It has been about a week and a half since I officially deleted my Instagram account, so I think that it’s been enough time for me to reflect on my feelings about the decision. Before I say anything else, I’ll say that I honestly have zero regrets about saying goodbye to IG, and if you’ve been thinking about deleting your social media presence yourself, I say DO IT.
I’ll come clean and admit that I had a bit of an addiction to Instagram. But who can blame me when I’ve had the app for more than six years? Let me just tell you that growing up on social media isn’t healthy, no matter how much you think that you’re immune to its negative impacts on your mental health. How you see yourself today has probably been somehow impacted by your use of social media growing up and most likely, it hasn’t been impacted positively.
Let’s first just talk about our obsession as a society with having an audience. Whether this is going viral on Tiktok, having a large following as an Instagram influencer, or getting over a hundred retweets on Twitter, we as a society like being watched. We feed this obsession by posting pictures of our overpriced meals, staging “candid” photos with friends, and sharing pictures with our tummies sucked in on the beach. Not only do we want people to see us, but we also want people to see the best version of us, and whether or not that version of us is even real doesn’t matter. Even if you yourself have an authentic social media presence, that, unfortunately, doesn’t prevent you from being negatively impacted by the staged online presence of someone else. The truth is, even if it’s subconsciously, many of us first learn to compare ourselves to others on social media.
Apps such as Instagram and Facebook are presented as harmless outlets to share photos with loved ones, and yet they reward users with the most likes, followers, and shares. Even the word “follower” subconsciously implies a power imbalance between the one posting and the one “following.” If you follow a user and they don’t follow you back, they have the “power” or influence in that online relationship. Even if it sounds far fetched, psychologically it’s how your brain is perceiving it and that is exactly why the users with the most followers on social media have such a strong influence. Regardless of their content, if they have people “following” them, they have a voice that matters in our society.
And I know, it’s not always that deep. But just look at the influence that content creators such as Emma Chamberlain and Charli D’amelio, for example, have on the current trends. And corporations are eating this cycle up. The more followers that influencers get, the more people buy their coffee drinks and use their partnership codes. It’s up to you to decide how much influence you want to allow the media to have over you and your choices as a consumer.
On the other hand, I want you to think about the last time you met someone new. How long did it take for you to look them up on social media and give them a follow after meeting them? A couple of hours? A day? As you scrolled through their page for the first time your brain subconsciously came to multiple conclusions about this person and their life, just from looking at their photos.
Whether or not you realize it, your brain holds onto these assumptions, and it impacts the way you look at this person moving forward. This goes deeper than just a first impression; it’s known as the primacy effect, or the first information we receive about others that shape our impression of them. Normally, we’d get our first information about someone else from spending time with them, however, social media changes that and may even be impacting the lasting impressions that we have of people in our lives. I think I really just decided that I wanted my actions to be the only thing representing me, rather than the very best photos of myself and the perfected image that I tried to portray online.
Don’t get me wrong, social media has its positives. I realize that it’s a great tool for connection and communication in the digital world. The way I see it, if you’re projecting yourself authentically online in an age of faking it, you’re already winning at social media. However, for me, the cons just outweigh the pros. I’m ready to start putting my time and energy into something that fulfills me and gives me joy, and Instagram was no longer something that did that.
I hope that if social media is something that you enjoy, that you’re using it in a healthy and positive way. This is just some food for thought!