FOMO

The fear of missing out.

I love internet shorthand, but this one’s different. The general category of human fears has been well documented— snakes, spiders, heights, darkness…

broccoli. (Okay, the broccoli studies are recent and inconclusive.)

Most fears haven’t changed much over time. Some—like shark week or snakes on a plane—are media-generated, but still follow the formula:

something scary, something external, something you can look out for.

But FOMO—the fear of missing out—is more abstract.

It’s not about danger. It’s about exclusion. Disconnection. Sociologists call this the Age of Information. Not just because information is powerful,

but because there’s so much of it. Important data is buried under mountains of distraction. And maybe—realizing we don’t have filters strong enough to sort it all— we’ve invented a new fear to name the feeling:

FOMO.

Like all fears, it provokes a reaction. We check under airplane seats for snakes. We squint at the ocean for fins. But how do we respond to FOMO? My wife had a brilliant thought: Maybe some people develop a kind of experiential hoarding— an overabundance of doing, to stave off the fear of missing. Just like hoarders of possessions are often reacting to fears of scarcity or poverty, FOMO sufferers may try to protect themselves from perceived emptiness

by collecting events. They fill calendars with meetings. Join book clubs. Sign up for PTA. Volunteer. Attend discussion groups. Say yes, yes, yes. None of these are bad things. But at what point do good things become manic things?

The question isn’t whether you’re busy. It’s whether you have days that are open. Moments that aren’t curated. Time for hobbies that aren’t hustled. Space that isn’t measured. So maybe it’s time to ask: Have you become a HOE?

A Hoarder Of Experiences? Hmm.

The acronym needs work. But the question stands.