Why do we do what we do? What makes us do these things? What makes us who we are? These are questions people will ask themselves daily. I wonder, who wouldn’t want to know why they act the way they do. The answer to the questions is simple. The influence of things surrounding us. From technology and family and friends to just wanting to fit in with the crowd influences the way you are. It is a big part of who we are and what we’re made of. Will you be able to figure out who you are and what made you that way? You just might, if you think back to what has impacted you through your whole life.  

Today in society, social media and technology altogether is influencing our world and the people within it. It influences what people do and how they live. Most people now rely on their phones for almost everything. It has phone numbers, so you don't have to remember them, it gives you reminders so you won’t forget and a calendar to keep track of your schedule. I’m not saying it’s bad; although, it could be limiting parts of our mind. With technology, you don’t really have to remember anything for yourself. It’s all taken care of. Maybe with the new phones, our memories are worse because we don’t have to remember things a lot. Cell phone radiation could have an impact on memory(Lorenzo). Just having our phones can impact us greatly. The social media that’s inside them, influences us even more. 

Social media has a very big impact on developing people and even adults. Starting from trends that go around. The trends like, eating a tide pod, the ice bucket challenge or even calling momo were some of the bigger ones. They can actually be very harmful though. The danger behind them is extreme. In 2017, there were 12,299 calls to U.S. poison control centers due to exposure to laundry pods(Ingrahm). Many people tried this challenge, risking their lives, just to fit in. To do what everybody else was obsessed about. Calling momo encouraged people to harm themselves. These trends that teens would follow to “fit in” with the crowd, actually had major consequences. Social media can and will control some people’s lives. Most everybody in the world has either facebook or Instagram. Both the apps people are able to like your pictures and it shows. Some teens or even younger kids now will try so hard to get a ton of followers and likes on their posts. By seeing how many likes or comments you get compared to other people, they can get discouraged, sad and some may even get depressed over this. And celebrities can have a big impact on people’s lives too through social media. 

Some people would say following a celebrity or like a model on social media could be bad. They usually have the “ideal body” that people will want. However, by young girls or guys seeing this, it could influence them into starving themselves or make their self-esteem drop. Although, some would argue that it might influence them in a good way. It could get them to try and make a healthier lifestyle for themselves. But by seeing these and what they have in their life, it could change their dream. To something like a famous Youtuber, an Instagram model or something else. They are being influenced into dreaming the same exact dream. So they won’t even think of trying to create their own dream with kids younger and younger getting technology earlier. Sometimes I’ll be sitting at a restaurant or anywhere really and a parent will give their three-year-old kid their phone to play games on. Right now, it may not be hurting them, but in the future, it could influence them as a person. They’ll probably be less patient and antsy when they don’t have anything to do. Waiting can be hard. Parents using tablets and phones to babysit their kids, young’ns are becoming “boredom phobic” at a much younger age(Tucker). Technology now is influencing people as small kids and older. Being exposed to electronics at an early age can influence the rest of your life. 

While social media and technology can influence you and what you do with yourself, the people around you can change how you act and even who you are as a person. Even if you don’t notice it, we change the way we say or do things around different people. We do this because it gets the person to like you more. Everyone does it. So you’re far from the only person who changes their speech pattern as the situation appears to demand(Fiouzi). Not only do our family and friends affect the way speak, but they can also influence everything about you. Parents can support you or be unsupportive. When they’re supportive and push you in the right direction, it’ll probably make you happier. If they are unsupportive and keep bringing you down with what you want to do, you might be more unhappy if you value their opinion. You as a person are a mix of what you’ve seen and known and what you want to grow to as a person. You are made up of things that have influenced you. 

I feel as if they’re not a lot of independent teens or even young adults anymore because everybody wants to fit in. This could make it difficult to reach the American dream because people will change their personality to fit in, making it hard to think for yourself. It got to a point that I would switch the way I spoke, depending on whether I was talking to someone black or white, except among my good friends(Uwiringiyimana). She changed so people would like her more. Once you’re used to being a follower in a large crowd, it’s hard to think for yourself after or if you get out of that trance. Thus making it difficult to reach the dream on your own. I think this issue is found everywhere around the world. Maybe more so in big cities like New York or Las Vegas. Places like that normally have a “worse” influence on people, because those are the hotspots for celebrities and a lot more drugs are used there. I would think living in a place with a big population would make it difficult for people to become independent because you’d be going against such a large group of people. This would make it hard to create a dream for yourself because it’s like, “the idea that there are no new stories to tell, and everything has already been written.” Meaning people like to try and achieve what’s ALREADY been done. No one has the courage to pursue their own dreams. They want to fit in and stay within the box. No one dares to try and go outside the box. People would rather follow what they know, stay in the lines, rather than take a different path or draw outside the lines. Which makes me think, being a follower of the crowd would limit what you could do with your life, therefore, to reach your own dream could be very difficult.

So many times in my life, I’ve seen something, read something or listened to something and it made me change a little bit. One time I read a poster on the wall from gymnastics and it gave me the motivation to be a better me. Every day I’d go in and read that poster and it sparked something new inside me every time. It was just a small influence that inspired me to be better. Everything can influence everything. Family influences us. Friends influence us. Objects influence us. Posters, phrases, a word! We influence others. I started writing this paper about how things will change us, our perspective, our dreams and the way we act. Not only was this true but it made me realize that we actually are made up of influences. Everything that has made us who we are today are from influence. If we lived somewhere different, grew up in a different family, we wouldn’t be the same. So in conclusion, everything we’ve seen and what we’ve been through have influenced us to be who we are today. Influences around us change who we are. 

Works Cited

Fiouzi, Andrew. "WHAT MAKES US CHANGE THE WAY WE SPEAK TO DIFFERENT PEOPLE?" MelBeta, 2018, melmagazine.com/en-us/story/what-makes-us-change-the-way-we-speak-to-different-people. Accessed 14 Oct. 2019.

Ingraham, Christopher. "There were over 12,000 poison control calls for people eating laundry pods last year." The Washington Post, 16 Jan. 2018, www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2018/01/16/there-were-over-10000-poison-control-calls-for-people-eating-laundry-pods-last-year/. Accessed 25 Sept. 2019.

Lorenzo, Carolyn De. "Can Cell Phones Affect Your Memory? A New Study Suggests Radiation Could Affect Teens' Memory Performance." Bustle, 26 July 2018, www.bustle.com/p/can-cell-phones-affect-your-memory-a-new-study-suggests-radiation-could-affect-teens-memory-performance-9895083. Accessed 25 Sept. 2019.

Tucker, Laura. "Should Children Be Exposed to Technology at an Early Age?" Maketecheasier, 17 Aug. 2018, www.maketecheasier.com/children-technology-early-age/. Accessed 25 Sept. 2019.

Uwiringiyimana, Sandra. How Dare the Sun Shine. Compiled by Abigal Pesta, New York, Harper Collins, 2017.