You look good normal

I love instagram. I fully intend to instagram the crap out of my pictures for the next 100 years. Or until phones are obsolete, and humans no longer communicate because they've forgotten how to use their words.

Several weeks ago, I took a picture of my best friends 6 month old son, Austin. One of his brothers, 6 year old Liam, watched as I searched through instagram filters. After a few seconds he looked at me and said "Can you just use normal? He looks good normal." I chose a filter, and showed him the picture. He gave the picture a passing glance and said, "But he looked good normal.".

Then he got bored and ran off to play Wii.

I know he's 6, and he probably wasn't thinking too deeply. However, in his mind, there wasn't anything that needed to change.  The real version of Austin was just fine, and no filter was necessary. He wanted the picture to look like his baby brother- not an altered version of him. Normal was good. Normal was enough. Reality was just fine. 

When do we start to believe that normal isn't good? That normal is not enough and reality should be edited a bit. We take the bad things in life, and apply filters to make them appear less bad. But reality still exists under that new light. We have the ability to look at beautiful things, but want them to look just a little bit better. A sunset. The ocean. The people we love. The situations we find ourselves in.

If you change the lighting enough then people can't focus on the imperfections. If you make it look artsy and creative,  no one will care that the photo was taken in a bathroom. If you portray your life to be just a little better than it is, then people won't know just how broken you truly are.

When it comes to photo's a little instagram magic isn't a bad thing. When it comes to life, and what we portray...let's just do "normal".

After all, you look good normal.