Social media add to depression and FOMO – visionary entrepreneur

SS: All right. So even though the word is catchy and quite famous by now, it would still be nice to fill our viewers in. So briefly, what exactly is FOMO which stands for ‘fear of missing out’? Is it a syndrome? Is it a condition? What is it?

PM: So FOMO is an anxiety that is caused by the fear that there is something better happening out in the world than what you're doing right now, combined with a fear of being excluded from a beneficial collective experience and sort of group thing going on, that you're seeing happening, and you're not a part of.

SS: Alright, and you're saying that you're the first FOMO sapiens known to men? How come before you there were none?

PM: Well, the word FOMO didn't exist before I came along. So I actually invented the word FOMO, when I was a student at Harvard Business School way back in 2003, if you can believe it. Of course, these feelings are part of the human experience all the way back to the earliest humans. But we didn't need the word FOMO until, I guess, social media came along, and my word was just invented, and it sort of perfectly synced up with the spread of the internet and social media.

SS: Okay, just a question that just came up in my head, did you make any money on FOMO? Did you get rich on FOMO?

PM: Well, here's how it works. Thankfully, I have made some money on FOMO. I do a lot of speaking to companies, individuals, I've written a book called ‘Fear of Missing Out. I have a podcast called ‘FOMO Sapiens’. But, you know, even though I have trademarked the term ‘FOMO Sapiens’, the reality is that like, when you coin a word, nobody sends you cheques in the mail. So you just have to get the actual joy of just seeing your word used, I guess, it sort of has to be the reward for you a lot of the time.

SS: So here's another one. Isn't FOMO really just a fancy word for envy and you just came up with it? I mean, what's the difference between envy and FOMO?

PM: So the difference is that when you have FOMO, you know, – I think envy is one of these things that goes all the way back to like the earliest humans. Think about like the Bible, right? Like Cain and Abel, that was the murder because of envy. So it's part of our human condition, the difference of FOMO is that FOMO is really about the fact that we live in a time now, where we receive so many inputs on a daily basis, that are completely unrelated to reality. So think about how on social media, people put filters, and they basically present themselves in a very unrealistic way. And so when we come down to FOMO, you know, there's envy involved, but more than that, it's about being sort of envious of something that may not exist. And it is also really tied to the fact that as humans, we want to be part of the crowd. You think about the lines outside of the Apple store, or the lines outside of, you know, like the most popular restaurants or shows. We feel uncomfortable when we're being left out. So there is an element of envy. But I also think that the difference between FOMO and envy is that there's a deep sense of wanting to belong to something, and not wanting to be left out of something that's happening,

SS: Even though that something is just an illusion, right?

PM: Yeah, I mean, the problem with FOMO, the thing that's so messed up about it, and the reason why I decided to spend so much time trying to help people with it, is because when we have FOMO, what's happening really is we're not thinking about the world around us. We're not thinking about the fact that something exists or doesn't exist in the real world. We're basically inventing a story in our heads. We are sort of filling in the blank and saying like, ‘Okay, well, my friends are at a party. I've been to a million parties. I know what a party is. But yet my head starts to spin and I start imagining it's the greatest party of all time’. And so I'm sitting there thinking, like, my life isn't good, I'm devaluing what I actually have in favour of something that probably doesn't even respond to reality.

SS: I see, I catch myself doing that lately, because I've just had a baby. So it was like my decision that during the pandemic, I would just sit at home, be pregnant at home, deliver the baby at home, I'm actually talking to you out of my own garden, because, you know, I'm still scared to go out a lot. Even though I got a vaccine, and now that I've been so asocial because of everything that's going on – baby and corona and everything, – I find myself scrolling the Instagram, which I never did before and I'm like, ‘Oh my God, look at this wonderful lives that these people have.’ And having said that, that's at the period of my life when I'm the happiest. I mean, I don't think I've ever been this happy before because I've become a mom. So yeah, it is kind of a weird thing. I'm not sure how to deal with it, though.

PM: Well, Sophie, so first of all, congratulations, it's amazing news.

SS: Thank you.

PM: Second of all, I'm going to tell you something. It's not your fault. Okay, so here's the thing, two things are happening. Number one is, when you did quarantine/ sort of maternity time, you left the world behind, and you entered a very small bubble, but you brought something with you, which is your friend here, the phone.

SS:Right.

PM: And the phone – we were all spending more time on our phones than we ever have. When I look at my stats, especially during the deep quarantine of last year, it's like it was a coping mechanism for not having human contact. So that's number one. Number two is, Instagram is designed from the base to drive your FOMO: notifications, idealized images, all of these people mixed with celebrities, it's like you mix your friends with celebrities. And so you start to sort of confuse everything together and start to compare your life not just to the people around you, but to people that you know, are living (you know, you are a celebrity already) but people who are even more fantastic than you. And so these things all come together to basically manipulate you. And so it's something that all of us have to deal with. And I think when you start to realise that the deck is stacked against you and that the game is aligned in a way that is unfair to you, and that plays upon your psychological weaknesses as all of us have, you start to realise that ‘okay, I can fight back against this.’

SS: Okay, is FOMO part of the herd mentality? I was going to say immediately ‘herd immunity’...

PM: Absolutely. In fact, what I talked about FOMO – So think about FOMO is when we have FOMO, our decisions are being affected by external factors. Think about a great artist, like Tchaikovsky or Kandinsky, or something I'm going give you some good Russian artists. They didn't get up in the morning and said, like, ‘Well, what's everybody else doing? I'm just gonna copy them.’ No, they absorbed the world and then created new things, they weren’t just followers. When we have FOMO, we are tapping into the instincts of the herd mentality, like, you know, when you see the wildebeest going across the Serengeti, they stay in a pack because they don't want to get attacked by a predator. And in fact, that part of human instincts is survival as being in the group. But when we have FOMO, we aren't making decisions from what we truly want to do. We're being part of a group or being followers, and therefore, we can't truly do anything great because followers can't be original, they can't come up with new things. They're simply going along with the crowd. And that's what FOMO for me is, it’s why it's so problematic.

SS: But are you saying that those who actually create and, you know, come up with new programs for computers, or write amazing music or do amazing films, they don't suffer from FOMO?

PM: I think there is FOMO in the artistic world because artists are competitive. And when they see their friends getting recognition, and they don't . . . I mean, I see this in the world of authors, it's like when you know somebody whose book does really well, you sort of feel like ‘oh, but mine didn't do as well.’ There's this natural human instinct to compare ourselves with other people. Of course, as we talked about before, that may not correspond with reality. But I would argue to be a truly great artist, creator, business person, you have to let the FOMO go and recognise that greatness comes from being original and doing new things, and not worrying about what the crowd is doing.

SS: But that's easier said than done. Do you agree? Because I wonder, if I spend my day scrolling Instagram and checking out all the great stuff that other people do, does this necessarily mean that I'm dissatisfied with my own life?

PM: Yeah, it's much easier said than done. And, in fact, what we know is that, for example, when it comes to social media, the research shows us and when I was writing my book, it was incredible, I found that there were hundreds of pages of sort of psychological journal articles about FOMO. So there are people who are dedicating parts of their careers to studying FOMO. And they have found that there was a clear correlation between social media use, depression and FOMO. So the more you use social media, the more depressed you feel, the more FOMO you feel, the more you actually use social media. So there's a vicious cycle. And so, you know, I think that goes back to the question of when you are trying to do anything original or create or lead you have to be careful about the inputs that you're taking in. Where are you getting stimulation and ideas? And if it's simply from comparing yourself to other people, you're going to limit your potential.

SS: Are you completely FOMO-free?

PM: No, zero. I think I'll admit it right here. I mean, especially right now I live in New York City. And we are in this phase where I live in the Tribeca neighbourhood. We are like 90% vaccinated, we haven't had a case in like a month. So we're getting back to real life. And I'm receiving so many opportunities, invitations, things to do to the point where I realised, you know, I'm very in touch with my FOMO because I recognise that it's something that is unavoidable. But what I try to do is I monitor it, I do a bunch of things around, you know, I'm very careful about how I use devices. I think about why I do things. And therefore, while I recognise that I have a lot of FOMO, what I try to do is manage it, so that I don't spend all of my time running around doing things that you know, I don't really want to do just because everybody else is doing them.

SS: Can FOMO be actually justified? You have a list of checkmarks when you write about FOMO, and one of them goes something like, ‘I'm afraid that others have a more interesting life than I'm having.’ So what do I do if that's true? Imagine I'm stuck paying back my student loan in some kind of a boring nine to five nightmare job and my college roommate is on a book tour in Europe, and aren't they really having a much better life than I'm?

PM: Well, so I think the reality is probably not, because book tours are exhausting, but it looks good on Instagram. But the reality is that –

SS: But it's still more fulfilling than, you know, being in an office nine to five doing something that you have no interest in doing because you have to pay your loan?

PM: 100%. And this is the beauty of FOMO that FOMO isn't always a bad thing. And in fact, FOMO can tell us where we emotionally want to be – the things that we wish we were doing. So for example, if you see that your friend is starting a company, and you're working nine to five in the corporate world, and you say, ‘Wow, I really wish I could do that.’ Or if your friend is running a marathon and you see that on Instagram, you say, ‘Wow, I'd love to run a marathon,’ listen to that. The important thing to do though, so when you feel those feelings of FOMO, what you want to make sure you're doing is you're not just getting into the perception that something is good, right? So that’s the temptation. ‘Oh, it looks so great. I want to do it. I'm going to pine after, I wish I could do that.’ Okay, great. That's step one. Now, let's get serious, people. Okay, can you do this? Is it as good as it looks? Do you even like doing it? And so what I recommend people to do is start slow. Like, if you think you want to do a marathon, don't start training for the marathon the next day, train for the 10k or the 20k. If you want to start a business, don't just quit your job and try to figure out what to do, start a side business. And that's what I write about that a lot in the book, it's about demystifying, taking this thing that looks so great, and then actually experiencing it in the real world and figuring out is it as good as it looks or not? And once you do that, then you can make a much more rational decision about whether or not this thing is actually worth all of the FOMO.

And you think about immigration around the world. When people were, you know, I think about like hundreds of years ago, travelling from Europe to the New World, or, you know, wherever people went around the world in different times, they were stimulated by FOMO, they saw this world that looked amazing, they saw all of their friends leaving to go to a country. And it wasn't easy, of course. But these people were ambitious. And I think anybody with ambition will take risks in order to go after something that looks amazing and good. And I just encourage people, you know, recognise there's FOMO, recognise that it can be an incredible motivator. But don't go in feet first, try to learn as much as you can, try to figure out if the dream is real because you don't want to, for example, move to another country only to find out that you hate the climate, you hate the people, you wish you were back home. Now that's not the place you want to be.

SS: You said somewhere that FOMO actually reduces with age. Is that thanks to wisdom that generally breeds a sane attitude towards one's life? Let's say I'm 65 – am I immune to FOMO?

PM: So the way that it works is FOMO is really driven by a couple of things. Number one, it's the amount of time you're spending comparing yourself to other people. Number two, it’s the amount of life experience you have to be able to determine whether what you see is as good as what it sort of looks like when you receive those sort of external impulses. And so when you're young, every party looks amazing. Once you've been to a million parties, you're sort of like, ‘Well, I know what a party is, okay, fine, I can go or I can't go but I know what it's going to be.’ Similarly, when you are young, you have a lot more time to absorb the world around you. When you get into your 30s and 40s you're just busy, you sort of like, “I don't have the time to focus on all this stuff like, I'm just trying to get through my day, my work, my family, all of these important responsibilities I have.” Now what's interesting, you mentioned the 65-year-old. So what happens as you get older actually is you do have that wisdom and wisdom is powerful. But you also likely have more time on your hands. And more importantly, you've begun to realise that you're not going to live forever. So the things that you want to do in life, whether it's take that trip, and see some part of the world that you've always wanted to explore, or whether it's sort of spend time with your grandkids, you recognise that time is of the essence. And so actually FOMO starts to increase because you recognise that life is precious and scarce, and you need to do as much as you can before, you know, you're not able to do the things you want to do anymore.

SS: There's more to this than just one funny acronym. There's also FOBO, fear of a better option. Where does FOBO come from? And how is it related to FOMO?

PM: Yes, so FOBO – I actually invented them at the same time when I was at Harvard Business School, and I wrote this article in our school newspaper that was called ‘Social Theory at HBS: McGinnis’ Two FOs’ all about FOMO, which is a word celebrity now in the dictionary, you know, you look it up on Google, there are 50 million hits, and then FOBO, which, unfortunately, has not become as famous, which is unfortunate because I think it's a bigger problem. FOBO stands for ‘fear of a better option.’ It's the idea, Sophie, that, for example, you go on to Amazon and say, you're trying to buy a pair of white shoelaces. And there are more than 1000 possible options. And they're all perfectly fine. But there's so much information, you just don't even know what to do. It's like overwhelming. And so you don't end up choosing anything because maybe you'll find something better later on. And so it's this idea that we are waiting for the perfect thing to come along and until it comes along, we're not going to decide and so we just delay decision making, and get stuck.

SS: Alright, so should we just always pick an option quicker and be more decisive even if that means we don't always make the best choice for ourselves, just for the sake of you know, staying sane and avoiding FOBO?

PM: We should do it. In fact, there's a really interesting book called ‘The Paradox of Choice’ by Barry Schwartz. And his book actually came out the same year I invented FOBO, but they have a lot in common. And the idea that he writes about, which is so powerful, is that people who are super picky, people who are looking for the perfect optimal decision, they spend a lot more time and energy. And in fact, they do make better decisions, okay. But the reality is that they've spent so much time and energy that they tend to regret the road untaken, the things that they couldn't choose, more than people who just choose something, saying “this is good enough” and choose it, even though it might be slightly not as good as the person who spent all the time and energy. They don't have all the regret. And so these people who chose more quickly, are more satisfied in the end with what they chose.

SS: Because, yeah, your advice on treating FOBO – learn to choose what you really want or choose and don't look back along those lines. That's good advice. But how exactly do you do that? I mean, how do I know what I really want? Come on!

PM: This is the eternal human challenge, right? But the reality is that there is a process. So you know, and I did a TED talk on this called ‘How to make faster decisions’ because I have suffered this myself. And so this TED Talk, which is, I think, done like 1.5 million views, clearly people are enjoying it. And what I tell people is, you know, there are three types of decisions in life. There are high-stakes decisions, low-stakes decisions, and no-stakes decisions. A no-stakes decision is something like, ‘Am I going to have the chicken or the fish?’ It doesn't matter, either is fine. So I literally just flip a coin because I don't want to spend time deciding something unimportant, I do this all the time. Should I go for a run today? I don't know, heads or tails, flip the coin, done. I saved myself a lot of time because I could spend 20 minutes agonizing. The second are low-stakes decisions. Those are things that require a little bit more work. It's sort of like, ‘Which TV should I buy?’ And what I do there is, you know, I make some basic criteria, I know I want a certain size, and I want to spend about XYZ, and then I find somebody who knows more than me, and I outsource it to that. So I literally say to them, ‘I can't decide, can you just tell me what you think I should do?’ And I've been doing that for years. And so I basically saved myself time and energy and I don't have all that regret. Now the big things in life are the high-stakes decisions and they're you need to sit down and thoughtfully come up with criteria. So like what are my basic criteria? And then you need to think about which options meet these criteria, study all of them, actually write everything down on paper because when you write things down, they become more concrete. And then what I simply do is I pick a nominal frontrunner, I say, ‘So this seems like it could be the best one,’ I can pair it with all the options one by one, and I eliminate the one of the two, you know, and I compare them side by side, I eliminate one and keep the other. And I do that until I have just one. And the power of doing that, the reason why that works is because when we do that, we convince our brain that we're always getting the better of two options. And by eliminating the other one permanently, we have no temptation to go back to the one we just got rid of, because the pathology is when we keep going back without eliminating anything, we keep going back to the same things over and over again. And so by doing that process, actually, we come to a decision that we can live with. And the good news is, when you have FOBO, all your options are perfectly fine so you can never lose. That's the power of FOBO is that you're just trying to take your brain and remove the fear and just base on facts all the decision making that you do.

SS: FOBO and FOMO in isolation are exhausting. But if combined, they produce an even bigger monster and that's FODA, fear of doing anything, you say, right?

PM: That's right. FODA is the ultimate, you know, that is when you literally can't get out of bed in the morning. And you see this with people, especially people who have lots of options in their lives. So, the older you get, the more successful you become. People start offering you things all the time. And you also have more money to spend on things, right? And so you start to see that some of the most successful and wealthy people actually are the ones who are least successful in making decisions because they have all this FOMO, their friends are fabulous, they're doing amazing things and so they're like, ‘Wow, I could spend my summer travelling around the world, I could go to Capri, I could go to South of France, I could go to New York or Moscow,’ whatever that is. But at the same time, they have so many opportunities and options, that they're overwhelmed and they can't decide. And so they end up doing nothing. I've seen this with friends of mine. They have 10 ideas for vacations, they end up going nowhere.

SS: Okay, so my feeling is that FOMO and FOBO are exasperated by the fact that we live in a society where there's a cult of success. Success is everything. I mean, I thought we're heading towards you know, more like happiness is more important than success, but not really. Success is everything. Successful people look at you from every billboard and TV and they tell you ‘be like me.’ It may sound like BS but it's kind of cool to sleep four hours a day and brag about working your brains out. Do you see FOMO and FOBO as side effects to this ideology, where success is everything?

PM: Yeah, I think you've nailed it. It's something I hadn't thought about before, but if you think about hustle culture, the idea that we have Elon Musk, for example –

Elon Musk is portrayed as a superhuman that never sleeps, he just makes money all day long, gets all the beautiful women and has, I don't know, 19 children. I mean, he does it all. And he does a lot of things. But of course, that's all marketing –

SS: He has a model mom, too. Can you imagine that? He nailed that, too.

PM: That's amazing! And she's awesome. But it's sort of like, we can't all be like Elon. In fact, if you met the guy, you know, I'm sure that parts of what you see are real, but parts aren't. And the thing about nowadays, it's so crazy, is that we're all mini influencers. Even like a teenager with their Instagram and their TikTok, they're creating a false world for the world around them. Their reality and what they portray online are not very connected. And so, yes, we have created this world where all of us are marketing success and the rest of the world feels they need to compete.

SS: Patrick, it's been such a delight talking to you about FOBO, FOMO. I hope you’ll come up with a new term soon so we get to record another program. Thanks a lot and good luck with everything.

PM: Thank you so much.

SS: Take care.