If You Need Some Attention (We All Do) Don't Shout at Cars

An Epiphany About Social Media, Secifically Instagram

I am always having epiphanies- pangs of clarifying thoughts that hit me like a tall wave in the face while the sun sets over the ocean. In other words, they are refreshing, welcome, but can be a shock to the system.

I’ve been thinking a lot about my relationship to social media lately and how I want to participate in 2020. I’ve thought many times that I’d like to take a long break, and honestly, that idea isn’t off the table, but it most likely would only be in regard to my creative posts, the ones about my artwork. I think about a time of creating without sharing, something I haven’t given myself in years, and as I sit here and type about it, feel like my heart really wants. Let me make a pact here and now that I will make that happen.

But I have four Instagram accounts total- two for art, one for my home organization business, and a personal one. I do like to share. Love it, but I also have a lot of negative feelings toward Instagram in general, so I’ve been trying to dig deep about what bothers me so much about it, and I had a moment of clarity recently, a vision.

I saw Instagram as a highway, we as the scrollers are the cars, and each post are the billboards, the highway signs, the tall gas station signage, and even, people pulled off on the side of the road, all trying to flag us down.

Everyday, millions upon millions of cars (or scrollers) are whizzing by all the people (posts) on the side of the road. We might wave (“like” a photo) and keep speeding by. We have places to go.

As cars in motion, we don’t always even see the signs. There are too many to pay attention to.

So what are all of the signs and broken down cars (posts) asking of the cars (scrollers)? In the real life scenario of a highway, all a broken down vehicle needs is one person to pull over to help. Or, even better, they need a cell phone to call for help. And a fast food restaurant needs however many people to pull off the exit and come through their doors. They don’t need everyone speeding by to stop.

It’s helpful for me to acknowledge that Instagram is similar. First, I need to know that people scrolling are moving at a pace that limits the amount of engagement each can have to my posts so that I have a more realistic expectation for who will “wave” or “pull over.” Second, I don’t need everyone to wave or pull over. As a business, I just need as many as will pay my bills, and as a person, well, if my sisters and mom wave hello, that’s really all I can ask for. Third, to wave on the side of the road in distress isn’t a position I want to put myself in if I can help it. When things get hard, I need a support system outside of all the people speeding by to help me. I need a handful of people I can count on when I call them. On the phone. AAA is also a great option.

This metaphor helps me see better why Instagram leaves me , and so many others, with such a bad feeling. At the core, we all want to acknowledge those people on the side of the road, even the ones telling me way too much information about how their life is hard or falling apart. And on the other end of it, when I hurt, it feels like announcing it to the cars is the right thing to do. But then I can literally see how many speed by. And that hurts.

We crave this connection from each other, but we are asking for it on a dangerous highway. Instead, we need to call the tow truck to get us to safety, so that we can ask for the help we need from people who can give it.

I am a four on the Enneagram, a natural sharer of my melancholic soul. I desire for people to know me and to understand me and I’m an open book so it’s not hard to share. But when I’m an open book on Instagram, it never feels great, and I’ve always wondered why. This analogy helps me understand better. More and more, the influencers I follow on Instagram, the ones with thousands of followers, are speaking up about how they struggle with depression and anxiety. One just announced she is bipolar.

While I know how much of a comfort this is to some who struggle with the same thing, I hope these IG celebrities don’t share this news with the expectation that it will help them. I don’t think it will. Looking at the big picture, I fear it will only make it worse, because social media is designed in such a way. I only think this type of sharing works if you have a wonderful, strong, and even professional, support system outside of the highway that is social media.

It’s amazing that something so present in our society perpetuates and even causes such a mental health crisis, and we welcome it with open arms. I want us to draw a line with it, to take away it’s power. Because, as I heard someone on a podcast say: “When I’m lying on my deathbed, I won’t be thinking about how many people liked that one post that one time.” The highway is great for headbanging to your road trip playlist. The exits and sites and people we are moving to and from are where it counts.