How To Retune Your Algorithm For Spiritual Peace

In these political times, it seems like everybody is outraged on social media. It’s time to retune your algorithm for spiritual peace.

Moral outrage has its place—don’t get me wrong. Biblical prophets and modern social justice advocates share a justifiable outrage over the exploitation of the poor and marginalization of the oppressed. Just as there was a time for Jesus to flip the tables, there is a reasonable time, place, and manner for you to express outrage.

But you can’t live in outrage. To the extent that outrage moves you toward positive action, it can be a beneficial thing. But when outrage changes who you are, you’ve moved from activism to addiction.

Rage is the Drug—Your Phone is the Needle

In my last article, I wrote:

Recently, influencer Carlos Whittaker posted on Instagram that rage is a drug, and your phone is the needle. If that’s so, what is the cure?

Of course, Whittaker didn’t mean just your phone, but whatever device you use to consume media, and especially social media. The Christian author, blogger, speaker, and worship leader said, “If rage is filling your heart…see the means of which it is entering your soul, and remove it.” Your soul, Whittaker says, only has a certain capacity to carry such emotions, and many of us are carrying too much.

In that article, I discussed Carlos’s seven-week hiatus from all screen usage, and the book he wrote as a result. And I listed eight suggestions Whittaker makes to reduce your phone’s control over you. I invite you to read that article, and to consider my recommendations for retuning your algorithm for spiritual peace.

Your Social Media Algorithm

Your social media algorithm is rigged to keep you hooked. It is specially designed to keep you looking at the screen for the greatest possible amount of time. This giant prediction engine bases its activity on a few factors.

It considers your likes, comments, saves, and shares. It factors in the things you watch all the way through, and the posts you scroll past. It even tracks how long you hover over an item.
The algorithm keeps count of the people you message the most, and the accounts you interact with regularly. Your best friend might not be regularly active on Facebook, for example, but you engage in frequent debate with your worst enemy. Therefore, the algorithm shows your enemy more than your friend.
It looks at your behavior history: past searches, what you clicked on, topics you follow, and groups or communities you’re a part of.
The algorithm prioritizes fresh posts, popular posts, and sponsored posts. (Sponsored posts are the ones that people pay for you to see.)
It tracks your profile data. Like Santa, it knows when you are sleeping, it knows when you’re awake. It knows if you’ve been bad or good (so, be good, for goodness’ sake!) Seriously, it knows your location and time zone, device type, and sometimes even your browsing history off-platform, if you have cookies/trackers turned on.

Just remember, your social media algorithm isn’t based on what you really want to see. It’s based on what the platform thinks you want to see, relying on the information you give it.

We use social media because we think it makes us happy. Unfortunately, all too often, it fuels our rage. The good news is you can retune your algorithm towards things that will bring you peace. Here’s how you can change what you see online:

6 Ways to Retune Your Algorithm

Change your engagement habits.This means liking, commenting, sharing, or watching more of the things that bring peace and wisdom, instead of rage. Avoid interacting with content you don’t want the algorithm to recommend to you later. Even watching something you dislike tells the system that you’re interested—whether you’re outraged or not.
Use built-in tools. You can always select “Not interested” or “Hide this post” or “See less of these.” On Instagram/TikTok/YouTube, you can long-press or use the three-dot menu to refine recommendations. On Facebook, you can unfollow, snooze, or prioritize friends/pages.
Curate your follows.You might follow accounts you hate, just to see what the other side is up to. Quit that! Follow accounts that are aligned with the content you want more of. Unfollow or mute accounts that cause you to see things that disturb you.
Reset or clear history (where possible). Some platforms like YouTube, TikTok, and a few others allow you to clear your watch/search history. It’s like hitting the reset button on your feed. You can also log out and then browse without an account or use incognito mode. This doesn’t train the algorithm at all.
Be consistent. Algorithms look for patterns. If you want to quit seeing so much news-related content, don’t watch so much of it. Look at gardening videos or camping hacks instead. Eventually, you’ll see more of what you want and less of what you don’t want.
Use third-party apps to filter content. One example is FBP, formerly “Facebook Purity” and now “Fluff-Busting Purity.” This app lets you select keywords you don’t want to see. If you’re tired of reading people’s posts about Trump or Charlie Kirk, you can de-select these keywords. FBP will also tell you who has unfriended you, limit certain post types, filter spam, hide side columns, and customize your newsfeed.

While you can’t retrain the AI, you can retune your algorithm so you see more of the things that bring you hope, and less content that provokes rage.

Retrain Your Brain

Just as there are ways to re-train your social media feed, you can also retune your brain toward inner peace instead of outrage. In my next article, “Retrain Your Brain: 7 Steps from Outrage to Inner Peace” I’ll discuss how you can retune the algorithm of your brain for inner peace. Until then, don’t forget to breathe.