If you have never heard about 'taking a selfie' with your selfie stick or with the camera on your phone, you must live on another planet. Everybody has been doing this for a while now, especially since the new trend is posting pictures to social media. Most people carry smartphones that are equipped with cameras. Armed with a camera and the Internet, the posting of pictures on social media sites such as Facebook, Snapchat and Instagram have become a trend on the Internet. It is at epic proportion. However, is there a fall out psychologically for those who overdo it? Let's find out.

The question is whether the posted selfies on social media influence the way that people see you and whether it influences your success with dating or whether it prevents you from holding down a romantic relationship. Putting pictures on social media may hamper you in more ways than one. What you do online does affect your personal and professional life. It also may have a negative reflection of what you do in your life. The posting of photos on Facebook sends a message to the world specifically about you and your life, whether you are single or whether you are in a relationship.

In the most recent years, there is a growing and transfixed interest in the digital world. Most of us have a laptop at home or we carry out most of our online activities on our phones. It is more often that you see people glued to their phones or captivated with social media. This kind of focus has caused people to have this insatiable appetite for other people to validate their personal lives. However, behind the scenes, this practice of posting selfies on social media could be destroying many relationships. It will certainly benefit you to limit your social media posts in order to save your relationship. By doing so, you will not have to succumb to phony validation from anyone.

When you go online and log into your most favorite social media platform and upload the selfie pictures you took to boast about your date or who you were with last night, you may be seeking that validation from Facebook followers and so you keep checking how many 'likes' you got. You use the number of likes to score how good or bad people think of you. You should never do that. You should be confident about your life and your relationship and not have to find out on social media what other people may think. When you have a healthy relationship, you don't have to seek validation from anyone. The relationship speaks for itself. When you put yourself out there, you may feel hurt by the fewer 'likes' you receive and this can subsequently cause a lack of confidence, low self esteem and insecurity, especially in your relationship. When you rely on others to validate you, then that will only put pressure on the relationship unnecessarily.

When you send a tweet out about your dates or post selfies on Twitter with your date, you don't know what kind of signal you are sending out in the Internet world because someone is always watching. Some frenemies might even get jealous of your new relationship and might want to sabotage it. So, no one should know what you are doing in your dating life. You are only setting yourself up for failure. If you have a stable and healthy relationship, you don't have to let everybody know about it. The public might not have your best interest at heart and posting a video or a photo might only instigate conflict. You just never know. For example, what if your date's ex or your ex is trolling you on social media? There are people out there that want to know what you are up to, even after you have broken up. And, they can cause trouble in your new relationship, if they know exactly what you are doing at all times. You should exercise caution.

In addition to being sabotaged by people or your exes, you should also be on the lookout for stalkers. If you post pictures online, you have given someone an identification of yourself. Your date also will be caught in the crossfire because he or she could also be identified. So, if you don't want to set yourself up to be stalked, lay off the selfie posting on social media. It could keep you safe from predators and people who don't have good intentions. Let's be clear, it is quite OK to post pictures on social media, but don't overdo it because there are all kinds of people watching and you are giving them more ammunition to possibly hurt you and your chances to have a successful dating life.

Most people go on Facebook, in particular to post selfie pictures just to get more people to like the photo. What is this doing to enhance your relationship? Nothing! You spend so much energy posing and taking pictures, only to have fewer people like it and then you get 'bent out of shape' because of your disappointment. No one should have so much control over your dating life like your followers probably do, just for likes. In fact, those 'likes' will never strengthen your relationship. Instead, it might hurt it.

Most women will post selfies on social media because they might be proud to show off their bodies or body image. However, they will do so at the expense of their date that may be in the selfie picture on purpose. Sometimes, it is not only the body image that she wants to show off, but she may want to send a message to other women to keep their distance. This might not sit well with the date because who knows if he doesn't want to keep his options open and the woman is spoiling that for him?

Many people are reporting conflict in their relationship because of this trend on social media. Sometimes, couples will have jealous arguments because of all the attention one person in the relationship is getting from social media followers. It can reduce the quality of the relationship in no time. So, is it safe then to say that constant selfies hurt people's dating life more than it helps it? Well, from the evidence, it appears so.

Many people become members of Facebook and other social media networks for different reasons. Some will want to go on Facebook to find out what their potential or previous partners are doing. If you are currently dating and your partner suspects or know that you are spending too much time on social media, don't you think your partner will want to find out more? Of course, and social media holds no secrets for anyone, not even you. After you have met your date and prior to you getting to know each other better, it is best to wait before posting selfies. Remember that you are not yet sure that it will all work out. You don't know how long you both will be together. You are just developing a relationship and there are so many quirks to iron out and you don't want to add any unnecessary fuel to the fire. During the first few months of dating you are in the experimenting phase, a very delicate phase. So, it is best to tone it down and go slowly.

The selfies that are posted online might be tagged and will go viral, which means many people will see it. Some will take a keen interest in them while others will pass over them. However, those pics tell a lot about your priorities, amiability and personality. It is best to be cautious since so many people use photographs to infer certain things about you. Viewers are probably going to have their own perception about you and in some cases, it can tarnish your reputation, especially as it relates to the type of pictures you post. In other words, some people might see you as being selfish, self-centered and arrogant, even if the only perception should be confidence. Some men will even think that you have low self-esteem and some women might be unimpressed with your photo shots and may say so in their comments. How is this going to make you feel when your intentions were probably honorable?

When you have one partner in the relationship posting selfies, it is possible that the other partner might feel threatened, dissatisfied, insecure or jealous. If this happens, then conflict might develop in the relationship over it. For this reason, your partner might start to sniff around or excessively monitor your online presence and see how much attention you are getting from other followers. This could result in a subsequent breakup or alienation, which means less emotional support and intimacy, especially if you are a social media addict. The other partner may start withdrawing because of all the time you are spending on social media. This might end the trust and interest may wane over a period of time.

If you have been in the relationship for a while, the social media postings could still be threatening. However, if you go a step further and change the word, 'selfie' to 'us-ie,' it will show people that you and your partner are in agreement with posting pics that have both of you. It should be safe to say that people in a satisfactory relationship will tend to post 'us-ies' instead of 'selfies.' This could even improve your romantic relationship. For instance, if John post a pic of himself and his girlfriend on social media, she might consider this an affirmation of the relationship. To her, it might seem as if he is proud of being in the relationship with her and is letting the world know. His girlfriend might view this as her boyfriend telling other women that he is off the market. John's friends, on the other hand, might view this as him being too involved with this girl and no longer able to hang with them.

If you want to make a real impact on your relationship, you should consider uploading a picture taken with your partner on your profile. This suggests that your life includes a partner. You are no longer presenting it as 'self,' but as 'us.' With a profile pic that contains the person you are dating, it offers a heavy dose of confidence to your partner. Before putting up any picture of both of you, make sure there is a discussion and mutual agreement. You have to make sure that the other person in the relationship is comfortable with your actions because some people love to have a sense of privacy. If you are not concerned about privacy, it doesn't mean that you have the right to take action without first making sure it is OK with your partner.

If any of your pics are taken down from your social media page by you; this will be seen as a time of conflict between you and your date, partner, boyfriend or girlfriend, even though, this may not be the case. People may interpret it as a sign of anger and also a sign that you are distancing yourself from the relationship. Therefore, be careful what kind of photos you post online and how it is presented so that you don't have to take them down and your actions could be mistaken for something else.

Finally, the use of 'us-ie' rather than always a 'selfie' could be the deciding factor of whether you are hurting your dating life on social media or not. It shows respect for each other and discourages the interest of any other male or female partner. You will be better able to navigate the presentation of your relationship on the Internet.

Did we teach you a thing or two about navigating your real-life relationship online? If so, then why not take a peek at our other great dating advice guides NOW RIGHT HERE!

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