An image is a false conclusion or generalization about life. The idealized self-image (or mask) is a false front, or attempt to portray a perfect generalized picture of who we think we ought to be. Both the image and the mask are motivated by the attempt to avoid in the future certain specific, real hurts of the past. Thus the real feelings of the

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“Perhaps, then, that Instagram shot or confessional tweet isn’t always meant to evoke some mythical, pretend version of ourselves,” he surmised, “but instead seeks to invoke the imagined perfect audience—the non-existent people who will see us exactly as we want to be seen.” “We are not curating an ideal self,” Alang added, “but rather, an ideal Ot... See more