Simple Living Series • Why I Deleted My Pinterest Account.
She must be crazy! Everyone is pinning! It's such a great source of inspiration! What is Lauren thinking? Guys, I don't even care. As much as I love Pinterest as an easy way to organize and share images, I just can't deal with it anymore for a few reasons. • I have so many goals to accomplish in these next few months, and I find that even though I don't really use Pinterest organically (I kinda force myself to pin sometimes, just to keep my boards fresh), it is still a huge time-suck.
• During Kendi Skeen's speech at TxSC, I was introduced to the quote (allegedly by Teddy Roosevelt, but after this Shakespeare debacle, I can't be sure) "Comparison is the thief of joy." Isn't that all Pinterest is, really? I can't tell you how many posts/tweets I've read or real-life conversations I've had where someone has said that everything on Pinterest is too perfect. "Why can't my closet look like that? Her hair is so much more beautiful than mine. I should buy more mason jars for my cocktails." Et cetera. I'm not proud to admit I've felt that way too, at times. Why continue to subject myself to that?
• You may be aware that I'm trying to continually minamalize my life, and I see Pinterest as one more "thing" to deal with. E-hoarding is real, friends. What good is pinning and repinning hundreds of thousands of images if I'm never going to look at them again?
• Honorable mention: I'm slowly but surely educating myself about copyrights (send info!) and it's shocking how many things are posted on Pinterest either uncredited or credited to the wrong place. Bummer.
Again, I really like Pinterest and I'm not saying that it's bad for everyone, just for me! Keep pinning if that's what you want to do, my pals. I saved all the images I wanted to keep onto my hard drive (and put the source in the file notes). I know that having the images saved on my computer isn't much better than saved on the Pinterest servers, but I will gradually be thinning out the folders as times goes by.
Also important to note, I'm deactivating my Chictopia, Facebook, and Tumblr for pretty much the same reasons. Chictopia was fun, but as of now, I'm not really a ~fashion blogger~ and it doesn't make sense to use it. Facebook. Oh, Facebook. I barely even use my personal Facebook account anymore. It's another time-suck, in my opinion. Tumblr falls into the same category as Pinterest. Interestingly, many of the images I had pinned were sourced from Tumblr. Unfortunately, a lot of them were just sourced from someone's Tumblr dashboard and it was impossible to find the original source. I really wish that I made better uses of these platforms. I'm not blaming the sites as much as I'm blaming myself. It's not you, Pinterest, it's me. ;)
Right now, I want to focus most of my energy on improving the quality of my shop and my blog. But in my spare time, you might find me on Twitter and Instagram, username'd "awildtonic" on both. :)
I support your simple living movement 100%, and that includes getting rid of Pinterest. I honestly haven't used my account in months. I upload the outfit photos from my blog to help drive traffic, but that's it. I definitely wouldn't miss my Pinterest account.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the support, Sierra! You can still get traffic from other people's pins, right?
DeleteFinding what works for you and what helps you focus on your goal is what's important.
ReplyDeleteI enjoy using my Pinterest, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram accounts but all for different reasons. Pinterest for me is a source of inspiration and a place I can save things for reference later (like recipes). I have both a personal and Bess Georgette page and both are important to me. I find if I don't use Facebook I lose contact with some friends that live in different states and countries. The same with Twitter and Instagram.
I know what you mean about Pinterest image sources and I'm one of those people that actually tracks down the original source before pinning or repining. :)
But like I said, it's finding the right fit for you! :)
Exactly! Also, I'm glad you track down the sources. Pinterest needs more users like you. :)
DeleteI really respect that you made the choice for yourself and realized it wasn't for you, instead of using it simply because "everyone else is doing it". I can agree that pinning can get out of control and is a giant "time suck", haha. I enjoy using it but at my own pace, and I never use any images on my blog that aren't credited properly. Instead, I delete them! So, I'm happy you found what's right for you.
ReplyDeleteYes! "Everyone else is doing it" was kinda the reason why I kept up with it. I totally see why other people love it though!
DeleteI tried pinning for a while, and it just didn't work for me. Same thing with The Fancy, Svpply etc. It's nice getting the traffic from those sites, but I don't want to waste valuable knitting time on things like that.
ReplyDeleteI still use tumblr, because I enjoy it, and it takes very little time and energy. Plus, I get loads of traffic from it.
I applaud you on your simplifying!
I can imagine that knitting more would be way more beneficial in the long run than pinning. Thanks for the support, Nicole! :)
DeleteThis is a great post--I honestly mostly use Pinterest to save recipes and things to do with Aurora, and then I actually DO USE THEM! I don't go back to any of my other boards. I do feel like there is way too much going on online, and there's a lot of competition. I am working on a post about how maybe life was better before "The Internet" (at least, in some ways).
ReplyDeleteGo on, girl, with yo' simplified self!
xo
I'm on the verge of deleting mine too. I can really relate to what you said about not using Pinterest organically. I rarely see something and think, "Oh, I'll pin that!" I regularly have dedicated pinning sessions to keep my boards updated. I've been scaling back the time I spend doing this and you know what? I don't miss it. I think I'll keep my account because I've just started crocheting, and it's a good way to compile the projects I want to work on. For everything else though, I'm a bit over it.
ReplyDeleteI probably need to do this or I need to unfollow everyone and just use it when I find stuff I actually want to pin, which is rare. I stopped using it for about a month around Christmas and I didn't miss it. Honestly, for me, it's a waste of time. Sure I find some neat things but 99.9% of the time I've never gone back to anything I've pinned.
ReplyDeleteI've heard the comparison quote before and that feeling of being inadequate is what has made me stop following some blogs. Some people I can enjoy the beauty in their life, but for some reason in other situations it makes me unsatisfied with my life.