The Fear of Missing Out, Featuring Dr. Jennifer Douglas

(upbeat music) Welcome to the Smikle Speaks Podcast. This is the space and the place for leadership learning. I'm Joanne Smikle, I'm a speaker and educator, a consultant and a forever student of the world. Enjoy this episode. Jen Douglas, my absolute favorite California-based clinical psychologist, educator, author, trainer, speaker, during your superwoman is back. And today we're gonna talk about the fear of missing out. Welcome back, Jen. - Thank you so much for having me. You know I love our conversations. - As do I. So remind us a little bit about your background. - Of course, so I'm a trained clinical psychologist out here in California. I recently left my faculty position at Stanford to be entirely on my own and have a little more flexibility in my life. So a lot of the things that we're talking about about value space living. And so I do training on perfectionism and burnout with corporations. And I also have individual coursework that folks can take as well as coaching in therapy. So I do a lot of everything. - Do a lot of interesting things. I like that. - If you're living in alignment with your values. - I am. - So today, Bomo and JoMo, those are not terms I coined. We know this. And the first person I ever heard used them is Dr. Carey Hirsch. She's actually one of the country's leading authorities on MS with the Cleveland Clinic in Las Vegas. And she was talking about FOMO and JoMo. And I thought this is interesting. What the heck is it? So what are FOMO and what are JoMo and what are they all about? - So FOMO is the fear of missing out. So we had a recent episode where we talked about comparison. FOMO is very much related to comparison. We see other folks, or we even imagine other folks doing cooler, more fun, more interesting things than us. And we fear that we are not able to engage with that or taking the same advantage of the opportunities that might be out there. - Okay. And JoMo? - JoMo, I smile because I love some JoMo. JoMo is the joy of missing out. And actually finding oneself very at peace with where we're at in the moment. Even if somewhere on earth, someone is doing something that might be interpreted as cooler than what we're doing in this moment. - I love that. I love that. I love that. So how do you move from FOMO to JoMo? - Hmm. So a lot of it we have to identify is in our heads. This idea, again, it's comparison. It's, oh my gosh, I'm sipping key and watching my favorite show at home and other people might be out socializing and oh, I should be doing that, but I'm only doing this. That's a lot of this is placing values and negative values on what we are doing in the moment. It also has a lot to do with social comparisons and for some folks where FOMO hits harder, it can also hit histories of feeling left out and not feeling included. And so it's making peace with, when we move more towards the joy of missing out, it's making peace with where we are that we don't need to be doing the newest coolest thing in the moment and we can actually find satisfaction in whatever we're doing at this exact moment of our lives. So I'm having a wonderful time here so I don't worry about this, but later when I'm writing notes and doing quote unquote boring things, I can actually embrace that and not to spend all my time daydreaming about, oh, what are other people doing in this moment that I'm not able to take advantage of? - So one of the things I see a lot in my consulting work is that people are overextended are creating their own burnout because of this drive to get the next thing, to get the next promotion, to get the next bonus. And I see it in a lot of the executives that I work with and a, it's frightening, but b, it makes me sad because okay, so if you don't get that promotion, I have to tell you this had a woman client who just did not get tenure. - Oh, it was very sad. - Yeah. - And even though she said, "Oh, it doesn't bother me." As we continue to talk, she says, "Well, that means they don't value me. That means my work is not that important." And I'm like, "Timeout." It doesn't have anything to do with them value in you. It has to do with there's all these other decisions and your work is phenomenally important. And maybe just maybe, if you really feel that they don't value you, is this the right place for you? - Yes. - So those are some of the questions. - Oh, yeah. - Absolutely. - So what do we do to help people in the workplace who are just striving and driving? - Yes. - Because we're never gonna have it all. - Yes. Have you talked to your listeners before about the hedonic treadmill? - No, I never even heard of it. - Oh my gosh, you're about to change a lot. Okay. (laughing) So the hedonic treadmill is a cycle that we go through as humans. And again, this was evolutionary developed in our brains and actually does help us. It helped us back in the day and it can help us here. But again, and I talk about those that you lot, in too high a dose, it can wreak havoc on our lives and it can create a ton of burnout. I talk about this a lot with, especially high-achieving women executives, you see it a lot. And so, hedonic treadmill means that you're going for the next thing constantly. And then when you achieve that thing, you get this little blip of joy, but almost even, some people don't even, some of the clients don't even bother to celebrate. They don't even celebrate the promotion. I have to make them celebrate. And they're already thinking about the next thing and the next promotion or the next bonus. And so you get in this cycle where your brain, what actually happens in the hedonic treadmill is, you think the next level is going to make you happy, then you get to the next level. And then you have this limited amount of happiness, but then you actually revert to your fundamental level of happiness. And so it feels the same when you get that promotion and then you're like, oh no, no, no, no, but it's gonna be the next level that's gonna make you happy. So it's gonna be the next bonus or the next towel or the next blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And so we can actually see it in the level of dopamine that's released after these events that we can feel, a lot of excitement and joy in the beginning, but then it goes back down very quickly. And so when folks are constantly chasing that and that's sort of related to this conversation about fomos, okay, I finally made this level. I finally made VP, but now I need to make senior VP. And then it'll be okay. But when we're stuck on this treadmill and we haven't learned how to be happy internally, it's never going to be enough. - And that's a lot of energy to put. - Yes. - 'Cause we have limited life energy. So. - Yes. - Yeah. Okay, so how do we get to Jomo? Like how do you get off that treadmill, stand in space, stand in place for a minute and get to Jomo? - Yes. So I know I'm gonna sound like a broken record, but we've gotta get back to our values. - Mm-hmm. - If we're looking at someone else's ladder and we're saying, well, I'm gonna climb that ladder, it's not gonna make us happy unless it's our ladder, unless it's what we actually think is important. And I remember this when I was at Stanford, it was the next level up, when I was a clinical assistant professor, the next level up was a critical associate. And I hadn't published in a lot of years 'cause I was focused on clinical work. And they said, oh, we're gonna have to publish on this class that you're teaching. And I said, well, I have a new baby and I'm about to get pregnant with another one. I'm not doing this, like I'm not staying up till midnight writing these papers and I said, well, then that's, this isn't the right time for promotion. And I could have, and most people say, no, I'm gonna stay up till one o'clock in the morning and do this on top of all my other duties and all my home life and all these things. And I said, you know, no, this actually isn't how I wanna spend my time at this point in my life. I'm actually not focused on that ladder, I'm focused on this ladder over here. And so getting really clear on how we wanna spend our time. There are also times when I was climbing that ladder like wildfire and that was okay 'cause that's when I wanted at that time in my life. But when you feel people who struggle to have joy in the moment and embrace what they're doing, it's often because they're looking for external validation, they're looking for happiness outside of themselves rather than inside. - Inside, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Totally get that. So what's the win for making the transition for an as hard work for doing the hard work to make the transition from FOMO to JOMO? What's the win in terms of the big picture of a person's life? - Big picture of person's life. There's two big wins. One is authenticity. You are going to feel genuinely happy and satisfied. You're not going to check the boxes that you think should make you feel happy and satisfied. I work with so many clients who say, oh, well, I did everything I was supposed to do. I've checked all the boxes. I'm stereotypically successful from the outside, but it feels very empty. I'm not actually joyful day to day. Do you feel that in your bone satisfaction and contentment of this is enough? I know what I'm doing. I'm not just kind of riding the train. I am steering it to where I want it to go. - I like that. - It's wonderful. - It's wonderful thing. It's beautiful to watch. I love my job. So you have that level of authenticity and life satisfaction. But then the other piece that I will die on this hill is you get time. You get time back to do what you want to do with your life rather than checking the boxes that other people have. - Yeah, yeah. And that's the most precious thing we have this time. And it's also the most limited thing we have and the most uncertain thing we have. Yeah. - Yeah, yeah. We can't get back. We can't buy it. It doesn't matter. - And we don't know when it's going to end. - Yeah. We do not know when it's going to end. All right. I want people to be able to get in touch with you. I want them to take your virtual class. I want them to, here you speak. I want them to hire you to come train at their organizations. How do they find you? - You can find me. If you're a social media person, you can find me on Instagram at Dr. Jen Official. So Jen with 1N. And my website is Dr. Jennifer Ducklist.com where you can find all kinds of information about getting in touch, about speaking therapy, coaching, and I do have an online course that is called Freedom for Perfectionism, how to take back your time and live a more authentic life. - Love it, love it, love it. And I hope that people will reach out to you because you offer so many valuable tools that improve individual lives, which means that that's improving our world. So thank you for those contributions. Thank you for coming back. - I know you have a book deal in the work. So as soon as that book is, (laughing) it's hot off the press, you're coming back. - I cannot wait. This will be my first stop. It's gonna be great. - Thank you, thank you, thank you. (laughing) All right Jen, have a wonderful afternoon. Have a wonderful, wonderful afternoon. And thank you again. - I appreciate you so much, Joanne. - You too. And a hug to Chaos and Drama. (laughing) - Bye babies. (laughing) (upbeat music) - Thank you for listening. Be sure that you subscribe and share. You can get more leadership learning from my YouTube channel and by following me on Instagram. Reach out when you're looking for a speaker to energize your next event. Reach out when you need curated leadership learning for your organization. Reach out when you're ready for consulting that will help your organization fulfill its potential. I'm Joanne, Smykel, and thank you for tuning in. (upbeat music)