I just deleted my Instagram account.
Deleted, like, forever.
It makes me kinda sad! I had lots of happy things on it, lots of things I loved, and now all of it is gone forever!
Well, that's not true. Because Instagram was not the real thing. It may have been keeping the memory alive in a way that people could look at it if they went to my profile, but the memory would have been saved in the picture whether I posted it or not, and the experience would have been experienced whether I captured it in a picture or not. See, my personal hypotheses that "instagram is a fake world" and therefore you do not have to follow people back if you don't want to convicted me (well, the Holy Spirit convicted me) that Instagram, a fake world, does not need such a hold on my real world. So now it's gone. Bye.
To be honest, I kind of miss it! (wow, self. come on. it's been like two minutes). But here's the thing. Now people can't randomly insta-stalk me for pics of my life. Now I don't have a forum for feedback on how awesome I can make my life look in a square on a screen. Now my phone will not be half so entertaining, because I know myself too well to get a twitter and I don't have any other social networks I use regularly. Now people will ask my why I got rid of my instagram, and I'll have to tell them that the Holy Spirit convicted me that it was something that needed to happen. That a social network was too big a deal for me and was skewing how I looked at people and I needed to delete it. But now it's gone, and that's good. Because, the Holy Spirit reminded me, if I kept it when I knew I should delete it, nothing I posted on it in the future could be purely and fully glorifying to Him. If it needed to be gone, then it needed to be gone, and I needed to let it go.
And now it's gone. Let's go live some now. Let's have a picnic and not worry about standing on my tip toes over the blanket to get the perfect picture of the perfect moment. Let me call a friend on their birthday instead of posting a picture or write them a letter or give them a donut. Let me show people my heart in real life so they don't know more about who I am from reading my tender captions and seeing how often I post about certain things than they know about me from actually being around me.
I know that Instagram is not a sin, but you'd have a hard time convincing me that it doesn't have a detrimental affect on our minds. Mostly because it's hurt me and how I look at people, and if I want to look and instantly love, I don't need to have preconceptions about numbers of followers or misconceptions about who people know. I needed to get rid of mine. I've tried before to just follow fewer people or have it on my phone less often, but this time I needed to delete it.
bye, fake, virtual profile.
I hope I love people better because of this. bye.
Also, I'll probably get stuck up because I deleted my Instagram. Because that's my sin nature, taking an act of begrudging obedience and turning it into a glorying martyrdom. [a virtual world. come on, self.] That's me, so I'm warning you. If I tell you about it, please say something to keep me humble. Like "oh." or "that's a pathetic struggle and if you have to do something like that to defeat it, whatever. I'm over here literally carrying a cross and Instagram is nothing to me. come on, maddieperkie. pick it up." Not because that's an appropriate attitude to have towards someone's struggle (at all), but because I need to not be praised, be the opposite of praised, because I'll probably be praising myself enough. Pride is dumb and I suggest avoiding it. As well as, possibly, avoiding Instagram.
