Have you ever had another persons phone, scrolled through their Instagram feed and feel like you are invading their privacy, or am I just a weirdo? The privacy part might be a tad dramatic, but scrolling through an Instagram feed that is not your own can feel so foreign. It's so personal to the individual and possibly, totally different to yours. The people we choose to follow, like and comment on are all very personal choices. Our feeds as curated as they may or may not be, are an extension of our lives and those who in some strange way we allow into ours. Or we go into theirs - I haven't really figured that part out yet. We have so much power and possibility in the palm of our hands, yet a lot of that power isn't being put to good use. I have never hidden the fact that I have a love/hate relationship with social media. As a generation we live in a very exciting time, social media is opening doors and bloody windows allowing people to create opportunities probably never possible before. But, it's also at times pretty gross.
Depending on how you use social media you may access the applications multiple times in a day, I know I do. That's a constant stream of content that you have tailor-made to consume in your hands, from any location you may be in (signal permitting). We take these people we follow to the toilet, shops, sofa and our beds. We have these feeds full of content that sometimes doesn't serve any positive purpose. If your struggling with your body image, but follow a bunch of Victoria Secrets models whos pictures, beautiful as they may be, make you feel even worse about yourself. My advice, hit that unfollow button! Find content that leaves a positive impact on your mind and timeline. That being said, if the VS models are inspiring you to be the best version of yourself. Then you keep doing you baby girl - everything is relative after all. Ultimately your feed should feed you, probably more figuratively than literally. It should feed your mind, empower you, inspire you, make you laugh and make you feel good. If you scroll through any social feed that you have, Facebook, Instagram even Whats app and your not feeling or experiencing the majority of the emotions (and more) that I mentioned before - then it's time to have a 'health check' on your feed.
I've realised that Instagram is a platform I will inevitably write about on countless occasions. The more I use it my feelings surrounding it evolve. It crazy when I think about it, I have friendships on social media with people I have never actually met in real life. At the same time I have met people in real life that I feel like I know, based on social media. When really they are complete strangers to me. Mind blown - LOL. But that is whats great about social media, Instagram in particular. We have this amazing tool for networking both personally and professionally. But a lot of that gets distorted in the fabricated reality that people project. As voyeurs it's easy to get lost in the space, consume it and leave it feeling not that great about ourselves. When Instagram was created that could never have been the intention, so don't let that be the reality you create. Next time you are scrolling think about what you are consuming via the palm of your hands. Make a conscious decision to have a feed that makes you feel good, whatever that feeling may mean to you. Hopefully that doesn't mean you will unfollow me, lol. But if you do, no hard feeling your feed comes first. xx
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