You can’t imagine having too many things

Fomo is the feeling of anxiety or insecurity over the possibility of missing out on something, like an event or an opportunity.

Not only has this term been added to the official dictionary, but it has also become a staple of our cultural lexicon.

To me, this whole idea is disgusting. Six billion people, and every last one of them trying to have it all? Fomo is just another way of justifying greed. It’s a sad reminder that many of us, myself included, have a very slim grasp on a sense of our own worthiness.

Nepo writes about this eloquently in the book of awakening:

This is a form of greed, of wanting everything. Feeling like we’re missing something or that we’re being left out. It’s the seed of lack that makes us feel insufficient. As if the thing we haven’t tasted will be the thing to bring us alive.

Make no mistake, greed is an important motive. It can be highly productive, as a source of ambition for an individual, as the motor of a company’s growth, or even the engine of an entire economy.

Several years ago, a group of economists started defining measuring greed. They developed a tool called the dispositional greed scale. There are several statistical and economic elements to this scale that are way above my intellectual pay grade, but to simply read through the line items is a very intriguing exercise. Check out a few of these survey questions and think about the degree to which they might apply to your own behavior.

Your life motto is, more is better.

You always want more.

As soon as you have acquired something, you start thinking about the next thing you want.

You can’t imagine having too many things.

You prefer to buy too much instead of taking the risk to not have enough.

As soon as you possess something, you don’t want to lose it.

You think it’s awful to lose your stuff.

Reading these questions helped me understand my own sense of greediness, but also reminded me that the overwhelming sense of urgency that I’m one purchase away from happiness, it’s just a social construct.

The world isn’t withholding anything from me. There is nothing that is going to free me, complete me, make me whole or save my soul.

Being informed in real time about anything that has happened, might happen, or could possibly happen at any time, simply because that one thing might happen once, is a recipe for anxiety.

Personally, missing out sounds awesome. 

LET ME ASK YA THIS…
Are you easily giving into consumer madness under the illusion of need?