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Alright Lovely Humans, today we’re going to talk about how to make Instagram a safe, friendly environment. A lot of the time social media can make us feel inadequate , guilty, ashamed or other negative things like that and Instagram is usually the main culprit.
The app is full of impossibly beautiful, tanned, toned gods and goddesses, living their best lives in a fantasy land where they make tonnes of money from wearing nice clothes and travelling the world. They never have bad days, they look spectacular 24/7 365 and basically, they’re not real.
But that’s not all there is to Instagram. The app is full of lovely, feel good content just waiting for us to consume it. But, for many reasons, it’s just not reaching us. So, how do we change that? Well, that’s what I’m here to help you with. After reading this article you’ve be looking at a whole new Instagram and feeling so much better for it.
How to Curate Your Instagram Feed
Follow Accounts That Make You Smile
This is SO easy to do. Find out what you love and basically only follow accounts that post that kind of content. LOVE wholesome animal content? Then follow a bunch of cute animal accounts. For me following a bunch of midsize, body confidence accounts made a HUGE difference. I was no longer opening Instagram and staring at a bunch of posts that made me hate myself. Now I was looking at beautiful women with bodies like mine who looked amazing, felt confident and radiated positive vibes. It was complete game changer.
If you’re not sure where to find accounts that you might like, Google is the answer. I Googled “Best Midsized Instagram Accounts” for inspiration and found articles like this mentioning people that I then found on Instagram. Once you follow one account that you like Instagram will automatically display a little slider of similar accounts that you might be interested in. Have a flick through those and soon you’ll be down a rabbit hole of amazing content that makes you smile.
The other option is to check out the explore page or to search hashtags that relate to whatever makes you happy. You can just start typing and Instagram will suggest popular hashtags. Then you can choose between Top and Recent and just scroll and follow accounts if you think they’re a great fit for you. In the words of Marie Kondo, only keep the ones that “spark joy”.
Interact With Those Accounts
The next step is to make sure that when these accounts and this content that you love/ makes you feel good pops up on your home feed INTERACT WITH IT. Instagram takes its cues from you, it will learn. So once you start liking and commenting and saving a lot of the same sort of content it will show you more and more of that on your home feed and in your explore page.
It’s absolutely brilliant! The other day I scrolled down my home feed and EVERY SINGLE POST was a midsize blogger and it honestly brought me so much joy. It was wild how quickly Instagram learned what I wanted to see and switched everything up.
Don’t be Afraid to Mute People
My GOD I love muting people. LOVE IT. There are plenty of people who I follow on Instagram for work purposes or even just friends, but I cannot stand what they post. It could be anything – maybe they’re mad into insane conspiracy theories, maybe they’re constantly whingeing or maybe they just put up 20 talking to camera stories every day without any captions. I MUTE THEM ALL.
The best thing about muting people is that they don’t know that you’ve done it. You’re still following them, you just don’t see their posts anymore. You can mute stories or feed posts or both and it makes such a big different. Of course, if you want to see what they’re up to every once in a while you can still go onto their page and check out all their content. You can also unmute them at any time.
Honestly, it’s one of Instagram’s best functions. If someone’s post has a negative emotional affect on me I nearly always mute them. I think of it as tidying up my feed. It makes more room for the good stuff. Don’t feel guilty either. What they won’t know won’t hurt them. You don’t owe anyone a watch of their story or a like of their post and if anyone gets upset about that kind of thing they need to sort out their priorities.
Muting is very simple. If it’s a story you see that you want to mute you just press and hold on the little circle of their story at the top of your feed and it will pop up with the option to “View Profile” or “Mute”. Then it will pop up with the option to “Mute Story” or “Mute Story and Posts” and will reassure you that the account won’t know. If it’s a post you’ve seen that you want to mute just tap on the three dots on the top right handside and “Mute” will be the option down the bottom.
To unmute just go to their profile and tap on the first rectangular button under their bio that says “Following”. There is a Mute option that will let you toggle mute on or off for stories and posts.
Definitely Don’t be Afraid to Block People
Sometimes mute isn’t strong enough and you just need to remove people. If you’re getting a lot of spam messages, rude messages, inappropriate messages or just downright annoying messages/comments then I highly recommend blocking people.
I have a LONG and well thought out block list. I block anyone who constantly follows me. You know when you recognise their name from the fact that they’ve followed you 7 times this week?! Yeah, I block those people, which has led to me accidentally blocking a travel PR before, which was awkward, but hey, she brought it on herself.
I also block any of those spam accounts that reply to story questions with silly messages promoting fan sites or their own sites. Of course, I block any account that sends creepy or inappropriate messages. Then, obviously, I block my mortal enemies so that they can’t leave mean comments on my posts haha. Some people just don’t deserve the privilege of seeing your Instagram account, so don’t give it to them.
Hit “Not Interested”
Last, but not least, if your explore page isn’t really showing you what you want, you should probably start using the “Not Interested” button. You simply click into the post and tap the three dots above the post and it will give you the option to select “Not Interested”.
This sends Instagram the message that you’re not into whatever type of content they were serving you and it will learn from that. You might have to do it a couple of times but after that you shouldn’t see that kind of content on your explore page any longer.
Let’s Wrap it Up
SO, I hope you found that guide to creating a safe and happy Instagram feed useful. I hope that if you’ve fallen out of love with Instagram and if it’s ever made you feel bad about yourself that this article helps to change that. May your home feed be filled with beautiful, happy, kind, funny posts that bring you joy. Hopefully I’m one of those accounts – @whereistarablog haha. Until next time, stay safe Lovely Humans!
