‘My mind is a lot quieter now and that I pay more attention to what is around me.’ Photograph: Ink Drop/Alamy View image in fullscreen ‘My mind is a lot quieter now and that I pay more attention to what is around me.’ Photograph: Ink Drop/Alamy Instagram Letters We are reclaiming real life after getting rid of Instagram Readers on taking back their lives – and brains – from social media algorithms
I couldn’t agree more with Georgina McNamara ( The one change that worked: I deleted Instagram – and embraced the joys of a truly private life, 19 October ).
Reading about the sheer relief of stepping away from Instagram resonates deeply with my own feelings over the last few years. There is an incredible quiet joy in reclaiming a truly private life, entirely free from the pressure to document, curate and perform our daily routines for an invisible audience.
This shift immediately brings to mind Jaron Lanier’s compelling points in his 2018 book Ten Arguments for Deleting Your Social Media Accounts Right Now . Lanier warned us that these platforms aren’t just neutral tools; they are behaviour-modification engines designed to hijack our attention and slowly erode our autonomy.
His argument that social media algorithms inherently reward outrage, tribalism and comparison to drive engagement feels truer today than ever. By participating, we unwittingly allow algorithms to alter our moods and warp our sense of reality, stripping away the simple contentment of just being.
In my own life, stepping back from that digital noise has been incredibly grounding. I’ve found that my most meaningful moments – whether I’m spending a few focused hours woodworking in my workshop, sitting down to figure out a new arrangement on the guitar, or just out walking the spaniels – are vastly richer when they exist solely in the present, without the impulse to photograph or share them.
Getting back to tangible, analogue realities has felt like taking a long, deep breath. Even organising a recent social evening at the local pub in Hipperholme reminded me how much more genuine our connections are when we are physically present, sharing a pint and a conversation rather than a screen.
A private life is not a smaller life; it is an unmediated one. As Lanier suggests, opting out isn’t just rejecting technology; it’s reclaiming our free will and our peace of mind. Guy Edmondson Hipperholme, West Yorkshire
Georgina McNamara’s article really resonated with me. I haven’t deleted Instagram, but I check it very infrequently now. While I didn’t post all that often, the compulsion to document experiences and turn moments into posts or stories, rather than being in the moment, was always there – and with it, the eventual anxiety about whether anyone had liked what I had posted.
I also realised that comparing my day-to-day life with others’ carefully curated highlights was making me unhappy: an endless stream of holiday photos made me keenly aware of how long it would be until I would next have a break, while other fitness instructors posting photos taken from strategic angles made me worry that I wasn’t as flexible as them in comparison, or that my technique was poor.
After reading some books and articles on cutting back on smartphone use, I took a number of steps to reduce my phone use, and used the One Sec app to trigger a breathing exercise whenever I opened Instagram.
It made me realise how often I checked Instagram as a reflex, and that I could be devoting this time to o…