Positive reinforcement loop set up to fail

It takes one to know one. I'm as guilty as anyone when it comes to seeking feedback or approval. Last week, I posted photos of my daughters' first day of school, and caught myself checking in on my post throughout the day — counting up the likes and comments. What is the magic number for my worth? Is it 100? 200? If I get 300 likes, does it mean that I'm popular? Why aren't more people from my hometown liking my post? Are people scrolling by and not clicking like? We are in a maddening feedback loop that I'm convinced is contributing to our collective poor mental health. According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness, one in five adults experience mental illness each year, and 1 in 6 youth aged 6-17 experience a mental health disorder every year. And even above these numbers, those who feel the blues and the thief of joy that is comparison probably number more than those who don't. We live in an increasingly selfish and vain society that treats positive feedback as currency. The problem is that too often, our worth isn't fostered on deep connection with others. It is too often tied to more surface level things like performance on all types of feedback — from how many likes a post gains to whether or not one gets ample playing time in the middle school volleyball match. Feedback is part of life, and always has been. Parenting, teaching and coaching all provide important feedback. Doctors, religious leaders, bosses. Most of the time, that feedback is behind closed doors, important information that by and large is contained to a private setting. Public feedback also is a part of life, but an experience that is now everywhere in our current society. If you've recently had kids or grandkids, you know how young they are separated into buckets — try out for this travel team, aim for that part in the play. This provides tense moments where one's "worth" can be affected by one of many feedback-inducing decisions we now must face. It often comes with a fear-inducing period of stress that proceeds a decision. Feedback is also on the increase in the testing world. State testing rules the roost in our classrooms, providing us instant feedback that is useful in making macro-level decisions. It's helpful to have measuring sticks and checkpoints, but this constant feedback has to be wearing on young minds that should be programmed on creativity, inspiration and dreaming big. Especially at the younger ages. Public feedback certainly is a hallmark of our social media era, where currency is built on the crafting of one's brand. "Influencers" existed far beyond the advent of social media, as advertising has always aimed to affect consumer behavior by depicting an aspirational life. But social media now tallies feedback in real time, through views, likes, shares and Snap scores. I fear we are creating people dependent on positive reinforcement in order to derive positive self-worth. And we should know that positive reinforcement is fleeting. Hey, my post got 350 likes. Awesome. But what if my next one gets a third of that? I know this is contributing to anxiety in our age, and likely is a contributing factor to our country's alarming suicide rate. What is the answer? It's nuanced and not one size fits all. The digital world is our world, and it's a fool's errand to fight that. People need connection, and digital connection is this era's most impactful form of communication. Tweaking or reducing screen time would surely help, but calling for a clean stop of our modern lifestyle is the equivalent of trying to push an elephant down with one hand. My solution is one that I often go to. It's to pray. To pray for those suffering from low self-esteem and for leaders to zero in on policies that protect the self-worth of children. It's to pray for more to find the peace that exists with a relationship with Jesus Christ, as an identity with him is exponentially more secure than one rooted in this world. I too often crave positive feedback as if my battery pack runs low without it. Being more comfortable in my own — our own — skin is something we all should work on. One more off the wall idea…Ohio recently had a pair of tax-free weekends for students buying supplies ahead of the return to school. Perhaps we should try a collective social media free weekend? I'm thinking it would do wonders for our mental health. Jeremy Speer is the publisher of The Courier, Findlay, the Sandusky Register, The Advertiser-Tribune, Tiffin, the Norwalk Reflector and Review Times, Fostoria. He can be reached at jeremyspeer@thecourier.com.