Trading in FOMO for JOMO

I'm an introvert so I don't mind missing out on things. But social media has been different, it's changed me in ways I'm uncomfortable with. 

At first, it was just a way to stay in touch with people. But then, with its growing population came content. So much content that it's overwhelming and it makes one feel as if they are missing out if they don't keep up with all the content. 

It has the ability to make people feel unimportant if they don't know someone's latest status update. 

For something that was supposed to increase our social interaction it has ironically isolated us and diminished our ability to be authentically social. 

It's created weird popularity contests and fake personas. 

It's introduced fear into our lives. Fear that we can't keep up with "the Jones' " whose life looks so perfect in all those pictures shared, I mean do they ever not smile? Actually, yes. They don't smile more than they do but who wants to see that? So the smiles get shared and the comparisons get drawn. But if all you and I see are the smiles we are forced to conclude that the Jones' are incredibly happy and successful and fill in the blank. 

It's introduced a whole new platform for rude, crude, and disrespectful behavior. People have forgotten their manners when *interacting* on social media. As people log in to their accounts it seems like they put their humanity on hold and forget that who they will be interacting with is a human as well. 

It's become a battle ground for all the biggies and then things that shouldn't be big but are made so by the attention they receive on social media. 

It is a hotbed of misinterpretation, innuendo, assumptions, false information, and one-up-man-ship. 

But I didn't want to miss any of it. I wanted to be in the know of who said what to whom and what the relationship status is of so and so and how the most recent catastrophe was gaining attention and and and. The list goes on like that damn energizer bunny. 

And then I wanted to miss it all. I couldn't breathe. It was, it is, too much. TOO MUCH. My phone was dinging with notifications, my computer would (it seemed) open up on to Facebook, I felt behind (with what I'm not sure) if I didn't check in a couple times an hour at least. (Pst. Nothing had changed that was significant.) In 2009, 2012, and 2016 I went overseas and my ability to check in on social media was zero to limited. It was a huge relief. HUGE. It was a relief to not think about what kind of insightful, quippy, and/or meaningful status I was going to post. It was a relief to get a break from all the content that populated my home page feed. It was a relief to remember there was life apart from social media. It was a relief to know I could miss out because I wasn't really missing out on what mattered. 

In 2018 I took Facebook off my phone completely. I logged out of Facebook and changed all my logins that used Facebook to logins through my email. I removed Facebook from my bookmarks and then left Facebook for a month. It was good, no it was great. Somehow people still managed to get a hold of me and I of them, who knew it could be done outside of social media?! But I came back to it for a couple of reasons. And I was frustrated that I even had the reasons I did. So I started thinking harder and longer about leaving it all together and what that would mean for me and my relationships. I became insanely envious of my brother who hasn't touched Facebook with a ten foot pole and hasn't been sucked into the social media vortex. Lucky guy. I started thinking through what was the most important thing to me about having a Facebook account and could there be a work around? Of course the answer is yes. There is always a work around. It might take some adjustments and transitioning but isn't that just part of life? 

So as we rounded the corner on 2019 and 2020 came into sight, I knew it was time. Listen, I'll be honest people - I can't do another election season on social media. The last one was so brutal that I am still trying to recover from it and no, I'm not joking or exaggerating. That's great if *you* have thick skin and don't care if your humanity is called into question. I'm not like that and frankly I don't want to be. 

FOMO, in my life, is all about missing out of the non-essential things. I sure as hell hope that my tribe knows how to communicate with me outside of social media and will do so when the chips are down and the stakes high in their lives. If you are in my tribe, Facebook should not be our sole means of staying in touch. That's a superficial connection that is easily broken. My tribe and I should have stronger threads holding us together...and I think we do.

So JOMO is my goal. As an introvert, it's a more attainable goal than it may be for others and I still have that twinge of FOMO but I'll get over it, I practically am already. 

My (MIS)adventures on the yoga mat

I almost suffocated at yoga today. My boobs and my nose met up and my boobs sucked in my nose like they were quicksand grabbing on. I had visions of my obituary reading something to the effect of "she died during an awkward yoga session when her boobs smothered her." I pulled up for air just in time.

Yoga is supposed to increase your awareness. Oh, I'm aware all right.

I'm aware of every roll, every fold, and every inflexible muscle I have. I'm aware that I don't know how to breathe (how I've stayed alive all these years is beyond me) and I am in fact as klutzy as I have thought myself to be. I'm aware of the sweat as it drips down my forehead, travels in a torturous way down my neck and pools between my boobs, all while I'm holding some quivering pose and can't wipe it away.

I'm also aware of my mind. "I can't", "This is ridiculous", "It's too hard", "I'm too big to do this", "I'll never...", and the litany of phrases marches on while I'm trying crow pose...or really almost any pose. I'm aware of my heart beating, not in the physical way but in the emotional sense. It beats and sometimes my eyes tear up and I don't know why. I'm aware I am uncomfortable, not just physically but mentally. I attempt to keep to myself, to make my large body as small as possible. Sometimes that awareness is when my eyes tear up. I'm aware that I am fidgety, distracted, and it's hard to just be.

So I suppose yoga is working. I'm definitely more aware when I'm practicing it.

As I was growing up I was given the impression that yoga was for hippies and it was evil. I'm not joking. In the circles I lived in, yoga was considered "new age" which was evil. So like any good lemming I have spent a good part of my life thinking yoga was bad. Very very bad. And then I decided to not believe that any longer because all of a sudden it didn't seem true and it seemed a little far-fetched that yoga, a practice in which you move your body for health and wellness, was evil.

Around 2012-2013 I started talking about beginning the practice of yoga. I took one class in 2017 and continued to talk about it. July 2019 I finally started, for real, the practice of yoga. It only took me 6-7 years...better late than never I suppose.

I'm an awkward yogi. Okay, I'm not really a yogi but go with it. The point is I'm awkward. For the first few classes I would find my mat folded up underneath me and I couldn't figure out how it had moved. I've figured out that issue but I still find myself more often than not somehow laying on the mat wonky. An aerial view would show the mat and I making an X. I don't know how this happens. A few times I have found myself with my whole lower body not even on the mat. Do I really not understand how to center myself? Well, since I'm so aware now, thanks to yoga, the answer is no I don't. I don't know how to center myself, literally or figuratively. But I'm going to learn.

After I almost suffocated in my boobs today I did a few things I was really proud of. I was in chair pose, I then went into airplane pose with my upper body. The the instructor suggested we raise ourselves up on our toes and balance in the half-chair, half-airplane pose. I immediately thought, "There is no way on God's green earth that's happening" and then I did it. It had to be a fluke. But then I did it again on the next flow. I was inwardly elated. I also did a few other poses today that, at first, I was like "psh, not happening" and then just did them. So I guess something else I'm more aware of is that I can be, and am, wrong about myself. I'm not giving myself enough credit, I can do more than what I think I can.

Why Self-Checkout is the Least of Your Concerns

I think I've heard it all...

"Self-Checkout is stealing jobs from people." NOPE. They aren't.* I work in a original size Target store and we have four self-checkouts (see above picture). Target hires people to specifically oversee the self-checkouts and it's more work and more stress than being a cashier at one register. Why? One person has to oversee four registers versus just one. Trust me, it ain't a cake walk especially when the technology fails or a guest has a question/complaint or it's a rush hour situation.

"Self-Checkout is evil." REALLY? What about human trafficking? Drug problems? Abuses? Systematic racism? Broken educational systems? I could go on and on but hopefully you catch my drift.

"If I can get your employee discount I will use the self-checkout." HUH. Don't be that person. I mean really, don't be an ass.

Listen, I'm pretty sure self-checkout isn't the thing you should be getting your panties in a twist about.

I'm serious.

Self-checkout is going to be the hill you die on? Really? I see people get seriously worked up about the self-checkouts and it makes me wonder...how worked up are they getting about people being abused? Or about people being forced into "modern day slavery"? Or the declining state of the educational system in America? Or the environment? As I said above, I could go on and on but I'm really hoping you are picking up what I'm laying down.

In the big picture is self-checkout the thing to rally against? It's a microscopic presence in your life so why are you expending so much energy on it rather on something that is worth getting worked up about? It is a brain boggler.

So what IS worth getting worked up about? Well I've already mentioned a few things, some of them more than once. And we all have a part. A part, not the whole. It doesn't rest on just our shoulders, it's a shared thing. Think, "What can I do in my own world and circles of influence to create positive change?" Do not think, "What can I do to change every single person on the planet?" One way of being worked up will bring about change, the other way will not - it will just anger and alienate people.

Anger about self-checkouts just anger and alienate people - trust me on this. And it's because in the big picture of life self-checkouts aren't worth an ounce of energy, they shouldn't even hold on a spot on anyone's list of "Things to be Worked Up About." If you are worked up about self-checkouts then you are living a tunnel-vision life. Expand your vision and really see what is worth putting energy toward.

Going to use the self-checkout? I double dare you.


*Don't just take my word for it Forbes and Zip Recruiter (among many others) have both written about it. I mean if you can't believe Forbes when it comes to business then who can you believe?! Are you going to find articles that say it is stealing jobs? Sure BUT for every one article that claims it is stealing jobs there are approximately three than support it not doing so.