I'm off social media but it's not what you think.

For some time now I had a premonition that I ought to quit social media. Or rather all one of it that gets any kind of use - Instagram. In good faith, I wasn't all-together sure that this internal impulse to quit was entirely deserved. To my best knowledge, social media addict I am not.

Faced with an impulse I did not recognise, I turned to the literature. Cursory glance across the space offers no end of potent examples and good reasons to quit social media. Usual suspects bubble up to the surface - excessive use, unhealthy comparison, and progressive radicalisation of content. My phone informs me that I spend around 38 minutes a day on Instagram, which isn't altogether much so excessive use is out. Drawing of comparisons has never been an issue, whether through pride, folly, or both. Radicalisation of content is terribly concerning in its wider context but my discovery page is filled with pictures of dogs and hamsters. This particular slice of Instagram doesn't leave much room for radicalisation. Extended use makes dogs cuddlier and hamsters fatter. If this be radicalisation of content, let us have more of it.

It is my general belief that whims of the mind are ought to be indulged and so I made a decision to quit for a month. In the first days that followed, unable to find the Instagram icon, I did stare at my phone with befuddlement a bit more than usual. But no other revelations followed. Minor suggestion of muscle memory addiction is concerning, but is exactly what it says on the tin - minor. Underwhelmed by the absence of life-changing revelations, I did consider scrapping the pointless exercise and going back to Instagram but having announced the endeavour to the world, to go back would be to admit defeat. No amount of protesting would help.

What started off as a matter of self-introspection turned into a matter of begrudging principle within days. It also goes without saying that a person who decides to quit social media still has to live in a world increasingly reliant on social media. Temptation to come back reached its pinnacle when I got asked to produce my ID while purchasing plastic spoons. Turns out 25 is the exact age at which chances of you carrying out a vicious attack with plastic cutlery reduces to a level deemed low enough so as to permit their purchase. Social media is made for occasions such as these so I was fuming at inability to share.

And yet, I did feel better, lighter somehow. I brushed it off to some odd strand of confirmation bias designed to make me feel content with choices made. Either way, it didn't make sense. Until that is I went to see Present Laughter at the Old Vic with R---. Noel Coward's brilliant play follows self-obsessed actor, on the brink of identity crisis, through a calamitous few days as he tries to deal with (wo)men in his life and they with him. This rendition is delightful and Andrew Scott is magnificent as the lead. Most funny plays are amusing merely. This one is laugh out loud funny. During the play's emotional pinnacle, Andrew Scott's character cries out "I’m sick to death of being stuffed with everybody’s confidences. I’m bulging with them. You all of you come to me over and over again and pour your damned tears and emotions and sentiment over me until I’m wet through". Click.

Instagram, and social media in general, does a brilliant job of keeping you updated on thoughts, moods, and hot takes of people in and out of your social circle. On reflection, I don't even want my own day-to-day minutia clustering the old noodle, let alone that of my friends; infinitely less still that of strangers. Its not that I do not care for my friends, I love the lot of them. Its just that I really do not need to know their every thought. Hopefully I earned enough of their confidence to hear from them directly should they ever need me. It dawned on me that while I miss certain aspects of Instagram, I do not miss these voices in my head that aren’t mine. Gosh do I not miss that.

At the time of writing, I have another 10 days or so before my month of self-imposed moratorium comes to an end. It's time to draw some conclusions. Social media itself wasn't the problem; and after all is said and done I will be coming back. Though this time with a difference. Coward said elsewhere "Television is for appearing on - not for looking at". I am starting to think that the same applies to social media.