Instagram Is Rotting My Brain

The spores of the algorithm have infected my habits

Life starts to feel mundane when I lay down on the couch scrolling through reels like a mummy wrapped in strips of cloth I chose to be embalmed in.

What the freak!

I’m choosing to waste my life away on dumb dumb dumb stuff while the algorithm tries to anger me into staying on the platform by throwing at me every asinine thing Donald Turnip is posting on Twitter.

I don’t even have Twitter!

This is the point where my mind’s librarians are wearing cardigans and are trying to bring me toward the Enrichment section of the Library. But I’m so stuck to the ground by Instaglue it feels too difficult to get my feet off the floor. The librarians notice that the glue in my hands is Instaglue and they scowl at it before ripping it from my hands and throwing it and it sinks into some dark hole.

I’m free!

I set my phone on the coffee table and get up. No dopamine. I have to earn dopamine the hard way? I guess so. This is when I’m standing as if my brain has been suction cupped from my skull and I feel a bit dumb for a few minutes. There’s too many things I could be doing with my time. Read, scrapbook, paint, write, watch a movie, listen to music. These are all things I love to do, but I can’t seem to get myself to do them. There’s no instant gratification from my hobbies like there is from scrolling.

I feel like a pirate who needs to kick a barrel and say “blast it all.”

And usually, some of my favorite moments come by surprise. I’ll have to go outside for something and I’ll feel the wind, something tangible yet invisible. Or I’ll simply look out the window to see a smart bird find a spider’s nighttime catches and gobble them up while it's out of town for the morning.

This is the most I’ve enjoyed writing in weeks. Months even. Being silly is the best brain dump. I can let out my weird little thoughts and use my imagination. My imagination’s been fairly stale recently, so I’ve moistened it up by adding a new slice of bread into its bag. Does that make sense? Probably not :) That’s ok.

I’ve discovered I actually notice things when my phone is in another room. In my purse pocket. In some forgotten cave. It makes me think of that line from Love Actually where Hugh Grant says “If you look for it, I’ve got a sneaky feeling you’ll find that love actually is all around.”

Yeah, I’m still going to scroll, but at least I’m aware of my problem. I’m not going to recover from an addiction to technology that has been forced on our lives for 20 years in a day.

I need to write something simpleton before I become too serious. Enjoy this quote.

“On second thought, let’s not go to Camelot. It is a silly place.” - King Arthur

When I put down that blasted phone and use my eyes, I see a world full of color, ripe for harvest and picnics. No, it’s not perfect. But it’s real. Something Instagram can’t say about itself, no matter how hard it tries.

catch you on the flippity flip

- emma

{cover art: A quince and two apples by Johan Teyler}