I feel a little jealous. My friend’s profile picture on Facebook is wonderful.

It’s her in all her Spring Break glory. Knee-deep in sparkly ocean water, red bikini, hips out and hands in hair in a great imitation of a Sports Illustrated swimsuit model, she’s the hottest girl on my newsfeed this week.

Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, etc. allow for the kind of tabloidesque fame originally reserved for the Courtney Loves of the world. In a time when every thought, activity and accomplishment can be shown to the world, is there such thing as modesty?

When I was growing up, I was taught to showcase myself in a flattering light, but never to brag. Flashiness was the equivalent to tackiness, and lists of skills were reserved for resumés. I find that now, any kind of modesty will leave me in the digital dust.

Luckily for the world, my upbringing has not prevented me from becoming obnoxiously revealing, which is why I have the audacity to think people want to hear my opinions every week. However, I can’t help but be anxious.

From now on I have the burden of carefully crafting my persona so that everyone knows how great/interesting/cool I am simply by scrolling through a Web page.

Should I have a nickname? Am I an intellectual with a list of cool books and indie bands and films?

Am I a party girl boozing with my friends or a man’s best friend whose interests are “Animal House,” Comedy Central and the Cavaliers?

I am also painfully aware of all the people (aka the New York Times editor dying to hire me) who can see me on the Internet. Perhaps online I will be a serious career girl using only SAT vocab words to describe myself.

Either way, there is nothing modest about this phenomenon. Seems to me the rule of thumb is to race for attention.

I can’t help but wonder how to use this to my benefit. Do you ever wonder what happens to that girl’s lingerie profile pic? Does it pop up on Google when she’s in her 30s? Does that photo of your boyfriend passed out with a penis on his face float in cyberspace forever?

It’s because of this that I think a push for modesty should come back.

Theoretically, Facebook isn’t that different from wandering around at the mall posing in stores you have no intention of buying merchandise from.

It’s no different from going to your high school festival with your besties trying to see and be seen, or playing frisbee in the Oval shirtless when it’s not even 70 degrees.

No one remembers those days. Everyone used to forget how slutty or strangely you dressed, how stupid you acted for attention or the pranks you pulled. You move on with your life and laugh about it when you are older.

Now that we’ve come to document these cases with the furor of paparazzi tailing a teetering, panty-less and wasted Miley Cyrus (it hasn’t happened yet but just you wait), funny anecdotes could become haunting embarrassments.

You can improve your whole life by being a little more modest. You can express your personality without becoming an exhibitionist. You don’t need every picture to be a posed portrait, or every line to be a declaration of your individuality.

Keep it clean. Tell me what you like and don’t like, and show me a picture that tells me who you are, not who you wish to be. You can keep your embarrassing mistakes to yourself.

Next week: Selfishness.

Everdeen Mason can be reached at [email protected].