Nash:

Create like there is no metrics. There’s no followers. There’s no likes. There’s no comments. The only thing waiting for you is the canvas.  

Source: Create Like There Is No Metrics

A hundred times this! 👏🏻

For the longest time, when I first started my blogging adventure, I got hung up a little bit on the metrics. That was during the WordPress days. The same can be said for Instagram at some point. Gotta have those likes!

Later I learned that, well, it is still a work in progress, that way of thinking just gets in the way and creates friction. I think we have been trained to think of attention on the internet as a competition and the need for recognition and validation of everything we put out there.

Unless this is how you make your living, then I guess I understand the need for the metrics, the likes, the views, the downloads, etc.

(Now I feel like I am going down a rabbit hole of thoughts and feelings about this. Lots of buts and what-ifs)

For me though, I just want to create and put things out there for the fun of it, create for myself first, and even if only one person reads my post, I am good with that.

STYLE: Port Barrel Aged Belgian Style Quad Ale

ALC./VOL.: 16.3%

RELEASED 2019

From the creative minds of Tonya & Sean; This masterpiece has been aging in Port Barrels for over two years. Dripping with nuances of chocolate, orange, and cinnamon, the expertise and patience put into this beer pays off in every sip.

I am not entirely sure where I picked this idea from, to be honest. Something I have been doing for the past few weeks is asking Siri, to play hits from a specific year in the 90s. Born in the early 80s, and although I do remember some of the music back then, I am mostly a 90s kid when it comes to music. Sorry, not sorry.

So, yes, I go and ask for Siri for hits of that year and play it for, well, until I have had enough and then move to the next. For whatever reason, I started with 1995. I should have started with hits from 1990, rather, oh well.

 I am listening to 1998's today, and the first song that played was My heart will go on by Céline Dion 🤢. 

This will be the least interesting thing you may or may not read today, with little child Musk trying to buy the Twitters, but, that's another post, or not.

It has been about three days, three days since I deleted Instagram from my device. I have had my struggles using this platform for years now. I have posted about it at least a dozen times, I think. But I always end up back at it. I do not because I like the platform as a photo-sharing one, if anything, these days is everything but. A shopping app! But I always find the arguments to keep it. 

"I gotta have it, so I can keep in touch with people"

"I gotta follow so and so for my kettlebell workouts"

At the end of the day, to me, it's like an addiction. I scroll and like, then, there's the infinite scrolling, the reels, the ads, the in-your-face stuff. There's the involuntary thing about comparing your joy and life with what you see, even if you try and know that you shan't. Is something that Instagram and Facebook have thought us to do in a way. 

Enough ranting!

This week, I signed up for Mailbrew. I want to say this would be my second time trying the service, although this time is a little more intentional.  I mainly to this idea from skoobz on Micro.blog, and created  Mailbrew Instagram newsletter. I added the Instagram accounts I think are worth following but I don't have to depend on the Instagram app. This way, I can avoid everything I hate about the platform.

It has only been three days and so far so good. I do still find myself looking for the app on my phone whenever I have one of those five minutes of nothingness and my brain is trained to open Instagram. I am yet to replace that bad habit with something else. Again, it's a work in progress.

I am not considering closing the account yet, but I won't be actively using it through the app or web. Unless I remember other accounts that I feel like adding to the newsletter.

We shall see how this goes