FOMO or HALO?

The chance to Miss Out

One of the things we noticed during the pandemic was how dependent many of us are on outside stimulation and distraction. Work, leisure, education, are usually social activities. Humans are social animals. We like families and groups, clubs and shared interests. That’s all good. Humans learn from each other. We learn practical skills and life skills. We learn how to question, forming our own identity. We learn how to take criticism. How to give praise. We learn how to love - if we are lucky.

Everyone knows that interacting with a screen is no substitute for real life experiences and friendships. So how do we balance the truth of human sociability with another truth - our need to develop our own inner resources?

Having a mind that doesn’t bore you is a wonderful thing. I know because I have one. That’s because it has been a priority all my life, just as someone who plays an instrument well is confident in their ability - an ability that comes from many hours of practice - and boring practice too.

That’s the strange thing. Not to be bored starts with being bored.

There’s always something more interesting, more fun, than being in the foothills of a new skill. Chefs learn knife-skills early in their career. If you have ever watched a professional chopping an onion you will know it’s a piece of theatre. But consider the effort it takes to be effortless. It’s the same with anyone who can do anything at a high level. They weren’t born that way. The boringness of learning your way out of boredom is not really discussed. There might be a specific goal, like playing the piano really well or learning to cook professionally, or studying a new language in adulthood. Whatever it is, it demands time and attention. What you get in return is bigger than the skill-set. You have developed inner resources. Patience. Humility. Concentration. Focus. Determination.

In the pandemic, the folks who did best, settled down to use the time to learn guitar, or Spanish, or whatever. The folks who struggled were the ones who donated their brains to Netflix.

Social media wants everything online and outsourced so that you can be monetised. In return you get instant, low-grade rewards that you can’t spend outside the store. By which I mean, not life-skills, not resilience. Just a loop back into more low-grade rewards. Meaningless activity generates more meaningless activity. FOMO.

Fear of missing out. Must check the phone to see what’s happening in the world. Must check my Insta, X, Meta, blah blah. Oh here’s another crazy cat lady video. And there’s a sale on at my favourite online store. Plus, what did Bezos buy Sanchez for a wedding present? Ping! Who’s on the Whatapp? And that’s before I get to the emails and texts and all the ‘interested parties’ advertising at me.

Humans are easily distracted. Study is there to train the mind away from distraction. Once you are concentrating you are in flow. Not just for the time involved but for the rest of the day. It’s like exercise. The benefits don’t stop as you walk out of the gym, or dance class, or roll up the yoga mat. You take your benefits with you.

And while you were doing your exercise, or your practice, or your studying, think how much passed you by! By which I mean NOTHING did. There was no fear of missing out. You were in flow. That’s the most satisfying place a human can be.

If we were designing a world that ignored our real human needs for connection and conviviality, for coming together, for being in contact with one another in 3D, not via some monetising app, it would be this world that the tech-bros have dumped on us

If we were designing a world that ignored our real human need for self-development, self-reliance, self-awareness - all of which lead to self-esteem, it’s the world now playing on your phone, a world we have all embraced. We say yes with every swipe and click.

The outside is empty. The inside is empty.

A strange side effect of handcuffing ourselves to our devices, is the frenzy to appear to be out in the real world, ‘enjoying’ ourselves, when all we are doing is a pastiche of reality. The scuffle for cheap air travel to places we aren’t interested in, activity weekends where you wake up and lunge for the car keys to drive round some poor sod’s village with your phone sticking out of the window. Visits to curated shopping outlets (arrgh). Theme nights, immersive experiences, all you can drink karaoke….

all the while uploading this fun-filled time-killing to your social media, because the supposedly 3D off-screen world on display, is exactly that… display. Could you have dinner in a restaurant and not photograph a) your food, b) each other, c) you with the waiter d) the menu, e) you getting dressed, f) you on the way home g) your influencer-waffle about what should have been precious time to talk and decompress with someone you like/love?

I am in mourning for the human. The human that knows how to Be and well as Do. The human that knows how to Do because this is something they really want to do. It’s personal. Not borrowed. I don’t have some big solution but I do have a suggestion.

Give up FOMO and go for HALO.

Home Alone Left Out.

It’s true I am an introvert so I want less human interaction than the majority of people. I think extroverts make up about 70% of the population, and some are more extraverted than others. Good! Difference matters. The key is to find your balance for you. The You that lives in the outside world. The You that needs to be alone.

I love it when I am not invited. I love it when I can wave off the others and have time for myself. Delighted they are having a good time. Delighted I am having it in my own way. Above all, I am left out of the jostling, fake, empty rush to be Doing Something in order to avoid the nothingness inside. Sometimes, it’s the pain inside. Why would I rush around and fill every waking second? What’s waiting for me when I stop? Or am I taking the meeting, working crazy hours because I want to leave my partner? Is it ambition or unhappiness? Do I know the difference? What will happen if I find out?

I find that I can avoid things in busyness. I am never bored but I can distract myself from whatever it is in me I need to talk to. Sometimes I need to sit down with myself as I would with a friend. `Instead I say, ‘write that article, clean the kitchen, pick up the shopping, call suchabody.’ As a Virgo it is hard for me not to busy myself. I had to learn the difference between outer/inner demands. When I am writing I am inner, but it’s justified by having an outward end. To be inner just for itself… look, I know it’s not easy.

HALO is an invitation to be with yourself as you would a friend. To make time. To show respect. I try to have an evening once a week where it’s just me making a date with me. So, a good dinner that I cook, just as I would for a friend, a book I want to read, and most importantly, a catch-up on my inner world. What’s going on?

I have a high-pressure life with a lot of demands from the outside world, and this small decision helps me. Each of us has a different life. Your solution won’t be the same as mine. Maybe a bike ride does it. Maybe an uninterrupted walk. Children always the change the decisions we can make about inner time, but by making time for inner time we are also showing our kids that it matters. Kids watch us. They see what we do. What we are. We teach best by example

Really, this inner time is time you set aside, just as you would for a good friend who needs you. You need yourself, you know. Don’t be a stranger to yourself. That’s how people get shocked into a massive life-change they didn’t expect. The sudden love affair. The sudden being-left by your partner. Even illness, which is often the only way we get round to paying attention to ourselves.

Paying attention to yourself does not make you a narcissist!

We can’t cope with life-change of any kind, good or difficult, if we don’t know ourselves. Knowing ourselves involves building up a relationship with ourselves. That’s also how you withstand those folks who say, ‘you’re this or that’. Are you? Knowing yourself means you can take fair criticism learn from it. It means you can reject the gaslighters and the liars and the controlling creeps.

Know thyself was inscribed on the Temple of Apollo at Delphi.

It’s hard, and like all things hard, it needs the boring hours put in when you would, or could, be doing something else. On the other hand, think how much time social media wastes. And the pointlessness it generates.

FOMO is a pointless waste of time

HALO is a chance to get to know someone you’re with for the rest of your life.