I had written a post a few months ago about the reason why I left Instagram in July 2024. However, not being on Instagram was leading to a few problems for me with the younger generation (which I am a part of, but do not always fit in *wink*). And so, I rejoined Instagram last Saturday.
One of the main reasons why I left in July was the reels. And yes, once again, as expected, I spent 3+ hours on the app on Sunday. But it's fine, weekends are meant to be enjoyed.
With regards to time management, I found a really good Instagram setting, where you can set a timer for the time you spend on the app each day. It's under Settings > Time Management.
There are two huge drawbacks of this setting:
When the pop-up appears on screen mentioning that you have completed the maximum time set by you, you have an option to ignore the reminder.
The setting is only a reminder! If you close the app and restart it, it works just like before.
So it's frankly pretty useless as it only reminds one that X amount of time has been spent on the app.
A much better way to control usage of the app is to go to your Phone Settings, and under Digital Wellbeing you'll be able to set an app timer. By doing this, your app will be disabled once the set time is up. The only way to enable it would be to go back to the settings and either delete that app's timer or increase the time.
Mindless scrolling and wasting entire days on the app isn't beneficial for one's mental health. The benefit of these timers is that even if you keep ignoring them, every time you see the time limit notification pop-up you are at least made aware of the time you spend on social media each day.
Here are a few ways in which we can reduce our daily social media screen time:
Use the Time Management setting or your phone's app timer to set a daily limit of an hour. Challenge yourself to adhere to the timer as many days a week as possible, and you can be lenient on the weekends.
Uninstall the app whenever you feel like you aren't able to control your daily usage. Do a digital detox. You can always install it again later.
Unfollow accounts which make you feel negative.
Being in control of one's time all boils down to mindfulness. We need to learn to be in tune with how we are truly feeling and to understand when something is making us anxious. We also need to learn to relax in ways that do not involve scrolling -- let's read a book, listen to music, practice a hobby, call a friend or just simply do nothing.
Thank you for reading! Stay blessed!
©TheKindTempest
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