I have tried oh so hard for the past few years to never do this.

However, I’ve came to the realization that simply not talking to the negative people that were in my life just isn’t enough. They trail me wherever I go and it felt like I really couldn’t do anything about it. My blocked list was too long and my patience was very thin. So today I took a very important step in taking a breath of fresh air by deleting my old Instagram account.

GASP.

Yes, I know. I was so proud of that. I was almost at 1000 followers. It took years to build that up. However, one day I was just scrolling through my following and it hit me.

I had over 900 followers, but less than 100 were liking my photos.

Worse than that, only once in a blue moon would someone comment. I realized no one really cared. I had even posted on Facebook for my personal friends to start commenting on my pictures so it would boost me up and encourage others to engage. Nothing.

The more I thought about it, the more I kept telling myself, “What’s the big deal? They follow but they don’t care.”

Some people have an Instagram for the sake of having one. Everyone else has one, so they make one and post the occasional photo to please their little following and rarely ever open the app. Which don’t get me wrong, that’s fine.

I, however, am not one of those people.

I love Instagram. I love when people like my photos (even though they don’t equal self worth). I love when people comment sincere comments. I love when people I know show love and support what I am trying to do. I upload pictures because I love taking them. I love sharing quotes. I just love doing it.

So it hurts to see so many people who were interested enough in me to follow me, but are uninterested in pretty much every other thing I did from that point out.

So I deleted it.

And created a new one. It is fresh and clean. I have zero followers, I am only following people I know, and I am putting together a plan for how I want my feed to turn out.

My block list is empty, and now I’m no longer on anyone else’s.

But most importantly, all of those negative followers are gone. Whether they were bots or other bloggers in blogging groups that had to follow you because it was the thread of the day or just negative people I knew from high school that just wanted to be nosy. They are all gone. And while it is disheartening to see that I have no followers I do know that anyone who truly cared that I was gone would find me again. I wanted to be one of those accounts that have a small following per say but had a huge amount of engagement. I want my followers to care about what I have to say.

I know this may seem very small and trivial, especially if you aren’t a blogger, but it isn’t to me. You can take what I have done here and apply it to any aspect of your life if you want to. Clean up your accounts, clean up your following. Don’t let negative people continue to be a part of your life. No matter what way, shape, or form, you don’t need any negativity in your life.

I still love Instagram.

I get on it everyday, and I do look at and enjoy the photos of everyone I follow. It’s nice to be a part of people’s lives, even if its just in a small way. I just don’t allow people who really don’t want anything to do with me, stick with me. You don’t get to look at my amazing life now because you decided you didn’t want to be a part of it before. I don’t care if you are just following me and it should do me no harm but you are the weeds around my roots.

And now you’ve been taken out for good.