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Many parents blamed themselves, or their kids, for the hours lost to the feed. But legal claims allege social media companies built in psychological triggers on purpose: intermittent rewards, endless scrolling, toxic social comparison, and recommendation engines that pull kids into content rabbit holes.
Now families are filing legal claims against platforms like Instagram and TikTok.
You may be eligible if:
Excessive social media use started under age 18
There was a diagnosis of an eating disorder, severe anxiety, depression, or self-harm
ClaimsHero checks whether you qualify for a claim and gets your family justice. Nothing upfront. We only get paid if your claim is successful.
E V O T I O N A L
The One That Stuck
Somebody said something to me years ago that I can still quote word for word.
It was not even that bad, objectively. A quick dismissive comment about something I had worked hard on. The person who said it has almost certainly forgotten they ever said it. I would bet money on that. And yet here I am, however many years later, able to repeat it back verbatim including the tone.
Meanwhile I could not tell you a single encouraging thing somebody said to me last month. Not one, not with any accuracy.
That is a strange way to be built, isn’t it.
But it is how most of us work. Ten people tell you something kind and one person says something sharp, and the sharp one takes up residence. It moves in. It gets replayed at red lights and in the shower and at two in the morning. The ten kind things go right through you like water.
There is actually a reason for that, and it is not a character flaw. Our brains hold onto threat harder than they hold onto comfort because that is what kept people alive for a very long time. Remembering what hurt you is survival. Remembering what encouraged you is optional.
Useful in a dangerous world. Brutal in a world where most of the threats are just words.
The problem is what that does over time. If you give criticism a permanent seat and encouragement a visitor’s pass, eventually the criticism becomes the narrator. It becomes the voice reading your life back to you. And then you are walking around with somebody else’s offhand comment, possibly from a decade ago, functioning as your internal commentary.
That voice is not an accurate assessment of you. It just has the best attendance record.
David understood this, which is part of why Psalm 103 reads the way it does. He is talking to himself. “Let all that I am praise the Lord; may I never forget the good things he does for me.”
Never forget. That phrasing only makes sense if forgetting is the default. He is not writing poetry there. He is correcting his own memory on purpose because he knows it drifts toward the wrong things if he leaves it alone.
That is a practice, not a feeling. He is choosing what gets rehearsed.
So here is what might be worth trying. When the old comment surfaces this week, and it will, do not fight it or argue with it. That just gives it more airtime. Replace it. Deliberately pull up something true that has better authority behind it. What God says about you outranks what somebody said to you in a bad moment, and you are allowed to let the higher authority do the narrating.
And then one more thing. Since you know how this works now, be careful with what you hand other people. You have no idea which of your offhand comments is going to move into somebody’s head and stay there for fifteen years. Some of yours already have, and you do not know which ones.
Be generous with the kind ones. Those are the only ones worth leaving behind.
Much love and blessings,
Ramzi
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Where This Meets Real Life:
Family
Kids keep what you say about them for decades. Watch the throwaway comments, especially the frustrated ones. They outlive the moment.
Relationships
If one harsh thing somebody said is shaping how you see yourself in every relationship since, name it. You are allowed to stop giving it that much authority.
Mental Health
Negative self-talk often started as somebody else’s voice before it became yours. If you cannot untangle it on your own, that is good ground to cover with a counselor.
Finances
One critical comment about money can shape financial confidence for years. Your past is not a verdict on what you can learn now.
Physical Health
Something somebody said about your body probably still lives in your head. That comment was never the truth about you.
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Closing thoughts…
Criticism doesn’t stick because it’s accurate. It sticks because it’s loud.
…and now lets end in prayer!🙏
Lord, You know the comment I am still carrying and how long I have let it talk. Help me put it down. Let Your voice be the one I rehearse instead of the one that hurt me. And make me careful with my own words, knowing somebody else might be carrying mine the same way. Amen.