Dear fellow millennials, let’s stop buying the FOMO.
It won’t take five minutes online before you notice that we indeed live in a fast-paced world bombarded with listicles. Tell me, how many brands, advertisements, and sponsored articles do you see in a day telling you that you need this, you must go there, and you must achieve this to be deemed happy and fulfilled in your life?
Squad Goals, Travel Goals, Money Goals, Vacation Goals, Bae goals, Makeup Goals, Selfie Goals, Job Goals–name it. It is easy for us to define our lives based on the virtual crowd that is watching, criticizing, and clapping on our posts. But in a world of #GOALS and #BLESSED, do you sometimes catch yourself cuddling #FOMO?
FOMO or the Fear of Missing Out is an extreme anxiety about being left out. It is being paralyzed by the belief that others might be having fun without you. The overgeneralization that because you don’t have certain things and you haven’t been in this destination, then you are stuck in life. It’s the millennial version of “Keeping up with the Joneses” that plagues young people with anxiety and depression.
FOMO might be real, but we don’t really need to buy it. Here’s why.
We all have different goals and perceptions of success.
Success is subjective. For some it is having a bank statement that reflects 9 digits, for some, it’s marrying Ryan Gosling, to some it’s building your own business, while for some it’s in the lives you’ve touched.
Before comparing yourself to others, think about your own values, convictions, and beliefs. Most often than not, we are just pressured to fit in. Is this really what you wanted or you just want it because everyone thinks it’s cool? If you understand that you have your own battles and own promised land, you will also understand that you don’t need to compare yourself to the achievements of other people.
ALSO READ: How do you Define Success?
Your life is not a Pinterest board.
We are certainly more than what meets our Instagram feed and not because we don’t post anything new means nothing is happening in our lives. People post the good things and spare the not-so-pleasing side of things. It’s all about projection and building your image. Will you post something bad about you? How many filters did you use for that selfie? How did you really like that party? I am not generalizing; what I am saying is that not everything you see online is true.
There is nothing wrong in posting your milestones online. In fact, your wall, your rules. What’s wrong is comparing your behind-the-scenes to other people’s highlighted posts. Your worth is not based on how many likes you have and your happiness is not directly proportional to how many followers you have.
It’s only your own life that you’re missing out on.
Let’s say you are really left out and you know it. Instead of spending the next months pitying yourself, why don’t you minimize your time online and start your personal projects? What if you try doing something new today? Maybe it’s time for you to start focusing on your life and stop looking at what others are up to.
RELATED: Facebook now provides an option to help Friends who are depressed or have anxiety
Some people say that FOMO is actually a good thing as long as you can use it as a motivation. A spark of envy won’t hurt, right? Well, be careful because this envy might dig you your own grave. You might end up chasing the wrong things in life. And it’s not a race. Do great things to better yourself and not to show others how you are better than them. After all, the right attitude and motivation go a long way.
So fellow millennials, let’s stop buying the FOMO. Instead, let’s get up and do something. <3
