The Boy Who Wanted Everyone to Like Him

I will call him Usman.

Usman was one of the most active students in school.

He made videos.

He posted jokes.

He shared photographs.

He followed trends.

He knew exactly what kind of content received attention.

And he had developed a habit.

Every few minutes, he checked his phone.

He would post something.

Then refresh.

Refresh again.

And again.

If the likes increased, his mood improved.

If they stopped increasing, his mood changed.

One day, he posted a photograph that he thought was excellent.

After ten minutes:

Twenty-three likes.

After an hour:

Thirty-one.

He looked disappointed.

At the end of the day, he had seventy-four.

He deleted it.

I happened to see him doing it.

“Why did you delete the photograph?”

“Nobody liked it.”

“How many people liked it?”

“Seventy-four.”

I looked at him.

“Seventy-four people?”

“Yes.”

“And you're disappointed?”

He shrugged.

“It should have been more.”

I asked:

“How many people do you think need to like something before you are allowed to like yourself?”

He didn't answer.

Over the next few weeks, I began noticing a pattern.

Usman had stopped posting things because he enjoyed them.

He was posting things because he wanted a reaction.

If a particular style of photograph got attention, he repeated it.

If people laughed at a certain joke, he made more jokes like that.

If a controversial opinion received comments, he posted another one.

He was slowly allowing an invisible audience to decide what he should say, wear, think and become.

One day he told me:

“Sir, sometimes I feel that nobody cares about me.”

I asked:

“How many followers do you have?”

He told me.

“Do you know all of them personally?”

“No.”

“Have you ever spoken to most of them?”

“No.”

“Then how can their reactions determine whether you are cared for?”

He looked confused.

I told him:

“Attention and connection are not the same thing.”

A thousand people can see your photograph.

And you can still feel lonely.

One person can sit with you for twenty minutes and genuinely listen.

That may be worth more than a thousand likes.

I asked Usman to try something.

For one week, he would create something without posting it.

A drawing.

A photograph.

A short piece of writing.

A video.

Anything.

But nobody would see it.

He hated the idea.

“Then what's the point?”

I said:

“That is exactly the question I want you to think about.”

He eventually agreed.

The first day, he made something and immediately wanted to post it.

He stopped himself.

The second day, he created something else.

By the fifth day, something had changed.

He was beginning to enjoy the process.

He was creating because he liked creating.

Not because someone might press a button.

At the end of the week, I asked:

“Did you enjoy your work?”

“Yes.”

“Did anyone like it?”

“Nobody saw it.”

“Then why did you enjoy it?”

He smiled.

“Because I liked it.”

That was the lesson.

We need to build parts of our lives that do not depend on an audience.

A skill.

A hobby.

A friendship.

A sport.

Reading.

Learning.

Helping someone.

Building something.

These are forms of achievement that cannot be measured by likes.

I told Usman:

“Don't make the internet your enemy.

Learn to use it without allowing it to use you.”

There is nothing wrong with enjoying appreciation.

Everyone likes recognition.

The danger begins when recognition becomes validation, when we need other people's approval to feel valuable.

And once that happens, we become trapped.

We compare.

We compete.

We perform.

We edit.

We refresh.

And we ask the same question again and again:

“Do they like me?”

Perhaps the better question is:

“Do I respect the person I am becoming?”

That question is much harder.

But it is much more important.

Usman continued using social media.

He still posted.

He still enjoyed likes.

But he stopped treating likes as a measurement of his worth.

One afternoon he showed me a video he had created.

“Sir, this time I didn't make it for the algorithm.”

I asked:

“Then who did you make it for?”

He smiled.

“For myself.”

And perhaps that was the first time the internet had stopped being his audience...

and become his tool.