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Myspace and facebook were engineered as networking tools allowing people to keep in contact with their friends and relatives, and to find new ones. Many people tend to use the site as a way of keeping in contact with people who might have moved away, or live in different countries. As well as this social websites make it possible to contact former schoolmates who you might have lost touch with. However contacting people you haven't talked to for years isn't always a great idea for a number of reasons.

Firstly the people from the past who you currently keep in contact with are the ones who were the most important to you. Which is why they were retained as a friend after school etc finished. The other people who you no longer talk to probably weren't that important to you at the time. Which is a good indicator that there is no reason you should want to talk to them now.

Imagine also if you were to contact the people you used to know only to find out that they are all a lot more successful than you. This to most people could be quite damaging and could well harm their self confidence and even bring about a mid life crisis. It is human nature to compare ourselves to others, and this is never more true than when we hear about old classmates. This is never a good thing however because there will always be someone that you never liked that has become more successful.

There are some cases where you might find an old friend that you never meant to lose contact with, and in that respect facebook and myspace are great ways to keep in contact and find people that you want to talk to, or that you lost in the past, but the vast majority of people form your school days aren't people you necessarily want or need to be reminded of.

If you had bad experiences of school, as a lot of people did in some way or another, then the last thing you want is to be reminded of them by being contacted by former friends etc. After all your life after school is completely different than it was then, and you are a much different person.

Having a constant reminder of that past may hold you back or even dent your new confidence and affect how you think of yourself compared to what you used to be like. For example a kid who might have been picked on in school or might not have been the smartest might in later life become very successful. However they might not have succeeded as easily or in fact at all if they were still in contact with the people who used to keep them down.

Overall I think things like facebook and myspace do have their uses, but contacting old school friends that you by now have nothing in common with apart from the past is a bad idea. If you liked these people so much you would have stayed in contact with them over the years anyway.

Learn more about this author, Scott Heritage.
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