The Silent Danger of FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) among Millennials

FOMO is a recent new terminology coined by Millennials to describe the inherent ‘Fear of Missing Out’. However, one would be forgiven for thinking that since Millennials were the first to coin the phrase, that it was the first time in history such happenings have been noted.

All through human evolution, we have always compared ourselves to others. However, FOMO tends to afflict Millennials more than every other generation that preceded them thanks to the internet. With the internet, millennials are able to compare their lives to a gazillion other people on the web.

So what exactly is FOMO? It is an inherent fear that creeps out after seeing amazing things happenings elsewhere or other people actively doing what we’re not. Usually, the key motivators of FOMO are the most mundane of things in our lives. An individual could be coming off a boring 9-5 shift and suddenly, they notice something about their friends on their newsfeed who could have shared something like bungee jumping in Thailand, climbing the Everest, having coffee in Paris, or navigating through the streets of Venice.

Social Media sites feed our brains with ‘feel good’ dopamine. However, in a virtual world where everything seems to be a competition, FOMO has been on the rise.

Of course, all these are ‘life goals’ most of us desire to achieve. The only thing FOMO tends to blind us about is the fact that we can only do one thing at a time. From a business perspective, FOMO can lead to unsuccessful attempts at fast-tracking our lives in order to catch up and surpass those who we consider our peers.

While this fear can be a great motivator for success, it seldom leads to happy rewards. Business moves and ventures should always be motivated by much more than just FOMO. We’ve analyzed a couple of handy tips we need to remind ourselves in order to entangle ourselves from possible FOMO incidents.

FOMO Is Built on Quick Sand

56% of Social Media Users Suffer From FOMO

In the real sense, FOMO is usually based on lies that we continue to perpetuate as a society. Social media is the worst at spreading the lies. When we log in to social media sites, almost everyone seems to be having the time of their lives. On the other hand, we could currently be in a state of loneliness or unhappiness. Seeing such images may trigger us to think that we are not doing enough with our lives.

While sharing montages of ourselves having fun is usually done in good faith, it is important to constantly remind ourselves that social media personas are not the same as real-life people.

Usually, what happens with social media pages is that we tend to craft characters whose persona we define and refine over time. Without we realizing it, the highs of our lives end up being dominated by our social pages. Those who opt to share literally everything, both the highs and lows may find themselves getting unfollowed and unsubscribed from.

Behind so many smiles lies the painful reality of life. Most of us struggle to find keys in the morning, have arguments with our bosses, miss the train and sulk. However, none of these events make it in our highlight reels. Instead, other events that are more jovial take precedence.

Fire with Fire

About 27% of social media users flock to social sites as soon as they wake up

To fight FOMO, we need to use FOMO against itself. Words shape a lot of things in our lives. We can replace ‘The Fear of Missing Out’ with words like ‘Focus on More Objects’ and ‘Feel Okay More Often’.

Replacing the words in FOMO whenever we experience a fear of missing out on something can help us gravitate towards a sense of wellness. That way, we can make smart business and life decisions based on what we have available to us.

Live in the Moment

FOMO tends to drift people to faraway lands in distant times thinking about what life could be like. Perpetual fear due to FOMO can have a negative impact on our lives. This is because FOMO makes us become disentangled from the present.

What does that mean? We could procrastinate on ideas that we were supposed to carry out or even cancel decisions that we had moments earlier considered as life-changing. Instead, embracing the present is the best way to go forward. There’s a lot happening in the present that most of us never seem to notice. All highlight reels are made by living life in the present.

For budding millennial entrepreneurs, FOMO can be overcome by sticking to laid out business plans and cherishing opportunities as they arise. In doing so, they can comfortably achieve a semblance of happiness.