Does Privacy Exist Anymore?

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Modern technology astounds me – I remember using the Dewey decimal system and encyclopedia Britannica for research. Today I can type any topic into a search engine and have thousands (or even millions!) of relevant resources at my fingertips.

I can also stay in touch. My sisters and their families live on the other side of the country. I can’t imagine how people did it a generation ago without blogs, Facebook, and Instagram. Thanks to the internet I get to see dance recitals, Little League games, and even open presents together on Christmas morning.

I’m also able to let other people see what I’m up to. I’m not exactly famous, but my name is out there and I like to think that someone someplace would enjoy my work enough to want to know more about me … but how much should they know? I want to be sincere, but I don’t want to be too revealing. I’m also very opinionated and quirky, which can come across the wrong way if you don’t really know me.

So what’s a girl to do?

In an effort to maintain some level of privacy, I’ve cleaned up my Facebook page. By “cleaned up,” I mean I’ve started to severely limit the people I allow as friends to be people who are truly friends and family. Not someone I go to church with or someone I met at a conference, but people I’ve invested in who have invested in me. It’s not that I don’t like certain people, but there are some things that not everyone needs to know (and sometimes I want certain people to know those things). I went to college and high school with a lot of people on Facebook, but why am I their “friend” on Facebook – because we had good relationships, or because I’m curious to know what they’re doing now?

It may offend some people, but I do value that bit of freedom that allows me to be myself and bare my soul without wondering if a near stranger will be offended or upset. If someone wants to dig around and comes up with a piece of personal information, I applaud his research skills, but I don’t have to be the one volunteering all of that information. I’m not going “off grid,” but I am going to try to keep things simple. I’m not really sure how much privacy exists anymore, but I can hold on to some of it for myself…for now.