Instagram & I

Instagram,

We need an upgrade.

An upgrade to the relationship we share.

You have housed all my emotions, expressions, feeling, shades of ecstasy, and silence since 2012. Evidently, I have given a big chunk of my life to you. Yet, I haven't learnt to hate you, and I haven't learnt to love you either.

We started as an experiment, curiously exploring our likes, interests, and follows. Hoping to have no strings attached, and eventually disappear from each other's life without remorse - but I stayed. Active sometimes, passive another. The content buffet fed your pocket, but blinded my gaze on and off. I rubbed my eyes to peer through the lines between reality and illusions, but none transpired as truth. My 6th sense failed at your dopamine doses. I woke up to you and slept by your side - you took the place of warm flesh and blood awaiting me; but you didn't overwhelm me with negatives, as you graciously offered the tools to say 'not interested' or 'repost'. This thin film of security you provided, kept me going. I stayed.

Instagram & I

We took each other for granted, easily assuming neither of us would and could run off from each other. In our granted-ness we became demanding and notifying. You with your Ads and me with the influence of the people you called influencers. Soon the journey became that of opportunities, making us the opportunists bred by the social constructs, especially after you were bought out by 'Facebook' which we now call 'Meta'. You were not you anymore. The simplicity of our relationship got lost in the 'stories' we told, but I stayed, for you had become a habit I wasn't conscious to be troubled by.

I consented to your new numerous terms, and I permitted your access to my memories, my voice, and my face - upon which you decided to slap countless filters. Then you became pushy, asking me to write a bio and gain reach, asking me to define my worth and life merely in a few strands of words. You push my expansive essence into a box, forcing me to choose a label under the category of your targeting: artist, writer, author, entrepreneur, this or that. As per your recommendations, I focused on my niche, and interests, and stayed true to myself with it all. I shared my poetry with you, showing the vastness of life and every individual, but you refused to understand it, yet I didn't rebel. I stayed, accepting your algorithmic limitation and marched without questioning or reevaluating our relationship.

Over the years, all sorts of bashing were given to you by the social-media morel police. The extremes are your spectrum of your spectators, in harshness and love. I didn't care to stand by you, I will be honest. Not because you didn't need it anyway, but because the criticism you received are the truth, although hyperbolic. Mistake me not! I am not influenced by the worldly critics in my words here. This letter is a product of my authenticity - for I know nothing else to be and nothing else to do but love.

Then came the most demanding update from your side - the reels. The possibilities with it are creatively endless for a creator for calibre, but you reduced the creator's grand energy within us into a basket called 'content creators'.  The bottomless scrolls were no less than codeine shots. The verticals diluted the landscape, panoramic, and 360-degree spectrum of gaze. Instagram, reels became your third eye - hypnotising the users, the creators, and the businesses to attain an impenetrable count of people.

Some to monetise, and most for validation. Well, this sounds dark and grave, but darkness when littered with stars became a splendour. And that's what you become for millions, including me, and I couldn't pause to complain either. I stayed. The same unpredictable vertical tool (reels) got my work of months outside (in the real world) bounty of recognition. It showed me the intertwined nature that runs between the real and the reel world. You have made the word 'viral' slate and 'trend' not so trendy.

Despite it all, I too am intertwined with you for the love of people and our lives being poetry. After all these years, one thing is for certain: You are not authentic anymore. Your 'stories' are born to compete with Snapchat. You feared YouTube, so you had introduced IGTV but none stuck. Staying true to the word 'opportunist' your addictive make-over came to be when Tik-Tok 's features were stolen by you to birth reels. Maybe you suffer from imposture syndrome, but I never judged you. Even when you turned hypocrite asking your users to be authentic while nothing about you remained authentic.

This letter is my means of catharsis on behalf of the masses. Yes, we need an upgrade. Not an algorithmic one, but one that allows us to pause and reflect upon the relationship shared. To reevaluate our place in each other's life. Maybe this will lead us to get back together with a deeper purpose or not. I don't know and neither do you. That's the beauty of love. You don't do it for follows, hearts, shares, or shave. It's beyond granting favours and seeking validation. You love to mutually grow while respecting humane values. You surely have plenty of fish to bait, but this bird is born to fly and fly I will - with you, without you, and all...

Hopefully, you will hop on the ride to balance, love, and natural abundance.

For now, I have upgraded!

I have upgraded, from you…

XOXO

RN💋

1st Feb 2025

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