It was snowing, or the temperature was in the negative or single digits, or the sunset was bright and colorful, so what did you do? You grabbed your phone, took a picture, and posted it on your social media accounts. You are not alone though, as so many other people are doing the same thing; they too want to take an artsy picture and post it. And so our feeds are filled with slightly different variations of the same picture over and over and over again.

Everyone wants to capture the picture-perfect moment, but does everyone have to post it? No. While I can’t say I am not guilty of doing this myself, when the same pictures are all over my social media feeds, I get annoyed. Less is more; there are times when we should just live in some moments without taking photos and sharing them with everyone.

I do not find any pleasure in scrolling through ten or more of almost the exact same picture, whether it be the full moon or the crashing waves on the beach. When people post those pictures, I think they are forgetting something very important: I can go outside and look at the sun, or snow, or feel how cold it is. I do not need to see your picture.

In some cases, I think it is perfectly fine for someone to post a picture of a landscape; for instance, if they are on vacation somewhere where the climate is different than here in Massachusetts. I appreciate seeing a picture of the beach on a cold winter day or of a city I haven’t heard of. It widens my world and I may add that location to my mental list of places I hope to visit one day.

Sure, take a picture of the pretty scenery here in Northborough and Southborough, but you do not need to post it for everyone to see. Keep it on your phone for you to look back at later, send the Snapchat to a few friends, but do not post it.

Yes, it may be an artsy picture that will get you lots of likes. Or yes, it may add to your Instagram “aesthetic.” Our generation has become obsessed with getting likes on pictures, sometimes even deleting a post if it doesn’t get a certain amount of likes.

Suit yourself and post the picture because there is no rule saying that you can’t. But just remember, when everyone posts very similar pictures on the same day, it gets repetitive and boring. Think before you post: are you the only one posting this picture, or is half the school posting it too?