, almost tragic, lives under the surface.

I can’t put it better than this!
I was part of a group like this and have happily relegated us to the very outer edges of the group because the people were actually very hard work to ‘relax’ with. Even photos at parties or on holiday were gently ‘curated’.
It’s what they want people to see, not the reality, and often the ‘close’ friendships portrayed were very inauthentic and shallow.

You’re seeing what they want you to see and only that. Why else would they publicise it?

I think we subconsciously tend to create a life for ourselves which is best suited to us.

I think we subconsciously tend to create a life for ourselves which is best suited to us

Wise words.

Sometimes also shit happens in any type of life though - whatever you've tried. It's also how you deal with the shit.

If that makes sense

You just can’t tell. A couple of people I knew via social media who seemed to have enviable lives (and I did envy them) turned out to be alcoholics.

I can't think of much worse than being on holiday with a bunch of image but no substance instagrammers. It's all bullshit, marketing and using children to sell the complete shite. Best thing you can do to have a happy life ? Stop wasting energy pinning your approval on an others façade.

I probably look like this on Instagram. The reality is I’m disabled, don’t get on with DP, there’s always some drama.

I’ve had a very hard life to get to this point as well, poverty in childhood, parental addiction issues, emotional abuse etc.

There’s a quote about not thinking “look how lucky she is” but “look how hard she worked”. Some of these the things you covet in these people were hard won gains for them.

When I was on Facebook, I generally found that the people who posted the most were the ones who were most insecure or unhappy. (Not always, but a lot of the time). It’s nice sharing the odd thing, but what purpose does sharing perfectly posed photos of your endless holidays have, other than to make sure people believe you’re having a brilliant time and your life is wonderful. People whose lives generally are happy and content just don’t feel the need to do this, I’ve found.

I think it’s lovely seeing people have fun. I work with the terminally ill your life can turn on a sixpence so seek happiness where you can and appreciate everything.

They may be able to pull it off, but how much is for show, vs how much is reality, yes they may all have solid relationships etc, but human nature being what it is, how many cracks are there too or indiscretions that take place.etc ?

It’s fun to go away for the occasional long weekend with friends and their families. We do it every few years with friends from university. But I always think that those who constantly holiday with other families must have issues with spending time alone in their family unit. Probably Mum and Dad are bored of each other or don’t enjoy spending the time with their kids and think all the kids will all entertain each other.

Skiing is the one exception in my view, because it’s always fun to ski in a group and you’re more likely to find people of your own ski/adventure level.

How shallow must their lives be to spend all that time creating perfect insta moments.

Live your moments, live your own life, don't waste any moments of YOUR time watching others "live" or manufacture theirs.

Smell the flowers, don't frame them perfectly, light them, spray a water mist, photograph and photoshop them... smell them...

The answer is really simple - get off Instagram. You'll miss it for a week or two then find yourself feeling much better.

They are not all perfect op, not leading perfect lives either.
There will be mental health struggles, unhappy marriages, family worries - just like everyone else.
The only difference is money. And although it makes life easier, money alone does not make happy lives.

Lol. Go and read a book or something and stop being so shallow.

It does sound lovely, yes. And while posters on here can be so quick to suggest these people's lives are empty/meaningless/fake, that's not necessarily true either. There are people out there with great lives. Good luck to them.

But people need to be more disciplined with their SM usage. If it's resulting in negative emotions, step away/hide/unfriend/whatever. Don't keep exposing yourself to things that make you unhappy.