Social media interactions say A LOT about how your friends feel about you in the real world.
In fact, the way your friends treat you on social media is how they really feel about you. Let me explain.
This applies if you have friends who are super nice to you every time you get together face-to-face… they’re warm, friendly, all good vibes in person.
However, whenever you post something on social media, they act like they never saw it.
They’re always in your views, but never in your likes. They don’t comment, they don’t engage, they don’t support.
What’s that about? I’ll give you my thoughts on the matter.
Social media speaks volumes about IRL friendship
A dating coach named Anwar White coined the term BDB: between-date behavior. He originally applied it to dating, but it works the same for friendships.
Think of it like this: if you’re dating someone new and you see them once a week, how do they treat you in the six days between dates? That “in-between” behavior is what shows you who they really are.
They might treat you like a queen on Friday during your date night, but if they ghost you Saturday through Thursday, is that a relationship that’s going to thrive? Absolutely TF not.
For friendships, it’s the same thing. We’re all adults, we all have busy schedules.
We might only see our friends in person once a month, every other month, or maybe just on birthdays.
That means the majority of our friendship is carried in the “in-between.” And a lot of that happens on social media.
So if someone claims to be your friend, but they never engage with you there — no likes, no comments, no DMs — how they treat you in that “BDB” is how they really feel about you.
Unless you’re my dance class friends that I see every day, I’m not seeing you that often.
So I keep friendships alive through engagement — liking posts, commenting, DMing, and otherwise showing that I care.
But here’s the thing: I’m the queen of matching energy. If social media engagement is not reciprocated, I’m not going out of my way.
And before people dismiss this with, “Social media isn’t that serious, it’s about real-life interactions” — that only works if real-life interactions are happening often.
If social media is the main way we stay connected, then engagement MATTERS.
This is 2025. Social media is how people keep up with each other. One example? When someone unfollows you, they’re sending a very clear message: they don’t care to keep up with your life anymore. That’s bold.
So don’t downplay it.
Social media engagement tells you a lot about how people really feel about you — unless you’re a boomer, I don’t wanna hear it.
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