If you want to wean yourself off Instagram but feel pressured you might not be taking advantage of how it can help you with getting your work in front of more people, I think I have an idea about maybe getting some of the best of both worlds.

Before I start, my gut tells me that the advantages of Instagram are highly overstated and that you can just simply not engage—but I don't think I can say that personally because I do have a following and I might be blind to how it has helped me.

I'll just start with the instructions and then I'll explain the rationale afterwards.

1. Download an Instagram scheduler like Later and follow the steps to enable auto-posting.

This is important because Automatically posting is a big part of spending less time on IG.

2. Go into the calendar view of the scheduling app you use. Find 12 images of your work. Put one image on the first week of the month. Go to the next month, put the second image on the first week of next month. Repeat for all images.

3. Set those images to post automatically. Now you're posting once a month for the next year.

4. Find another set of 12 images. Put one image on the THIRD week of the month. Go to the next month. Put the second image on the third week of the next month. Repeat for the rest of the images.

5. Now you're posting twice a month, every other week. If you have another 12 images available after this, great. Read the next steps. If you don't have enough images, or if you have even less than 12 images, that's perfectly okay and I'll explain later.

If you have another 12 images available, do it for the second week of every month. Another 12? Do it for the last week of every month. Now you're posting once a week—on autopilot.

If you have more images of work, cool. You get the logic. Spread it so you post twice a week on autopilot, then three times a week, then everyday, etc.

Now go to the settings on your phone, and set it to limit your use of Instagram to 5 minutes a day. If you have an iPhone you can do this with screen time.

You have five minutes a day to make sure it's working, to check your DMs, make some comments and scroll your feed. But after five minutes, you're done.

1. This is not about getting a lot of followers fast, or optimizing for best engagement. Again this is a MIDDLE ground between not using Instagram, and letting it take over your life because you think its good for your work.

2. This is built on the assumption that consistency over time ultimately is better than frequency of posts. It's better to post once a week consistently rather than once a day for a week and not posting again for the rest of the month.

So with this method, in 12 image increments spread over a year, you start by ensuring you post once a month. Then with 12 more images, you ensure you post twice a month, then three times, etc.

3. In an afternoon, you can basically take care of IG for the rest of the year. If you have more images, because you made new work, cool slot it in on empty days, but your baseline is there.

4. The idea of Instagram being a part of your job is gross. But the thing about treating something like a job, is that oftentimes it makes it less personal / emotional. Sometimes taking a clinical approach to things maintains a better distance.

5. The idea is about having a baseline. You should still post organically here and there. Not have copy / pasted captions, not reuse the same hashtags over and over again. https://twitter.com/parkan/status/1349047369036406796?s=20

6. But even if you are "penalized," anything short of a ban is fine. It's not about optimizing for best engagement. It's just that your work is on your profile when someone looks you up, and you get your work in front of people on a consistent basis.

7. But Instagram's API allows for automated post if you are a business account. Turn your account into a business account. Treat it like the work it is.

8. The best part of it is, is after a while if you feel like you didn't do anything for you—cool. Now you have confirmation that IG didn't add much to your career, but now you have your portfolio IG if someone looks you up and you can put that issue to rest.

Boosting this here: https://twitter.com/gothshakira/status/1349046455793696769?s=20

Many of the scheduling apps like Later show a preview of your grid for your scheduled posts and if you move images around, it swaps the schedules around too, so you can be flexible.

Last tip is that it's intentional I mentioned 12 images. It doesn't all have to be work. Process photos, a screen cap of a movie you like, an old selfie, in between images of work is great.

And if your project has more than one image, cool. If you have five images for ap project, better in my opinion to have five individual posts over time than a single carousel with five images.

If you read this and wonder "why not just delete the app," good for you. I'm sure more people want to be like you than you think, but please direct the self-righteousness elsewhere. Harm reduction is better than cold turkey for most addictions.