How My Life Changed After I Stopped Using Instagram

I'll never let them program my mind again

“Oh, you are not on Instagram?”

People get shocked when I tell them I quit Instagram (IG).

They find it hard to believe I lived without the dopamine fake world for so long.

My friends act like I've made a terrible mistake by leaving the platform that's mentally affecting billions of lives.

Won't lie; it wasn't easy.

I had spent years building an audience there, designing, writing, and sharing my philosophy weekly. I didn't care about leaving my 3.5k followers behind.

I was worried about my mental health and relationships with my friends. So I went cold turkey and stopped using the platform at the beginning of this year.

I didn't anticipate that these 5–6 months would change my life drastically, but they did.

And now I can never go back to using IG like before.

No Comparison Loop

The biggest sin of these algorithms is they make you compare your life with millions of others.

You sit at your dingy office when your friend is having a summer break in Alps. How will it not affect you when you haven't taken a vacation in years?

Seeing other people live the life you want but cannot live makes you question yourself.

Seeing other people live the life you want but cannot live makes you question yourself. As a result, you get depressed, and the comparison loops take over your mental health.

This was my last year — single, burnt out, and desperately looking for a change.

Seeing my friends marry and live their best life made me doubt my capabilities and pushed the button of negative self-talk and jealousy.

Now, when I hear about my friends doing better in life, I feel happy for them.

I don’t compare myself with anyone and don’t think my life should be perfect.

No Info Overload

We're living in a time when everyone is a content creator — willingly or unknowingly.

Everything online is content.

• The pictures from your weekend trek
• Your blog on mental health
• People's wedding pictures
• Even the IG reels.

With so many people posting and sharing their lives online, getting overloaded with content is inevitable.

This made me stop consuming content altogether.

As an ambitious person, my feed was flooded with Gary Vee screaming, motivation reels, a psychology carousel, and funny stories of dogs and people.

On top of it, I had my friends and colleagues sharing things.

My brain had become a mess.

Once I stopped using IG, I realized how amazing it feels to have a clear and empty mind.

My Inner Circle Got Strong

Another primary reason to leave IG was to focus on building real relationships.

I love memes; they often explain me better than I can explain myself.

I also love receiving memes, but they replaced the vulnerable talks and the deeper conversations I had with my friends.

Leaving IG saved me from fake meme friendships.

The time I saved from not going through hundreds of reels and posts gave me a chance to look at my relationships closely.

I finally had the time to connect deeper with people who mattered.

Our conversations were now on personal networks without distractions from the media platform. It brought me closer to my friends.

Not using IG also revealed who my real friends are and who were just acquaintances.

Less Info Means Less Drama

The more information we feed ourselves, the more unresolved threads and thoughts we entertain.

When I was active on IG, I was frequently caught up

• With the new business strategy, I could copy
• The new ensemble I could try
• The new book I could read
• The new video and podcast I could listen
• And the hundreds of personal details I garnered looking at my friends' stories.

I wanted to try everything and be everywhere.

My friends would forward controversial news from our inner circle and that of celebrities we adored.

There was news about breakups, marriages, and the market crash.

The drama and the tension were intense.

When I stopped using the platform I was away from the news, gossip, and drama — I was more peaceful and calm.

More Time To Do Things You Love

Time is the most critical asset of our life.

We can get the lost money, start a new business, and even make new friends but what we can never get back is the time we waste.

I had no idea until I ran an experiment where I started treating my time as money. It opened my eyes to how blatantly I was using different apps and wasting time.

Life = time we are alive

Time is life. And once you realize that, you'll automatically stop scrolling through social media all day.

Not using IG, in this case, save me enough time to learn new things and do what I love.

When you say no to the algorithms, you’re saying yes to yourself.

No Flexing

This break made me conscious of what I post online.

The constant flexing on social media doesn't benefit us; unless you're doing it for your business or a brand.

This made me decide not to post my pictures online. Flexing is the last thing I want to do online.

Once the urge to show everything I was doing in my life declined, I focused on activities that benefited my personal and professional growth.

What you ate for breakfast and what you wore to your cousin's wedding will not help you become a successful creator.

“If you need others to know that you are doing well, you’re not doing well.” — Nassim Taleb

Not Being the Product, I Make My Own Decision

The final change that happened with the experiment — I stopped being a product of these tech giants.

I still haven't seen Squid Games, Money Heist, or anything they flood your feed with.

The amount of content these companies create to woo you and the number of ads they run to make you buy a product is unbelievably high.

You cannot win against a billion-dollar company that's hired thousands of developers, scientists, and psychologists to feed your brain.

Not using IG was a pursuit to make my own decision and not get influenced by the world.

Unless you have rock-solid self-control, you will not win against their propaganda.

If you’re not paying for it you’re the product.

Social Media is a Double-Edged Sword

This era has given us many opportunities and is probably the best time to be alive, but it's also severely affected our mental health.

You can make millions online and can also get into depression.

You can find love online or get trolled for voicing your truth.

How you use these channels and how much you use them is the only way you can use the platform and not get used by them.

Staying away from IG for so long made me look at life through my eyes without any filters.

It made me think independently and make decisions that weren't influenced by my feed.

I've promised never to let any platform program my mind and alter my thinking.

What about you?

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