A black and white polka dot top, a pair of lacey red Alohas and two dark wash jeans. These are the final links added to my new “Galentines” board on Pinterest before sending it to my friends with the caption “Fit inspo if you need.” Thirty seconds after hitting send, I am met with fifteen thumbs up and three people replying, “This is so cute.”
Pinterest is the one thing that keeps my Type A party-planning side at ease whenever I host. For any event at my house, the first thing my guests can expect is a date, a time and an accompanying Pinterest board with curated outfits. It is a way to check off one more item on my to-do list: dress code. No one is left questioning if a dress is acceptable or if it is strictly a jeans event. My friends and I all end up in perfectly complementary outfits, ensuring every group photo is on point.
I will admit, I do not do well in a disorganized environment. I like to know that everyone will show up to a dinner in a coordinating color scheme. I find comfort in having four dozen different Pinterest boards, each with absurdly specific content. It brings me peace to know that I have multiple boards for each season of the year, outfit inspo for my next vacation or options for my next haircut categorized by color, length and style.
In my month-long break from Instagram and Snapchat, the one social media platform I allowed myself to peruse was Pinterest. Without any outside influence of what was trending on my favorite creator’s storefront or my friends’ latest stories, I was able to curate a Pinterest that was undeniably me. In this one month, I let myself research less popular styles and more underground brands I would not have found if not for my Pinterest home page. I designed myself a page that was purely my own taste and created new boards for the life I wanted to build. I put together a mockup of what I wanted my new wardrobe to look like, saved recipes I tried to recreate, pinned workouts I planned on replicating and made myself a vision board for the year. As a diehard believer in manifestation and visual learning, seeing the year I wanted to have laid out before me hit me with a fresh perspective and newfound confidence.
When I put together all my goals for my upcoming year, suddenly 365 days of improvement seemed less impossible. Read a new book here, starting a craft there. However, once I save my resolutions in a compact Pinterest board on my phone, it all starts to seem far more attainable. When I am feeling unmotivated, I can just click on my “2026 visions” board and remind myself of my own ambition from last month.
I am part of a generation where kids are glued to their phones more and more each day, losing a bit of themselves with every post they like just because everyone they know is sharing it. In today’s culture of collective personality, Pinterest is the one thing I hold on to. It is the one place on social media, I believe, where young people can find themselves. It is not about competing for likes, comments or followers; it is about curating a space that perfectly embodies your persona. Any Pinterest fan can tell you that just scrolling through their homepage is enough to make them happy. It almost feels like your entire personality is spread out on your phone screen. It can be unorganized. In one scroll, you might see a picture of a vintage car, a link to concert tickets for your favorite rapper and a how-to video on planting a garden. No part of it has to correlate; it just has to be you.
The beauty of Pinterest lies in that, at its core, it is one expansive conglomeration of all the parts of your personality that make you the person you are and the person you want to become.
