Creekside Garden

Four months ago, I deleted Instagram, and I have no desire to go back.

I love Instagram. There is so much beauty, inspiration, and community. I have creators I love following. I am a hungry learner and soaked up all the education available that I found interesting. There were extreme people to entertain me, godly people who encouraged me, and wise people to learn from. Instagram brings many amazing things right to our fingertips.

Yet, there is a darkness lurking among the beautiful pictures and crazy people. A time devouring monster with an insatiable appetite was eating away at my life one second at a time.

Since deleting social media I have noticed many changes in my life, but I wanted to share the three that stand out the most.

1. Peace in the Silence

As an introvert there is no feeling like coming home from a social event completely drained. When my shoes come off and I finally relax there is always a big sigh of relief. Even if it was the time of my life and the best day ever, being home suddenly hits like a refreshing glass of water. That is my brain away from social media. The noise is entertaining, but being away from it is life giving.

Instagram was a busy place for my brain to be. It was also a lot of fun. I love learning new things, celebrating the accomplishments of my friends, and seeing the beautiful things people share on the internet. I was updated on the latest songs, trends, and my friend’s lives – but it was a lot to live with every single day. It was too much and I found myself anxious and overstimulated. I craved peace.

My relationship with the Lord felt stagnant after I moved away from home. It was a long season of close to five years that I was thirsty for the peace I used to feel when I was close to God. For so long I was confused and frustrated. Why wasn’t I growing? Why did God stop answering my prayers? Why did I feel like I went backwards in my faith? Why was life so hard and where was God?

God never moved. But I did. I had filled all my quiet moments with worldly noise. Instead of meditating on his word, I scrolled reels. When I was stressed or scared I numbed out with funny videos to distract me. I replaced my relationship with the Lord partially with social media, then I had the audacity to wonder why I was anxious and overwhelmed.

True peace is found in a relationship with the Lord.

I find the most peace sitting in lonely places filled with nature and beauty, where there is silence to fill by talking to God about my life. I find peace in empty notebook pages with room to pour out my heart. Peace is not found in noise, distraction, and constant entertainment.

Deleting Instagram reminded me where true peace was found and revealed one reason why my spiritual life was struggling.

2. Comparison is the Thief of Joy

I am guilty of comparing myself to others. My children, my life, my marriage, my opportunities. Social media is the highlight reel of everyone’s lives and it made me struggle with feeling like I wasn’t good enough or (even worse) better than everyone else.

After comparing myself to others there is very little joy in me. I am suddenly anxious about my children keeping up with other people’s kids. Jealousy creeps in. Why does so-and-so get to travel and I am stuck here changing diapers and matching socks? Arrogance pops his ugly head up when I see someone struggling with something I am confident in. Or I start judging people for doing life differently.

During this 4 month fast from Instagram I gave into temptation one day and logged in to check my messages, suddenly I found myself in my old habits of checking all the updates and new things. As I scrolled I stumbled onto a post from a girl I knew in college who had recently had her second baby and is in a similar stage of life as me. She used her postpartum time to write a poetry book about her kids, published it, and had it listed for sale for her many followers. An amazing achievement and I have nothing but respect for her.

My reaction (something that I am solely responsible for) was not so amazing. I was immediately jealous. I have always wanted to write something to publish – and she managed that soon after having her second baby? I felt like I wasn’t doing enough. I was discouraged. Why didn’t I have that opportunity?

I recognized my reaction and deleted the app as fast as I could, but what I had seen continued to bother me. It also reaffirmed my decision to stay off of Instagram.

There is a lot of ugliness in my heart, which is there even without social media, but there is no need to feed those feelings intentionally. Jealousy, worry, and arrogance are sins I already struggle with.

Deleting Instagram has removed some of the temptation to compare myself to others.

3. Victim of Influencing

Finally, the number one reason I deleted Instagram is because of how it affected me as a young mother. Cason’s birth was my wake-up call. Social media influencing had so deeply changed how I thought about birth that I felt GUILT over being induced. Inducing labor was the right decision for me, my baby, and our family… yet there are people in real life and on the internet who believe that I failed.

There is so much valuable education on Instagram about almost every subject, but there is an equal amount of complete crap. The amount of effort it takes to sift through it all is exhausting. My emotions were being played with as pride, fear, love, and hate were triggered in mere seconds of each other, only muddling the waters of what is true and what is garbage.

As a mother, deleting Instagram has given me my authority back. Instead of being influenced by people who don’t care about me and my kids beyond what attention they can get from me, I have gone back to what mothers have always had. My intuition, advice from experienced mothers who I respect in real life, praying for wisdom, and God’s guidance in His word.

This approach is simple and timeless. It is not flashy, easy, or trendy. My goal is to protect my kids from bad advice on the internet and to raise them up like children have been raised by mothers for all of history – with a mother’s trusty gut, grandma’s advice, and God’s wisdom. Simply being faithful in the ordinary everyday.

Deleting Instagram restored my authority as a mother and my reliance on God for wisdom instead of strangers on the internet.

In Conclusion

I knew it was time to quit Instagram when it was negatively affecting my life. I also hated the addiction I had and how hard it was to quit. The easy dopamine and instant entertainment I had come to rely on when I was bored, lonely, distressed, or tired. In silence my thoughts sometimes felt too loud and the craving for distraction is real.

Quitting Instagram was a gradual process. I started by setting time limits on it, then deleting it for periods of time throughout the day. When Cason was born I finally deleted it for good, the major life change of having a baby was disrupting enough to my habits that it gave me what I needed to stop that addiction.

I replaced Instagram with YouTube videos and podcasts. The long form content is so much better for my brain and I am extremely picky about who I listen to. Facebook feels more like checking the newspaper and I am honestly bored after 15 minutes.

Currently my personal account on Instagram is still active because it is tied to my blogging account. If they were separate I would delete my personal account entirely. I have the @creekside.garden account to drive traffic to this blog – although I will admit, I haven’t posted over there hardly at all. I want more time away from Instagram before I try to keep that account active. No matter what, I never want to get stuck in the habit of scrolling ever again.

I hope you feel challenged about your relationship with social media. Even if this doesn’t inspire you to get off of it, I hope that you are at least wondering how it has changed your life (for good or bad). I would also encourage you to take a short break from it – a day, a week, or even a month.

How has social media affected you?