How I gained back 2 hours of my day
My Instagram addiction story
Brook Slagle • 2024-02-04
Yo! Brook here.
I am currently writing this at 11pm on Sunday in Barcelona, Spain, procrastination nearly got me today.
Time change is a blessing for the KEEP GOING newsletter,
Anyway, story time…
I used to have an absurd Instagram addiction.
I had the habit of any second where I was “bored” to open my phone and click on Instagram. I would start scrolling and being mindless.
Hours would disappear.
Can you imagine how rough it was once they implemented reels?
Any free second and I would commence the DOOM SCROLL.
I eventually realized this was an issue and put a time limit on the app, thinking that this would solve the issue. Hopefully thinking.
But this issue was that I still had the habit to open the app whenever I was bored.
And even when I ran out of time,I still had the option to “One more minute… remind me in 15 mins… etc.”. The good thing was that I would rarely press it. That’s a mild win, at least.
I gained back some of my time.
But when I did press the button to extend my time, it would cause a cascade effect of me instilling the habit of opening that app whenever I was bored all over again.
I became aware of this, and so I thought that I would stop the habit of opening it by moving the app around my home screen.
The goal was to remove the physical habit of touching the screen in certain spots, ideally the habit would be interrupted, but stopping it.
This worked! For a little while…
But eventually I would find the app again, and it would just restart the process.
And in the end I ran out of new places to place the app, and I ALWAYS found new ways to find the app quicker each time.
So, I removed the app entirely from my home screen. Fixed! Or so I thought…
I then figured out that I could just swipe up and search the app with three characters “Ins” and then tap the little icon and BANG, I was back, stuck in this loop.
There was no end to this issue.
Now I had no choice but to just accept the issue and be addicted to Instagram, or uninstall the app entirely.
What did I do? The right thing, I did the right thing.
I removed it from my phone and honestly haven’t looked back since.
I access Instagram on my computer if I really want to, and I only do that for a couple mins a day.
One thing that has helped prevent any sort of habit from forming with the desktop site is a little Chrome extension called News Feed Eradicator.
Once configured, it allows the main feed for a determined amount of time, and then blocks it when time is up.
5 mins a day allows me to check up on my friends and favorite accounts, but never get sucked into a terrible habit.
I have gained back hours of my day, and years on my life.
Do you have the same issue? My recommendation: delete the phone app, and adapt to using it on your computer.
KEEP GOING
B.S.
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