I also ended up deleting my Instagram app over the past couple of weeks. I was spending so much time on it, it was just getting out of hand and it was affecting my mental health. What I like about Instagram is that it helps me look back on my own highlights and memories...so I found an alternate way to document memories. I recently bought a journal and mini Kodak printer and have been printing photos and basically created an "Instagram" in real life in the form of a photo journal! And the nice thing, it's just for myself, like a memory book for me to look back on and a way to express my creativity. It was inspired by the host of an Air bnb I stayed at recently: https://www.thewoodlandstudio.ca/2020/04/document-my-journal.html
Oh I love this idea, how fun! What a sweet way to organize your memories. That's a really good point about looking back on positive memories and how healthy/good that can be. Thanks for bringing this up Naomi.
Absolutely love how you compared being off the gram to wandering around a foreign country. I feel the same sense of anonymity when I take breaks from the scrolling.
Oh my gosh I loved reading this! Thank you so much for your candour. This was so enriching and thought-provoking.
Personally, I stopped posting and scrolling Instagram about five years ago because it was just too much for my brain. Like so much that it was directly affecting my mental health and relationships. I was never an every day poster but I was an all day, every day scroller and it was a total time and energy vacuum. After having periods back on the app with finstas to see people’s work and to produce client work, I finally deleted absolutely everything about 12 months ago and haven’t been back on. Honestly, the moment that clinched the deletion was when I was in Portugal (having an extraordinary time!) last summer and was feeling yucky and envious of a girl who was in Spain...where I had just been. It was just taking me out of the moment so much, compromising enjoying a special moment, and a disservice to everything I actually care about that it had to go. This is long-winded, but basically now my outlook is that I need to intentionally source what I engage with otherwise it’s a slippery slope to a bad place mentally and even just with the time burn.
Something my husband and I talk about a lot as people that work in music and writing/marketing respectively is how the catch-all term of content is warping how we engage with all kinds of media and art. For instance, is something meant to be a snack or junk food like a treat for immediate forgetful inhalator consumption, or is it meant to be savoured and returned to and riffed upon and immersed in. I think this is what I want my media and art and creativity diet to be so for the foreseeable future, I just can’t be on platforms that require that sort of whole-body in and out. Is that a wild and inaccurate metaphor?
Anyway, I loved reading this and adored your pictures! Those places look so beautiful and sacred 🥰
It's nice to hear about your experience and how it helped you being off instagram. I was also feeling the intense energy vacuum of that app, and not to mention all the comparing. Thanks for sharing, and I really liked your metaphor. Let's savour the good meals of media! xx
I also ended up deleting my Instagram app over the past couple of weeks. I was spending so much time on it, it was just getting out of hand and it was affecting my mental health. What I like about Instagram is that it helps me look back on my own highlights and memories...so I found an alternate way to document memories. I recently bought a journal and mini Kodak printer and have been printing photos and basically created an "Instagram" in real life in the form of a photo journal! And the nice thing, it's just for myself, like a memory book for me to look back on and a way to express my creativity. It was inspired by the host of an Air bnb I stayed at recently: https://www.thewoodlandstudio.ca/2020/04/document-my-journal.html
Oh I love this idea, how fun! What a sweet way to organize your memories. That's a really good point about looking back on positive memories and how healthy/good that can be. Thanks for bringing this up Naomi.
I deleted mine too!
Interesting to read this as I've spent the past week considering doing the exact same thing!
It's the best. Excited to see what you decide and how it goes :)
Absolutely love how you compared being off the gram to wandering around a foreign country. I feel the same sense of anonymity when I take breaks from the scrolling.
Thanks Lexi, it's a fun thought. If only travelling were as easy as closing down Instagram, haha.
Oh my gosh I loved reading this! Thank you so much for your candour. This was so enriching and thought-provoking.
Personally, I stopped posting and scrolling Instagram about five years ago because it was just too much for my brain. Like so much that it was directly affecting my mental health and relationships. I was never an every day poster but I was an all day, every day scroller and it was a total time and energy vacuum. After having periods back on the app with finstas to see people’s work and to produce client work, I finally deleted absolutely everything about 12 months ago and haven’t been back on. Honestly, the moment that clinched the deletion was when I was in Portugal (having an extraordinary time!) last summer and was feeling yucky and envious of a girl who was in Spain...where I had just been. It was just taking me out of the moment so much, compromising enjoying a special moment, and a disservice to everything I actually care about that it had to go. This is long-winded, but basically now my outlook is that I need to intentionally source what I engage with otherwise it’s a slippery slope to a bad place mentally and even just with the time burn.
Something my husband and I talk about a lot as people that work in music and writing/marketing respectively is how the catch-all term of content is warping how we engage with all kinds of media and art. For instance, is something meant to be a snack or junk food like a treat for immediate forgetful inhalator consumption, or is it meant to be savoured and returned to and riffed upon and immersed in. I think this is what I want my media and art and creativity diet to be so for the foreseeable future, I just can’t be on platforms that require that sort of whole-body in and out. Is that a wild and inaccurate metaphor?
Anyway, I loved reading this and adored your pictures! Those places look so beautiful and sacred 🥰
Thank you so much for your sweet response AJ!
It's nice to hear about your experience and how it helped you being off instagram. I was also feeling the intense energy vacuum of that app, and not to mention all the comparing. Thanks for sharing, and I really liked your metaphor. Let's savour the good meals of media! xx