the human group - session 30 - no FOMO

No Fear of Missing Out.

Or perhaps there is something to be missed?

What is behind the restless striving to capitalise on every situation? Is it to get ahead, to feel good about ourselves, to feel accomplished? Yet we are aware that the hunger never subsides, like an addiction we continue to capitalise by transforming our relationship with the present into a goal oriented race to the finish line. What is the finish line anyway? Death?

With nowhere to go, no festivals to miss, parties, gatherings, exhibitions, no scenes to be a part of, are we happier?

An article in the guardian suggests that in Australia our happiness presently is equal to the happiness experienced this time last year.

Australians are as happy as before coronavirus lockdown, Guardian Essential poll finds.

- the Guardian.

Has the Earth called for global rest, that our bodies have been yearning for as we restlessly strive in our caffeine induced tunnels of habit. Are we slowing down to the pace of the greater nervous system, to the pace in which love can be received and relationship can be nurtured?

In this slower liminal space of limited FOMO are we happier? If so, why?

Check in - What did you notice about the day?

The noise of the ocean, the sound of people talking, stillness, the art of nature, moments of overwhelm and less chaos were a few things that people noticed the day leading into this discussion.

There was a quietness to the group this week, a collective feeling of ease and spaciousness. This could be a symptom of not missing out and spending time simply with ourselves.

We explored our restlessness, our FOMO and whether it had subsided or only in certain aspects in life. Socially everyone agreed that there was a feeling of ease not needing to be somewhere or pressure to maintain a place in a social group.

Though for me and others there remained a restlessness in making the most of the opportunity of the pause in our habitual ways of living. Why do we have this restlessness? This FOMO on life? Comparison, contrast, competition, self-value or maybe just a busy mind that is unable to acknowledge ourselves for all that we have, have accomplished and the simple beauty of the present moment. Is our restlessness a symptom of a tired body needing nurturing and rest? Or is it a drive that we need to satiate?

One human mentioned the landscape of overwhelming choices has simplified to a degree, enabling space from paralysing indecisiveness constantly pulling us out from our present awareness. This is an exhausting state of being, never content being where we are, always looking to the next thing. Reality being skipped as if we are constantly changing the channel but never watching anything fully through. Focusing our attention on the future and the past.

Anxiety is a mental state born from dwelling upon the future, depression is a mental state born from dwelling upon the past.

How do we stay present?

Taking time to feel, no input needed, simply staying where we are and opening.

This was an offering of one of the humans and it seemed to really send us into a flow state of discussion. Gratitude was brought to the forefront as an affective tool in bringing ourselves to the present, one human said that he would do the A - Z’s of gratitude in order to get to sleep at night. He said that he would never make it past ‘H’. So when submerged in anxiety or depression, when we are lost in the mind and imaginings of the future and the past, simply stay where you are and open up.

If in doubt be grateful.

Gratitude seems to open our hearts and we suddenly feel. This feeling only exists in the present and perhaps it circumvents the mind’s wanderings and ground us in the moment. Feeling seems to be a focal point for the present and being grateful a bridge to feeling.

With less opportunity for reaching what do we discover?

Boredom needs to pass before understanding or contemplation.

We once again find ourselves within the unknown, this place of nothing. What is this nothing we find ourselves in once we have removed any form of FOMO, anxiety or depression?

We fool ourselves by calling this space ‘nothing’ because what it really is, is that in which we do not know. Passing through the threshold of boredom we start to play and see ourselves for who we really are without the identities we paste over ourselves and each other.