We are living in a modern and fast-paced digital world where our relationships are more complex than ever. Dating apps, social media, and our lifestyle choices have made our connections more fragile than ever, which now flourish and falter with just a click and swipe. It is evolving so fast, that each day new terms like ghosting, benching, situationship, breadcrumbing, cookie-jarring, DTR, and textlationship are getting added to the lingo, and honestly most of us have little or no clue about it.
A recent addition is micro-cheating or emotional cheating, which apparently means small acts of betrayal on the internet. Gen-Z has coined this term for those subtle, emotionally charged behaviors, especially on the internet that can undermine trust without physical infidelity. So, if your partner liked an Instagram model’s picture or sent a good night text with a small heart, chances are it might be a form of micro-cheating. umm, no comments.
I came across this term during a recent Reddit post on r/AskIndia where a user asked fellow Redditors to define what according to them was micro-cheating. While some of them clearly made sense, some of them got me a little confused. Take a look at them and decide for yourself.
Social media has opened multiple ways of interacting. A simple heart reaction on your story might just be a like for you but can mean something else for someone else. What may or may not constitute cheating is a personal topic among couples and what might be normal for one couple, may not be for other. Especially in a digital age like ours where emoticons are emotions and snaps are more common than calls, personal boundaries need to be well-communicated for a healthy relationship.