Are your friends going out this weekend? Are you stuck inside wishing you could be anywhere but your dorm? You probably have FOMO, or the “fear of missing out.”
If you were born anywhere from 2000 on up, this feeling is most likely commonplace to you. If you were born before then, chances are you’ve experienced it without naming it. College students are in the unique position of having the most free time to date in their lives, and for most college freshmen, this is a huge transition from nonstop eight-hour school days and endless extracurricular activity. With class times ranging from seven in the morning to nine at night, there is a seemingly infinite pool of things to fill the empty space in our days with.
Naturally, opportunities to hang out with your friends 24/7, to go out to the bars every night, to get Whataburger at midnight, to see Waka Flocka Flame on a Thursday of all days or any number of other things abound with this newfound free time, and it’s extremely easy to get wrapped up in it all. When you get to college, you want to think that you can do anything you want whenever you want, that things all magically work out and schedules are optional; you want to maximize the memories you can make and rightfully so. Don’t be fooled, though — forget FOMO before it’s too late.
You are in college to learn and grow. To become a future physician, lawyer, writer, world leader, anything you dream of, but it comes at a cost.
You can’t make your dreams come true if you aren’t willing to sacrifice your time and put in your best effort. Having been here for a mere three weeks, I’ve already been forced to make several ultimatums in respect to the time required for my success. I’m certain that I’m not the only one.
Imagine for a second that your friends are going out tonight and you’re worried that missing out will hurt your relationships or cause you to be left out.
Maybe you have a biology exam in Himes tomorrow morning, a chemistry assignment you’ve neglected for two weeks or a research paper that’s due in a week. If going out means that you will have a blast for a few hours, that’s great.
However, going out probably means that you’ll either oversleep or perform poorly on your exam. Going out might mean forgetting about that chemistry assignment and earning a zero. Going out is stealing valuable time from your research process for your paper. Going out makes you more inclined to worry about not going out the next time or the time after that.
Going out when you have more important priorities means trading temporary pleasure for long-lasting fulfillment.
Unfortunately for us, we live in a fast-paced society that places a high value on living in the moment and an even higher value on capturing that moment. We hear so frequently, “you had to be there,” when we miss out on fun events our friends went to, and it makes us worry about going another day not experiencing everything we can with them.
It’s easy to forget that your life now will not be your life forever, and it’s even easier to forget everything it took to get you to this point of achieving your aspirations: time, money, countless hours of effort and duress, blood, sweat and tears. Letting your emotions get in the way of your long-term life goals is a waste of your energy and a disservice to yourself as well as those who helped you get here. Recognizing that there is a time for everything, for studying and stressing and working hard, for partying and staying out late and enjoying yourself, is of the utmost importance.
There is a delicate balance to strike, an important line between happiness and foolishness, but you cannot let it ruin your life. Be willing to forget FOMO in favor of fool-proofing your future. I promise that you won’t regret it.
Riley Sanders is an 18-year-old biology major from Denham Springs, LA.
