So much of what we read online wants us to believe we’re missing out. And every time I scroll, it works. I’m always left feeling like there’s something I should be doing, buying, or being. If I’m not, I worry I’m wasting my life away.
The fear of missing out is an old friend of mine. When I first heard the term FOMO in the early 2010s, it immediately resonated.
As a child, my parents’ divorce meant that being with one side of my family meant missing time with the other. I felt torn between two places. I didn’t feel like I belonged in either. As a teenager, every day brought something new that felt like the end of the world if I missed it. Fitting in felt so important in those formative years.
As I’ve grown older, the things are different. But those feelings haven’t gone anywhere. It seems like other people always have something figured out that I don’t. Or they get to have experiences in their lives that I don’t get to have. They have skills, or abilities, or knowledge, or any number of other things that feel just out of my reach.
The content knows we are terrified of missing out. It preys on that fear. It promises some secret key to life, our profession, or our health. It draws a direct line from our deepest fears to whatever it’s peddling. It wants us to believe that this one thing could be the difference in being successful, happy, or whatever else we fear we’re missing. And it works.
Here’s the truth: I know what I need to feel happy and fulfilled. And quite frankly, I already have it all. It’s not that everything will always be perfect. There will always be plenty out of my control.
But if I’ve learned anything in the past few years, it’s that the good life isn’t nearly as complicated as we sometimes think.
There’s always more to learn.
I’ll always have room to grow.
There will never be a shortage of things I should be doing.
But there’s also always more to appreciate.
I’ll always need to make room to slow down.
There will never be a shortage of things I should stop taking for granted.
The true secrets of life are all actually pretty simple.
The content just wants us to believe otherwise.