Real-life effects of FOMO and why it is no longer just a social media problem: Psychologist explains

FOMO has gradually begun to influence how we perceive happiness, success, achievement, self-worth, and more, explains Chetna Luthra.

Fear of missing out, or FOMO, is a term that we use very casually in our everyday conversations, often without fully understanding what it actually means. While FOMO has traditionally been associated with social media and the fear of missing out on what others are doing, its implications have now extended far beyond social media, psychologist Chetna Luthra believes.

“Social media may have amplified FOMO, but the phenomenon has gradually begun to influence how we perceive happiness, success, achievement, self-worth, and even the pace at which we believe we should live our lives,” shared Chetna with HT Lifestyle.

She believes that at its core, FOMO can distance us from our own experience of happiness. We may begin to overlook the small, everyday things that can bring genuine satisfaction because we are constantly running after what the media and society have defined as happiness or success.

Instead of recognising and appreciating the good things that we already have, we become preoccupied with what we might be missing. In this process, we can lose touch with the things that actually make our own lives meaningful. The psychologist elaborated on the ways in which that happens, which are presented as follows.

1. The idea of peak experiences

One of the ways in which FOMO overshadows genuine happiness is through the creation of an idea of “peak experiences,” noted Chetna. Social media predominantly exposes us to the highlights of people’s lives, their achievements, celebrations, travels, relationships, milestones, and extraordinary experiences.

As a result, we may begin to believe that these are the kinds of experiences that our lives should constantly contain. We start expecting life to always feel exciting, productive, or extraordinary because these are the experiences that are most visible to us.

“However, life cannot always exist at its peak. Just as there are highs, there will also be lows, and there will inevitably be ordinary and slow moments in between. We need to learn to experience these moments fully as well,” stated the psychologist. “A slow or mundane day does not mean that our life is any less meaningful. The inability to appreciate these ordinary moments can itself become a consequence of FOMO, because we begin to believe that we should always be doing something more.”

Social media often has people only highlighting their peak experiences. (Pexel)

2. Creation of haste

Another major issue associated with FOMO is the haste that it creates. When we constantly compare ourselves with others, we may begin to feel that we need to achieve things quickly simply because someone else has already achieved them. We stop understanding our own pace and begin measuring our progress against someone else’s milestones.

Chetna highlighted that this comparison can create significant insecurities. We forget that another person’s life is different from ours and that there are multiple factors, circumstances, opportunities, and experiences that have contributed to their current position. Despite not seeing the journey behind the outcome, we compare their visible milestones with our own present circumstances and conclude that we are somehow behind.

3. Setting up impractical standards

This can eventually lead us to give in to the pressure of keeping up with made-up or impractical standards of experiences, success, and achievement. We may begin pursuing milestones not because they are genuinely meaningful to us, but because society has made them appear desirable or because other people are pursuing them.

This leads to another important aspect of FOMO: not knowing what we want for ourselves. In the words of the psychologist, “When we lack a clear sense of purpose, we can become more susceptible to wanting what others have. Without our own direction, someone else’s life can easily become a reference point for determining what we should desire. We begin to confuse what we want with what we have been conditioned to want.”

Therefore, understanding the difference between wants and needs becomes important. Not everything that we desire is necessarily something that we need, and not everything that appears valuable because others have it necessarily holds value for us. Without understanding our own needs, values, and purpose, we can continue chasing things simply because they are visible, desirable, or socially validated.

FOMO can also lead one to modify their identity to get closer to an unrealistic ideal. (Pexel)

4. Highlighting insecurities

“FOMO is also closely connected with our own insecurities and our need for validation. Comparison can influence how we perceive our self-worth and self-esteem,” noted Chetna. “When we become conditioned to seek validation through external or materialistic sources, we may begin to look at other people’s achievements, possessions, experiences, or social approval as evidence of our own value.”

In this sense, FOMO is not simply about being afraid of missing an experience. It can also reflect a deeper fear that we are not enough, that our lives are not enough, or that we are not keeping up. Our insecurities can therefore make comparison more powerful, while comparison can further reinforce those insecurities.

As the therapist shared, “This can also create a gap between our real self and our ideal self. To reduce this gap, we may even begin to construct or wear fake personas. In doing so, we are no longer simply comparing our lives with others; we are also modifying our identity to fit the standards we believe we need to meet.”

Therefore, Chetna argues that FOMO is no longer simply a problem of social media, even though it can act as a powerful amplifier. The deeper issue lies in how we understand ourselves, our happiness, our purpose, our worth, and our pace of life.

“The problem is not necessarily that other people are achieving, experiencing, or enjoying things. The problem begins when their experiences become the standard against which we evaluate our own lives,” she noted.

How to move beyond FOMO

Chetna suggests the joy of missing out, or JOMO, as a possible antidote to FOMO. According to the therapist, “JOMO involves being able to consciously accept that we will not experience everything, achieve everything, or participate in everything, and that this does not make our lives inadequate. Instead of constantly asking ourselves what we are missing, we can begin asking ourselves what is meaningful to us.”

JOMO is about accepting that not experiencing everything still makes our lives meaningful. (Pexel)

This requires developing a better understanding of our real self while keeping our ideal self within a reachable distance, thus allowing ourselves to aspire and grow without creating an unrealistic standard that constantly makes our present self feel inadequate, she explained.

It also requires creating a sense of personal purpose and meaningful goals, and recognising that someone else’s milestone does not have to become our deadline. At the same time, we need to work on the insecurities and patterns through which we seek validation.

“Rather than depending excessively on external, materialistic, or socially constructed sources of worth, we can work towards developing healthier and more practical ways of understanding our value,” noted the psychologist, adding that an authenticity movement on social media itself can also be helpful.

“We need to highlight the importance of experiencing life in its totality rather than constantly searching for peak experiences. Because the goal should not be to have a life that always looks exciting. Perhaps the goal is to have a life that actually feels meaningful to us even when nobody else is watching,” she stated.

Note to readers: This article is for informational purposes only and not a substitute for professional medical advice. Always seek the advice of your doctor with any questions about a medical condition.

Chetna Luthra is a clinical psychologist at Marengo Asia Hospitals, Gurugram.