I’ve been off social media for about a month: no posting, scrolling, messaging, or commenting.
And surprisingly, it was pretty easy to stop. Initially, I noticed my thumb reflexively trying to tap the spot where the icon for Instagram had previously been located on my phone screen. But after a few days, the instinct stopped.
I did get a little curious during election week in the U.S., but then I decided it was for the best that I wasn’t spending time in the app doom scrolling.
So, did I learn anything from this break?
First, the things I didn’t miss…
- Mindlessly scrolling through posts that seemed to be less and less the people I am following.
- Feeling like the algorithm is constantly listening to me.
- The constant push as a creative to be sharing new content day after day.
Second, the thing I did miss…
- Learning from other artists and artist friends about events, successes, challenges, and new work.
- Staying up to date on the happenings in the lives of friends and family who I’m not chatting or texting with regularly.
- And, sharing some new ideas as I work through them.
In our household, we subscribe to 3 different newspapers, and I listen to an hour of NPR each day, so I didn’t feel like I was missing out on what was happening in the “world”, but I did feel like I was missing out on the happenings of individual people.
When I started posting more regularly on Instagram during the #100dayproject in 2021, what I enjoyed most was connecting with artists, both locally and from afar. We were still dealing with COVID protocols and I was a stay-at-home mom with an 18-month-old and a 9-year-old. I was barely seeing any adults, let alone my actual friends. Connecting with others this way helped me deal with my feelings of isolation.
It was during this time that I finally realized the good in social media. I think recently I forgot that or just felt like I needed a reset, which is why I took a little break last month.
My goals as I return to Instagram are…
- Try to limit mindless scrolling, or at least remember to select my favorites or followers instead of the default feed. (Which will be filled with more and more AI junk according to this article >)
- Make sure I’m engaging and commenting on other artists’ content.
- Put less time into my posting, it doesn’t have to be perfect. And, perhaps scheduling more of it, so I don’t feel like I’m constantly posting.