More often referred to nowadays as FOMO (bulldozing language along with YOLO), the fear of missing out seems to possess my friends. And, if we’re being honest, it was my second greatest fear until about eight weeks ago. (My first greatest fear was making a mistake, which led to a huge void in decision-making skills.) Moving on.
I remember as a kid, I eavesdropped on all of my mother’s phone calls—not wanting to miss a single detail.
As a teenager, I fought the weights of my eyelids to stay awake until my parents’ nocturnal friends finally called it a night. College: I pushed myself to go out, stay up and watch the group movie, rage at the after-party, just so I wouldn’t miss anything. I would be present for all of the important stuff, damnit. All of the fun.
So what changed eight weeks ago? If you remember, eight weeks ago it was still summer time. My summer was packed to the brim with weekends away. If you've been reading, many of those weekends away were not spontaneous summer getaways. They were weekends in CT for family events, trips to New Hampshire to see a show. Obligations. Weekends that started as duties, but turned out to be total pleasures.
My first weekend away, I was sad to miss a night out in the city with my friends. But by the last weekend, I looked back and realized how many amazing memories I had made this summer. From Father’s Day and a bridal shower to the subsequent wedding and the production of Hairspray in Connecticut; from the family weekend on Lake Winnipesaukee for All Shook Up to the solo weekend in New Hampshire for the Broadway triumph A Chorus Line; I had a singularly incredibly summer. So who knows what I missed here? And quite frankly, if I was having fun where I was...who cares?
That’s the thing. If you are doing what YOU want and what pleases YOU, you cannot regret what you are missing that EVERYONE ELSE is doing.
Over Simchat Torah (the Jewish holiday I spent on the UWS), I was unable to go downtown to my good friend’s party. I do not take the subway in observance of the holiday, and it was just too far a walk. So I missed her party. Of course, I was bummed not to be celebrating with my good friends.
But later on in the night (that I would have been downtown) I bumped into someone, “Hey, why aren’t you downtown? You’re missing the party!” Without hesitation I responded, “The party is wherever I am.”
That reads really cocky when I type it. All I mean to say is, I can no longer worry about the fun other people are having. I'm done with the pressure and the stress over fun. It's supposed to be fun.
Choose the place you think you’ll have the most fun. If that means staying in and watching a movie, instead of going to a bar with seven girlfriends, then that is where YOUR party is.
I do my best to live by this new theory, but sometimes curiosity kills the night.
Another night of that same holiday, I ended up in a group of about eight girls. We were all excited for the evening, but naturally each of us had at least one stop we wanted to make in the night. The night was a string of entrances and exits. “Checking out places.” We never truly settled anywhere. We were so afraid of missing out and finding the fun, we didn’t make our own fun.
FOMO is just that...a fear. Conquer your fear not by forcing yourself to go out when you want to stay in or trying to please everyone by going to three parties in one night. Make a decision about where you want to be. What will be fun for YOU tonight?
Make your decision. Sit with it. Enjoy it. After all, you will always be missing out on something. Best not to worry about the fun you're not a part of and make the most of where you are.
Ditch the FOMO. After all, YOLO.
It’s been a little while since I’ve written. Two weeks to be exact. But it has been an important and eventful two weeks. For starters I am officially in my mid-twenties now. Older, yes. Wiser, hopefully.
The actual date of my birth this year happened to land on a Jewish holiday known as Sukkot.
I know, I know. The holidays. The Jewishness. I promise that even though I’m about to jack yet another lesson from a rabbi, this is actually not about Judaism.
It’s about a children’s book.
For back story purposes: Sukkot is a holiday that lasts a week and comes after Yom Kippur. It’s the occasion for all of those random huts popping up all over Brooklyn and Forest Hills, Queens. It is supposed to be a week of celebration for the harvest after the reflection (also known as harrowing hunger and thirst) that is Kippur. So...happiness. Got it.
Well on my birthday, a gifted young rabbi at Beth Torah in Flatbush, Brooklyn—I know, it can’t get much more Jewish—talked to us about the children’s story The Happiness Box. [Note: I have not been able to locate said book, but this is how the sermon was told.]
As the story goes there is a little boy who is pessimistic and cynical and has a terrible outlook on life. (They grow up so fast these days.) Everyone else gets presents, everyone else has what he does not. And when his dad buys his mom a washing machine, that is the last straw (in my uncle’s retelling of this sermon the gift was a washing machine...I don’t remember if this is accurate or not. Nevertheless...). The boy’s father says “But I did get you a gift. The gift is the box and inside of it you will be happy.” Well the boy starts to play inside the box and he loves the box. He is always happy when he is in the box. It’s his happy place. But when he packs for summer camp, the happiness box will not fit in his duffel. How will he ever be happy?
Somehow (through some rabbi-editing) the boy realizes that the happiness was in his mind all the time.
On Sukkot, we live our lives for seven days in our happiness boxes—those huts I mentioned that line Ocean Parkway. But after the holiday ends, it is our job to hold on to the happiness. Happiness is a mindset. It is not a place. It is not a thing. It is an active state of being.
During the service, Rabbi Tobias revealed the first three of seven steps to happiness—he reserved the next four for his after-shul class in hopes that people would stay later. Unfortunately, it appears that food makes people happier than the other four secrets to happiness. Anywho, the first three:
- Happiness is a mindset. See above.
- Learn to accept criticism. You will never become a better person if all you can do is accept praise. We must learn to accept and internalize criticism to become better people. Better versions of ourselves.
- Be patient. Slow down. Don’t be that jerk that honks the horn at the car in front of you when the light has not yet turned green, just because you saw the light of the perpendicular traffic turn red. But more importantly, absorb life. Do not rush through it. Even the seemingly miserable parts have something to teach us.
Number two really hit home for me. I am terrible at accepting criticism. I admitted this out loud to myself for the first time on October 1. I think I’m good at it, but I’m not. I like being liked. I like being told that my work is good/valuable. I like being told I have a nice singing voice or my boots are “so cool, where did you get them?”
For the record, I also work hard. I worked my butt off in school from the age of 5 through my college graduation. And I firmly believe that hard work does deserve praise—be it my own work or someone else’s. I am a people-pleaser by birth, and I labor to meet expectations. It’s hard when I fall short.
I silently took note from my seat in the balcony to be better at this.
Well, I think G-d wanted to know if I was serious about that because not one week went by and my friend delivered some heavy criticism.
We were in a cab together from the Lower East Side to the Upper West Side. Clearly, we had some time to kill. The topic of my blog (yes, this one you are reading) came up.
“So...what’s the goal of your blog, really?” he asked.
I went on to describe how my blog was born, that its intentions are loose, but basically: I want to answer questions for 20-somethings like myself that I encounter or struggle with, whether that question is “where should I go out to eat” or “what cool random thing is there to do in New York” or “why is being 20-something SO HARD?”
“Ok. Ok. I get it. But listen...I read it sometimes. And it’s like “oh I did this thing today” or whatever but....I want it to be better. I just...I think you can do better. I mean, are you really sitting down and taking the time or are you just like slapping it together?”
At first, I was taken aback. It was definitely jolting to be told hey I’m reading your stuff and it’s just not that good. In fact, it sounds lazy and slapdash. But instead of dismissing him or running out of the cab to go cry myself to sleep, I asked him “in what way?”
I really tried to listen hard to what he was saying. What was it that wasn’t speaking to him? How many others have tuned out? Have I been lazy?
And this is part of the reason for my hiatus.
My #1 priority when I began this blog was to write and put out a solid post once a week. As the weeks continued on this goal evolved into just putting out a post once a week.
But after hearing his criticism and accepting it, I believe I am better—and, slowly, my blog will be better—for having truly heard his feedback.
Being told you’re not good enough (or your work isn’t its best) is tough to take. But the alternative, not being told despite this being an issue, is worse.
Think about a time when you received criticism (aka definitively negative feedback). What was it? How did you handle it? Tell your story in the comments.
After all, only by making yourself better will you earn your seat in the happiness box.
