A Love/Hate Affair With Instagram

Can you believe Instagram has been around for six years? Honestly, it feels longer. I remember when I first heard about Instagram. I had an Android phone at the time, and the uber popular social media app was exclusive to iPhone users only. By the way, can I just say that I wish they had kept it that way? But I digress. I wanted so badly to be a part of this cool photo-sharing community because Droid users didn't have anything as neat as Instagram, and because of my undying love for photography, I wanted IN. I felt it was only right to make the switch from Droid to Apple, and I never looked back.

It started out really fun for me. It was a great way to express myself through photography, and to allow my followers to see through my eyes. It wasn't just about the occasional selfie; I enjoyed taking photos of pretty much everything.

Somewhere along the way, it ended up becoming....not as fun anymore. It stopped being about people showcasing their creative skills, and more about gossip, and hookups, and memes, and obligatory follows of people whose content you had no interest in looking at (nothing personal, of course), and...I just didn't want to be a part of it anymore. I am very big on controlling what I see on social media, and when I felt I couldn't do that, the ability to enjoy it was no more.

It was always something I remained torn about for a long time. Because I loved photography so much, I felt that I needed to be a part of this community, but I wanted to curate my feed so that I would never see the stupid stuff that wasn't part of the true essence of Instagram. But then with that, you had to worry about people possibly being offended that you didn't want to necessarily follow them, and...it just became too much (or maybe it was just me and my over-thinking), but the desire was no longer there.

In the six years that Instagram has been around, I've opened and closed several accounts. But, here I am - again (for now). I have a new account which I primarily only started so that it could coincide with my new blog, and to continue doing what I enjoy, and that's taking photos and curating an aesthetically pleasing collection of pictures.

I'm not sure how long this will last but for now, I'll ride the wave.

I love playing around with light and filters (VSCO is my absolute favorite app for photo editing), and with this new camera on the iphone 7 Plus, how can I not take advantge of a photo-posting op?

Photo via Hospitality Est.