why unfollowing people on social media is a good thing.

I posted a while ago about why I felt a small amount of hatred for my blog, and how - rather than putting me off blogging entirely - I'm trying to turn this feeling into a positive instead, with the aim of making 2017 the year I give my blog the best go I can. After years of interrupted blogging and not really putting as much effort into my little piece of the internet, I felt my blog deserved that (is that weird?) I know this all sounds so weak but I find it hard to admit that I want to put effort into something in case I fail.

Anyway, as part of this process, I decided to just sit down one afternoon and reassess my blog. I remember signing into Bloglovin' and just feeling completely and utterly overwhelmed. I'm always looking for new blogs to follow and have always had trouble finding ones I really loved, but just didn't want to read anything that was on the dashboard. And not only that, but there were hundreds, if not thousands, of unread posts to catch up on. I knew there would never be a chance for me to catch up on all the posts, so I clicked that I'd read them. And I knew that in those unread blog posts there would have been some awesome posts, but at that moment in time, finding them would have been like looking for a needle in a haystack.

This felt a bit repeated on Twitter too. I'd whack open my Twitter app and scroll down and just feel irritated by some of the people I followed. Truth was, I didn't like them very much. Every time they tweeted, a little negative voice in my head would pop up and have a mini argument with their tweet - "oh utter bullshit", "oh my god that is such a boring tweet, why do I care?", "do they ever stop tweeting" - and I don't like being that horrible person. And to be fair, their tweets weren't bullshit, they weren't uninteresting and of course, they did occasionally stop tweeting. But these people just weren't for me. 

And one of the things I've always wanted to do is engage more with all of the social media I use. If I see a blog post I like, I want to share it and comment on it. A funny tweet, I want to retweet it and chat to other bloggers on Twitter. But I felt like I never had the time, all my channels felt bogged down. I wasn't seeing things I liked on any of my channels anymore. 

So, at the start of the year, with the mantra of "new year, new me" stretching as far as social media, I started a mass unfollow. It took a while, but I went through the people I followed on Twitter, Instagram, Bloglovin' and Pinterest and culled them. I was ruthless. You won't have moved on the "blogosphere" recently without seeing references to Marie Kondo's The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying and I applied that to the people I followed. Instead of asking if an item of clothing or a belonging brought me joy, I asked whether that person brought my joy. If they didn't, they were gone.

If I'm honest, I felt a little harsh. We all want people to follow our social media otherwise, we probably wouldn't bother. But then, what do we want more? We probably want followers who engage with our posts and I think that now I've "culled" I stand more of a chance of being able to be that follower. I want to give my time to great posts and encourage other bloggers. I want amazing photos to come up on my Instagram feed, rather than ones that don't give me joy at all.

Seriously, since I've done it, it's felt like a weight has been lifted from my shoulders. Yes, I took a little hit on my follower numbers too (I'm almost impressed by people who can unfollow someone who unfollows them so quickly!) but it was worth it. When I use my social media channels now, I don't get annoyed by posts I see and I'm starting to enjoy them more. So do a little cutting and culling. I promise you'll feel better for it.

Annie x