Your feed is a mirror—here's how to curate the reflection
Three ways you can retrain your algorithm and reclaim control over what you see
Hello friends!
This caught my attention this week.
“They say my generation is wasting our lives watching mindless entertainment. But I think things are worse than that. We are now turning our lives into mindless entertainment. Not just consuming slop, but becoming it.
We have been posting about our lives for a long time. But now I notice something else, something more than a compulsion to capture and share moments. I see people turning into TV characters, their memories into episodes, themselves into entertainment. We have become the meaningless content, swiped past and scrolled through. Experiences, relationships, even our own children, are cheapened, packaged, churned out for others to consume. For some of us growing older has become a series of episodes to release: first the proposal, then the wedding, followed by house tours, pregnancy reveals, every milestone and update, on and on, forever. We exist to entertain each other.” —
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The question is: are you becoming the slop, voluntarily consuming it, or are you mindlessly letting the algorithm decide for you?
The Era of the Influencer
Nothing new here, but we live in the era where anyone can become a celebrity by commodifying their every day. It’s not that new anymore but this shift demands acknowledgement and closer observation.
Like yesterday’s celebrities, we are living in the era of influencers. Even celebrities are mimicking the influencer business model these days. Literally anyone can become a celebrity in their own right, just by being themselves. I don’t blame them. If financial freedom and autonomy over how you want to live is what’s on offer, turning into characters of their own life feels like a small price to pay.
We can judge, we can envy, and we may even despise. But let’s be real: it takes genuine dedication to command people’s attention. Whether we agree or disagree with the methods, the mental grit alone to keep staying relevant amongst the noise—every day, all the time, 24/7—will either kill you or make you stronger.
While some have become slops in the name of entertainment, it’s those who have turned their newfound fandom and “fame” into empires and real occupations who are laughing all the way to the bank.
If brain rot is your fear, then swipe, unfollow, or keep on scrolling—because your feed mirrors you.
Here’s the funny thing about social media: while I once demonized it (and those algorithmic techno-Gods), I see things more clearly now—the internet and social media are simply a reflection of the things I choose to pay attention to.
Social media—and I’m predominantly talking about the major three: Instagram, TikTok, and X (formerly Twitter)—is a subjective curation of the things you’ve liked, engaged with, and lend attention to. It’s essentially feeding back to you what you’ve chosen to focus on.
It may try and recommend novel things, but even these are informed by your previous choices. Social media platforms are like personalized mirrors that reflect what you engage with versus acting as objective content distributors imposing random content on you.
The algorithm will feed you more of what you linger on, so be intentional.
[Now, because I am mostly an Instagram user, I’ll speak through this lens].
It’s you that’s reacting—the algorithm is neutral.
Because it doesn’t have a conscience.
The algorithm learns from you. It notices what you notice and serves you more of what it thinks you want—knowingly or unknowingly, it adapts to what you feed it, logging categories of information you preferred before.
The more you linger and engage, the more it’ll follow your lead to serve you more of the same. So, if you’re unhappy with what it’s serving you, then maybe it’s time you have an honest conversation with yourself. He he.
Unfortunately, it also isn’t smart enough to decipher whether it’s triggering a negative or positive reaction in you, so here are three things to consider:
#1 Guard your attention like a hawk
Your feed reflects your engagement choices, so do yourself a favor, you MUST STOP engaging with content that drains or disturbs you—no matter how tempting.
Like that friend whose constant posing makes you cranky? That influencer whose perfectly curated outfits makes you angry for no reason? You know exactly who I’m talking about: the ones that irk you without warning.
STOP LOOKING. Unfollow. Mute. Delete. Do whatever is in your power to release yourself from the negative tides. Stop spending more of your precious attention on the people, brands, and feeds that don’t sit right with your soul.
Whether it’s graphic war updates bombarding your feed or that acquaintance whose peacocking fires you up in the wrong ways—liberate yourself!
Instead, pay attention to what lights you up and eliminate the things that weigh you down. In life and online, the same principles apply.
#2 Respond to the algorithm with what you actually want to see
Did you know you can proactively train your algorithm by deliberately engaging with content that nourishes you. Want more Paris Fashion Week? Search for fashion brands, big-name models, and fashion influencers. Craving food-porn? Hunt down food creators, linger on their videos, and follow their accounts. The goal: make the platform work for you, not against you.
Because the algorithm learns from your behaviors and in 2025, it’s not just tracking what you like, save, or share, it’s also monitoring your brief pauses when something catches your eye, how long you watch a video for, and how many times you rewatch it. We have TikTok’s innovations to thank (or blame?) for what’s become the industry standard of ‘personalisation.’
Here’s TikTok’s CEO, Shou Chew, explaining how their algorithm works. Rule of thumb to remember: the algorithm feeds you more of what you pay attention to, so be intentional with what you lend your time to!
#3 Actually take control of your feed—Instagram has built-in tools you might not know about.
Instagram offers more control over your feed than most users realize, tools to shape your feed just the way you like it. (Pun intended. Haha.) I confess, before researching for this edition, I had no idea just how much control we actually have!
As the folks at Instagram (owned by Meta, by the way) are incentivized to keep us happy, they’ve adapted by creating more controls. Good news for us!
While let’s not minimize the dangers Instagram poses— especially on developing and underage brains, as it’s no secret the app has been made to be addictive— we can appreciate it’s efforts in trying to give us a little more control over our feed.
Here are four insider tips to manage your feed, straight from Adam Mosseri:
Curate your algorithm like a museum curator.
In Settings > Your Algorithm, you’ll soon be able to see all the categories Instagram thinks you’re interested in—then you’ll be able to add or remove them as you’d like. Brilliant! But, while he shows a demo on the video above, I haven’t seen this functionality on my account yet, which likely means they’re still A/B testing it.
Control your feed’s ranking (in other words, it’s time to play favorites).
Not feeling what the algorithm is serving you? Skip the ranking entirely by marking accounts as favorites—these will then become what your feed feeds you first. Best part? You’ve got unlimited favorites! Go wild.
Mute the people you’re too polite to unfollow.
If you’re concerned about the social optics of unfollowing, leverage mute! They’ll never know, so like turning your head and pretending you didn’t notice the person you knew walking along in front of you, mute away!
Master reset your algorithm (but use with cation!).
Profile > Settings: What you see > Content Preferences > Reset Suggested Content. This is MEGA. You can literally ‘factory reset’ your algorithm—wipe the slate clean and start from scratch. But as Mosseri warns in the video, tread carefully, especially if you’re a longtime user, because by clicking this Instagram will forget everything it’s ever learned about your preferences. It’s like amnesia, algorithm edition. Only do this if you’re ready to rebuild those preferences, otherwise it’s like being on ‘Guest Mode’ forever.
Your feed isn’t happening to you—you’re creating it, one click, pause, follow, like, and share at a time. The algorithm doesn’t care whether it shows you inspiration or envy, creativity or emotional click-bait, but you should.
We’re all navigating our ever-changing new normal too. These technologies aren’t going anywhere, they’re only going to keep evolving, so we must be smarter too.
All you and I can keep doing is guard our attention like our life depends on it, be intentional with how we engage with our feeds, and remember—you’re more in control that you might think. The internet is what you make of it. Make it work for you, not against you!