Why I No Longer Use Instagram

From Social Media Addiction to Social Media Detox.

What is it for?

I don’t need to explain to anyone what a revolution to the world the birth of Instagram (IG) made.

I remember the day a friend introduced me to this platform shortly after it had launched in Poland. I could not comprehend the idea of why would someone want to post photos out there. What was the meaning?

The same happened with Snapchat. I totally didn’t understand the purpose of posting a photo “somewhere” where it will be gone after 24h - for what? All of that seemed ridiculous to me and I was against downloading the app.

As time came by and I noticed many of my friends being excited about these mobile applications and giving them attention during boring days at school - I gave it a try.

Instagram is Great

I started to fall into the “trap” of social media (SM) and shortly after I became a number one fan of IG.

What did I enjoy there?

easily accessible inspiration of any kind
getting to know how other people live & their new-to-me perspectives on life
informative & aesthetic & beautiful content
finding places worth visiting
staying in touch with my friends
following interesting to me accounts
keeping up with SM trends

From Love to Hate

For many years I’ve been a highly active user of social media - mainly IG, to the point where many of my actions came down to simply catching a good moment to post on an IG story. For what? You tell me.

Over time, my attitude towards this app has gone from love to hate. I began noticing that instead of brining joy&inspiration - the platform started to annoy me + I realized I am addicted to opening the app whenever I had a chance.

My Social-Media-Addiction Symptoms:

opening an app without a conscious intention to do it

wasting much of my free time to mindlessly scroll my phone
feeling dizzy after
needing to constantly keep up with the people I follow
instantly opening a story of people with whom I had a closer connection to
FOMO (fear of missing out) and fear of being not informed about something important happening
wanting to keep up with “everything-that-is-happening”
no internet access was making me nervous
having regrets when I didn’t catch “something special happening” to post it after

How Instagram Was Ruining My Everyday Well-Being

I was comparing myself to others I saw on IG - starting from their appearance, clothes, body image, the house they live in to the lifestyle they presented out there.
I rarely felt good enough - as all that I saw on SM was taking my attention out of being grateful for what I have to the lack of something I should have in my life.
I felt fat all the time. I was judging myself in the mirror roughly every day. I constantly tried to look better. And I was rarely satisfied with the way I was - having the not-real body standards in my mind.
I was wearing fake lashes - because I felt not pretty the way I was.
I had my hair highlighted to the point it became extremely damaged - because my natural hair color was not “good enough”.
I had my eyebrows painted to the point that instead of becoming more beautiful, I started to look funny.
I had my nails done - because long acrylic nails were “better” than my short natural ones.
I was buying fast fashion clothes to follow up with constantly changing trends.
I felt that I needed to become better, better, better and I believed that the external things that I put on me would make it happen.

— I am aware that the aspects above are not solely correlated to the use of IG only, but from the perspective of today, I can now admit that this platform was adding a lot to my poor mental health —

Detox Time

My “social media detox” began for a couple of days only - followed by a year - and finally after almost 2 years - ended in a conscious choice of whether I wanted to use SM or not.

The first days of the detox made me fully realize my addiction.

I was opening my phone and became disappointed that I had nothing to scroll in there.
I felt that I was missing out on something important happening, I felt “left out” & wanted to be “up-to-date”.
The times I was downloading the app again - I had a huge dopamine spike and an even bigger need to keep up with everything that had happened during the period I was gone.

That behavior showed me again that I didn’t want to function like this. Although I was still an active user of IG, I became more conscious of the ways this platform may affect me - and my approach to the app has changed. I started to look at it from a different perspective.

With time I started to be more & more disgusted with what I saw on IG and what kind of content was promoted there.
Of course, I fell into the trap of posting such content too.

My dislike towards IG has grown so much that one day I became simply tired of everything* out there and decided not to be on a “detox” anymore - but simply disappear from there until one day I would want to come back.

*including - everywhere-present persisting lies about reality, sexual content promotion, promotion of life with no values, the number of people presenting only their fairytale-kind-of-life & by any means showing off how amazing/cool/handsome/beautiful/sexy they are, the type&culture of direct messaging, advertisements everywhere, the type of “influencers” becoming famous, people pretending how much fun they’re having when in fact they’re just putting a fake smile adding a little dance to the camera when an IG story is being recorded, instagram filters, photoshopped photos, unrealistic beauty standards promotion, and so on, and so on…

— Was I contributing to the aspects above? Surely. —

After 2 Years

After 1 year of choosing not to be a user of IG and not to feed this machine, I opened the app again to see what was happening out there.
I was happy to see posts of my happy friends & to see “some news” that I wasn’t aware of before.

But I also saw that what is happening out there is no longer affecting me and I am just “visiting” a place that I don’t want to belong anymore. Also, I was surprised that it is difficult to find a photo in the feed, as the majority of the content is videos, making the experience even more overwhelming.

Overwhelming - this is the word that gives out the vibes of visiting IG after a long time.

Now, almost 2 years have passed and I still choose not to participate in a “regular” activity on IG. I visit the platform to look up what interests me or to keep up with SM trends for professional reasons.

What’s Next?

Everything that I wrote in this post until now is fairly biased and subjective - I know.

- Do I like social media in general?
- Yes.

- Do I think they may serve a good purpose?
- Yes

- Am I still using social media platforms?
- Yes.

I’ve just shared my personal experience and feelings towards IG showing the reasons that made me stay away.

I work in social media marketing and I am truly excited about my job & professional development - so obviously, I want to know what is happening in all of the SM platforms. What is the best way to learn how they function? To use them.

The Sweet Spot

Luckily, I have found my sweet spot.

I decided to use IG in a way that is closer to my values & without contributing to the aspects of IG I dislike.

For my joy, inspiration, aesthetics & input to the aspects I enjoy in social media - I am using Pinterest, where I dedicate my more personal space, as I enjoy the nature of this social media platform. (+LinkedIn has grown on me.)

Facebook & TikTok serve as a professional tool of work for now.

The End

If you have read it all through - thank you! I understand that you may not agree with many of the things I have written. The purpose of this post was not to attempt to get anyone to change their opinion about this matter - I simply wanted to share my perspective.

But hey! The opinions & perspectives change - as mine may too.