It’s common for those born in the 70s and 80s to look back and think, “Ahh… life was so much simpler back then.”
This nostalgic reminiscing may actually contain a kernel of truth if we stopped to look at the millions of people suffering from FOMO.
With the advent of technology, the proliferation of mobile devices and the constant barrage of social media notifications – one is ‘wired’ into life almost every waking moment of their existence, and this is not a good thing!
Just look around and you’ll see countless people with their faces glued to their mobile phone screens, oblivious to their surroundings as they go about their daily activities.
This scene would have been unseemly in the past but has become the norm now.
When you have FOMO, you’re constantly trying to get the most out of the day. You’ll sacrifice sleep to spend more time on social media.
You’ll always feel the need to do more, be more and get more.
This may seem good if one is looking at it from a self-help perspective… but very often, a person with FOMO is usually engaged in non-productive, busy work that neither elevates their mind nor their life.
Now, as a business owner or marketer you may think that FOMO is a good thing, as it can make your product or service irresistible, and you are right; FOMO is a very powerful marketing tool, but it must be used sparingly, or it can lose its efficacy.
If you are using the power of FOMO by adding scarcity to an offer, it must also be genuine scarcity; don’t tell people that they only have 7 days to get in at a special price, only for them to see the same price/offer 30 days later!
So, FOMO does have its good and bad points depending on your perspective!
If you notice that you or someone you know is displaying the signs below, you can be almost certain that you/they have FOMO:
Since social media is designed to keep you hooked, you’ll be getting a mild dopamine hit every time you check your notifications. Likes, ‘thumbs ups’, comments, etc. are all little hits of ‘validation’ that keep you glued to the platform.
By putting your phone aside, it’s almost as if your world has come to a standstill and you’ve left the ‘party’ – and you’re missing out. Definite FOMO!
A candle that burns brighter because it’s burning at both ends often burns out faster. We live in a world where motivational gurus often preach philosophies of ‘hustling’ and ‘grinding’.
So, now we have stressed out people with frazzled nerves who don’t want to waste a minute while in their pursuit of success – another sign of FOMO.
This is a very obvious sign. If someone has to update their social media with photos of their food, or ‘check in’ to whichever location they’re at or post all their thoughts and feelings on their Facebook wall – chances are high that they have FOMO.
The need to be seen by others is a secret need to feel significant. It’s also a desire for validation. This can be seen on Instagram where people blatantly share glamorous lifestyle photos in an attempt to appear successful. This too is a disguised sign of FOMO.
If you’re photographing and/or video recording everything (to post on social media) instead of enjoying the moment… yes, you have FOMO written all over you.
There’s a reason Netflix posts all the episodes for a TV show at one go. Not only does it give people the opportunity to binge watch and spend more time on Netflix… but it also appeals to people who have FOMO and can’t bear to miss a single episode. It also keeps them on the platform for as long as possible.
Gone are the days when people would wait an entire week to watch the next episode of MacGyver or The A-Team. Now, it’s all instant and dumped in front of you all at once. Gorge as you please… with a side of FOMO.
If one hates staying home alone and spending time in quiet, they probably have FOMO. They may try to fill the time with unnecessary activities.
They may want to meet friends at social events – and will feel terribly left out, if not invited. The need to be a part of everything will have them constantly stressed out.
In a nutshell, they have a serious case of FOMO.
A quick Google search for ‘tips to overcome FOMO’ will give you a list of practices you can adopt and apply to end this pesky problem.
The sooner you overcome this fear, the better. Like the saying goes, “Quiet the mind and the soul will speak” – and you’ll discover true joy and inner peace.
Overcoming FOMO and any limiting belief requires a change to the way you think, and this requires a lot of self discipline. If you want to know more about harnessing the power of self-discipline, check out the featured resource below for a free report; download, read it and take action 😊
Negative thoughts are the nemesis of creating a successful business – and life – for yourself. It’s difficult to drown out the thoughts that corrupt your thinking and prevent the flow of energy to make yourself better, but there are some ways to calm a racing mind and stop the flow of negativity that threatens to bring you down.
Perhaps you just need some quiet time – time for yourself to ruminate on the positive things you’ve accomplished. Meditation is one way to achieve the quiet time you need to get your thoughts under control.
Whether you meditate in the forest, next to a babbling brook or in a quiet place in your home with the television and other devices turned off, the quiet you’ve created can be a catalyst for more creative and positive thought patterns.
When you’re meditating, you may want to try positive affirmations as a way to quiet your brain and push out negative thoughts and feelings.
An affirmation can be as simple as repeating to yourself that you’re stronger than all of the negative thoughts that come your way and that you can and will overcome them.
Journaling is also a good way to get your negative thoughts out of your mind, onto pen and paper and see them for what they are.
It’s a fact that writing is an exercise that seems to reinforce and help you understand things better than typing or even speaking. Journaling helps you work out problems that may have cluttered your thinking in the past.
Reinforcing the positive messages you receive from yourself or others is an important and viable way to drown out negative thoughts.
The above methods of affirmations, meditation and journaling are valuable tools to ensure that negative thoughts and feelings don’t remain in your life and that you can continue progressing to a more positive inner state of mind.
When weeding negative thoughts out of your life, make sure you surround yourself with positive people whenever you can.
It’s easy to be influenced by people who always spout negativity and seem to want everyone around them to feel the same way.
Of course, it’s impossible to feel upbeat all the time. Life is sure to get you down once in a while. But find a way that works for you to silence the negativity and stop being so hard on yourself.
The fallout from self doubt can be devastating and render you incapable of continuing to make rational business decisions. It’s like flailing yourself with a whip day in and day out – a torture so blistering that all you can think of the pain it’s causing.
When you let the exhausting task of doubting yourself take over your life, you’ll be less likely to seize opportunities and have a more difficult time in beginning or finishing tasks that could bring you success.
Moving forward can be difficult as the voice of self doubt becomes louder and drowns out the reality of who you are and what you’re capable of.
Standing up to the chatter and telling the chaos and loudness to stop can help you break the destructive pattern of low self esteem.
It’s like turning the flame down under a pot of soup that’s about to boil over. You take over control of your thoughts rather than letting your mind overflow with doubt and take those thoughts where you want to go.
This time could be different if you don’t allow the voices to take control. Each time you leave your comfort zone and ignore the self doubt torture, you come closer to realizing a positive outcome to your efforts.
Self confidence will replace self doubt and you’ll finally be able to focus on your future success rather than past failures. Silencing the exhausting torture of self doubt will also boost your optimism about the future.
You’ll become more confident about your abilities and motivated and enthused about your ideas. Take action even though you don’t feel like it.
Freeing yourself from the loud and destructive self doubt voices – if only for a few minutes – can calm the voices and help your mind find clarity and creativity.
You can always tweak the immediate actions you take later on. The real task of the moment is to get feedback, knowledge and experience so you can build your self-esteem and empower yourself to success.
Conquering self doubt frees you to stay on the course and reach the goals you’ve planned for yourself. Don’t let the voices of self doubt exhaust you to the point of abandoning your future success.
Beginning an Internet marketing business with a product launch that’s much less expensive than some of your successful colleagues (who love to post their earnings from one launch that would pay your bills for months) can help alleviate some of your self-doubt.
Starting on a small scale – perhaps a $7 product instead of a $97 one – can mean less work to get it off and running and a launch that can teach you a thing or two.
The feedback and knowledge you get from beginning with a small launch is invaluable to help you move up to higher ticket items.
You’ll likely build your list with each small launch, too – meaning that when you do get to the big ticket launches, you’ll have more marketers who will buy from you. With each small launch, your self-confidence will build and self doubt will begin to wane and destroy your lack of confidence; you will feel empowered.
Even the small launches may fail, but that’s a good thing, too – when you use the knowledge you gained to set your focus on something else or to use another strategy because the current one isn’t working.
You won’t have lost much time and energy if you discover these truths from a small launch. Self doubt is often made up from failures of the past, but your small successes can provide positive thoughts about the positive outcomes you’ve realized.
The positive feedback you receive from small successes may serve to set you up for huge success. There’s always something new to learn in Internet marketing.
You’ll soon discover if something works – or not – and can quickly tweak or discard it at your discretion. Little will be lost if you haven’t invested a great deal in something you lack knowledge about.
Correcting your course along the way is the same thing pilots do when they’re approaching a bit of unexpected bad weather before reaching their destination.
Look at the charts again, learn from the experience you’ve gathered during the small ventures and correct your course so that you’re firmly on a safe and steady path again.
Learn from other marketers. Follow the business path of others to possibly discover more ways you can promote yourself and become successful with your own enterprise.
It’s sometimes easy to get lost in your own little world of strategizing and promoting, but you may become stagnant if you don’t allot some time for learning from others.
Trust your instinct and values when making decisions about your business. There are many shady marketers out there who might turn your head with promises of fast money, but if you stay true to your own values, self-confidence will become the antidote to any self doubt you may have.
Whatever you want in life will require discipline to achieve and overcoming negative thoughts and self doubt is a small part of this. So, if you want to know more about harnessing the power of self-discipline, then check out the featured resource below for a free report; download, read it and take action 🙂
Lao Tzu once said, “Govern a nation as you would cook a small fish. Don’t overdo it.”
This saying is very true and applies to us when it comes to governing our lives too. Society these days is extremely stressful and moves at a breakneck pace.
We want more, we want it faster and very often, we want it yesterday. We want to be the best and have the most in the least amount of time.
Mental health issues are at an all-time high. With the advent of technology and this era having the most conveniences available, you’d expect life to be easier… and yet it’s more difficult and burdensome than ever before.
The key to achieving work-life balance in this insane world, will be to adopt a few tips and abide by them like your life depended on it.
There’s a saying that ‘perfectionism is self-abuse of the highest order’ and that’s undeniable. With social media so prevalent, people often feel a need to appear perfect to others. They seek validation like never before.
Filters are used for photos. Extreme measures are taken to portray a glossy lifestyle that’s worth of a magazine cover.
While it’s good to challenge yourself to do the best you can at work, aiming for perfectionism will stagnate your progress and leave you feeling drained.
There’s only so much you can do. Trying to have a million dollars in the bank account, washboard abs, a beautiful supermodel as a wife and fame all at the same time is highly unlikely to happen for most people.
Very few people achieve all these goals, and yet, these outliers are held as the paradigm of success instead of being treated as exceptions to the rule.
Most people struggle to control their eating habits. Just reining this one habit under control will be a Herculean task.
Don’t be a victim of unrealistic expectations. Write down your goals and make plans on achieving them – but give yourself a reasonable amount of time.
Want six pack abs? No problem. Try and get them over 8 months instead of 3. If you’re overweight, then give yourself a year. What’s the rush?
You have time. Don’t mess up your work-life balance by spending hours at the gym and neglecting other areas of your life.
Like they say, you eat an elephant one bite at a time. In the same way, break down your goals into micro-goals with multiple checkpoints along the way until you reach your destination.
Slow and steady wins the race. Rome wasn’t built in a day, but they were laying bricks every hour. Approach life the same way and remember to rest and relax in equal proportions to your work.
This is an all-too-common scenario that affects thousands of people all over the world and it’s especially prevalent in entrepreneurs and artists. You love your work so much that you just can’t switch off.
You’re either working more than you planned to or you can’t stop thinking about work even when you’re trying to sleep or in the middle of other activities such as eating, watching a movie and so on.
Confucius once said, “Choose a job you love, and you’ll never have to work a day in your life.”
While that is true when it comes to finding job satisfaction and not dreading work, it doesn’t give one the license to obsess about work at the expense of everything else.
You still have to look after your health, your relationships, etc. Work is a means to an end and not an end in itself. Below you’ll find 5 ways to help you switch off from work and find peace and satisfaction in other activities.
Try and create an interesting life for yourself. If you have something fun to do after your work, you’ll be more engaged in the activity rather than doing mental gymnastics thinking about your work.
The change of scenery will help to break monotony and give you a mental break from the constant whirring of gears in your own mind.
Be fun. Do fun things and enjoy life. It’s not all about work.
Avoid checking your emails and answering work related calls once your working hours are over. You don’t want to risk getting sucked back into ‘work mode’.
Handle work issues during your working hours and switch off all access to you once you’re done for the day. It’s imperative that you draw boundaries if you wish to mentally switch off from work on cue.
Avoid discussing work or work-related incidents when you’re back home. Find new topics to speak to your family about. Discuss plans for the next vacation. Or ask them what they’re watching on TV or how their day went.
Appreciate the time you have with them. In time to come, it’s these memories that you’ll fondly look back on.
Pick up a new hobby that you enjoy. It could be something you’ve always wanted to do. Rock climbing, yoga, knitting, dancing, learning a new language, etc. are all opportunities to stretch your mind and body.
Try not to be competitive about it and just seek to enjoy the hobby for what it is – something to pour your passion into. It shouldn’t become a new job.
When you have a hobby you love, you’ll be glad to leave work and go work on your passion.
At the end of the day, work is a part of your life. It is not life. Understanding the difference will help you to treat work as an important activity but not an overarching one. Find balance and both your work and life will improve.
“Is there a place you can go to break away for a little while? If you haven’t yet built your tree house, it’s never too late to start.”
Gina Greenlee, Postcards and Pearls: Life Lessons from Solo Moments on the Road
Whatever you want in life will require discipline to achieve and maintaining a healthy work life balance is a small part of that. And if you want to know more about harnessing the power of self-discipline, then check out the featured resource below for a free report; download, read it and take action 🙂
For many people, having structure is very beneficial to their work. Having goals, milestones, and plans on how to achieve them is a great way to keep yourself on track and focused.
However, that doesn’t mean that more structure is going to be equivalent to more or better results. In some cases, if you have too much structure, you might actually end up doing more harm than good to your creativity processes.
If you were to have every little detail of your work planned out and highly structured, down to when you’re going to do what, where you’re going to do it, and how it’s going to get done, then you’re really not leaving yourself with much wriggle room.
If you feel like doing a different part of your work on one of those days, but force yourself to follow the schedule and plan, then you’re going to be unhappy with your work and probably end up creating something that isn’t your best effort, because you didn’t want to do it.
Some of these ideas will have to come naturally, and you can’t really predict when you’re going to be feeling creative and when you’re going to be feeling more work oriented.
You need to have a bit more flexibility in your plans. Instead of planning day by day or hour by hour, you should instead have weekly goals to fulfill, so that depending on how you’re feeling on various days throughout the week, you can accomplish everything you need to for that week without being overly dependent on a schedule.
Of course, if there’s a case in which you’re feeling a bit too loose, and you’re unable to focus or you’re struggling, you can tighten up your schedule as needed. But when it comes to your day-to-day life, you should have a bit more flexibility and freedom to approach your work as you see fit.
Tightening up your schedule is something that you can do if you really need to see more progress, just know that when you’re in a more comfortable spot, you can let up again in order to regain a better sense of creativity.
One of your goals should be that you’re able to constantly maintain a flexible schedule, so work towards that goal diligently.
Many people have begun mixing their work and off time together, so that they’re always thinking about or doing work throughout the entire day.
They might take small breaks between work, and what ultimately ends up happening is that they don’t get enough work done, but also don’t end up relaxing that much.
Instead, you should separate the two, so that you have dedicated relaxation time and dedicated work time. It’s necessary for your mental wellbeing to have ample time off to relax and unwind from strenuous work.
If you’re working all day every day, with random bits of “relaxation” strewn throughout, you’re going to be getting the worst experience of both parts. You won’t have enough focus in your work, but you also won’t have enough time to properly relax.
During the times that you have dedicated to work, you’re not distracted by anything else, and you can give 100% effort into getting your job done. Once you’re done with work and you’ve worked hard, you can actually fully relax without having to worry about working again until the next day.
Just as work requires your full attention, relaxation requires you to have a clear mind. If you spend your entire relaxation time worrying about the work you haven’t gotten done yet, you’re not going to relax at all, but rather you’ll just be distracted while getting more stressed out.
You should take the time you’ve set aside for relaxation and use it fully. Completely take work off of your mind and just enjoy whatever it is you’re doing. You can be watching TV, chatting with friends, reading a book, or doing absolutely nothing.
Whatever it is, just make sure you’re not letting work bleed into the time you have, otherwise you’re not going to enjoy it very much. Some people can blend their work and enjoyment together, but this doesn’t work for everyone.
If it truly works for you to do both around the same time, then you shouldn’t stop doing that. If you’re unsure, you should try to separate work and relaxation time as much as possible, because that may be what’s going to work best for you.
If you only work well in complete silence and complete focus, you’re going to need to learn how to adapt. Very few places are dead silent. Even if you have your own home office, chances are you’ll hear your family in the background, as you should.
If you’re at a café, there will be people talking. If you’re at an office, there will be background noise and voices. You need to train yourself to be able to either tune out or work well with background noise.
Only working well in near or complete silence is indicative of larger problems with focusing. You might be able to focus in those situations, but you can’t let the smallest things throw you off completely, otherwise you’re going to struggle to keep up with your work in all kinds of places and situations.
One option you have is to simply get used to it and work in places with background noise more often. Instead of holing up in your apartment or house where it’s all quiet while you work, go and work at a nearby café.
This will allow you to work under more and more circumstances, meaning that you’ll be able to efficiently keep up with your work anywhere you go. Of course, not everyone has a nearby café that they’d want to work in for extended periods of time.
Coffitivity is a website that you can use in order to better get used to working in environments with a bit more noise. You have a few free selections to choose from, in various levels of noise, and you can adjust the volume as you’d like.
This allows you to get used to it, even from your quiet home or office. You don’t have to get used to a ton of noise. Everyone has their limit. Nobody is expecting you to work well in the middle of a theme park or at some other loud location.
The point is to be able to handle fairly common level of background noise that you would encounter in a wide variety of situations, so that you don’t need a special place to get all of your work done.
As you can appreciate, a lot of this is dependent on the way you think and if you want to know more about developing a good mindset for success, please click on the featured resource below for a free Strong Mindset report; download, read it and take action 😊
We all want to reduce stress levels, right?
Well, in this article, we’ll look at three more ways you can improve the quality of your life by learning how to properly manage your stress levels and, more importantly, the causes of stress, and you’ll see that stress management doesn’t have to be complicated.
If you want to look at a previous article covering three other stress relief strategies, you will find it here.
Best of all, every method featured in these articles are based on 100% natural remedies and solutions.
Many adults are self-professed caffeine addicts, and studies now show that coffee does come with some health benefits. But as with everything in life, moderation is key.
For some people, caffeine may not be a good idea at all.
Everyone has a different caffeine threshold, right? Some people can handle a lot, some just a little, and some not at all.
It all comes down to your body’s overall chemistry.
Just as many of us need caffeine to function after waking up, too much can make us jittery and scatterbrained.
If you’d like to try cutting back on your caffeine intake, it’s important to do so in moderation. Caffeine can be addictive and going cold turkey can lead to withdrawal symptoms.
Try cutting back just one cup a day and see how you feel. Depending on the outcome, keep doing this until you find your threshold.
Who knows, you may find that you don’t need caffeine at all!
So many of us are afraid to say no when people reach out for help, advice and support, and by not considering whether saying “yes” is good for us, it can easily lead to the first signs of stress, including self-doubt which can lead to incredibly high stress levels.
Are you someone who often takes on more than you can handle?
Are you a “yes” person?
Are you finding yourself emotionally and mentally depleted because you give so much of yourself to others?
Are you struggling through toxic relationships that don’t add any value or happiness to your life?
And being a “yes” person doesn’t just apply to your personal life, but quite often “yes” people are the same way with their jobs or careers.
They don’t want to miss out on an opportunity so they sign on for as many tasks or projects as possible.
They’re worried that they’ll fall behind the competition, so they say yes to every marketing strategy or new course that pops up online claiming to help them enhance their business skills.
Sometimes managers will reward hard workers with a higher workload output, assuming they’ll be motivated by the bonus despite any consideration as to whether they will be able to perform consistently at the required level.
If you find yourself in this situation, take a step back and look over your workload. Ask yourself what you can get done within a reasonable amount of time, and then discuss this with your manager, business partner – or simply yourself!
Explain why taking on a heavier workload will cause your current one to suffer in quality. And if you work for yourself, consider restructuring your schedule and reducing your workload by getting rid of the tasks that you don’t personally need to do. Learn to delegate or outsource.
If you’re a student who is constantly stressed out about your course load, then consider taking on a lighter one next semester, or if it’s not too late, dropping one you’re currently enrolled in but that you may not need.
Or perhaps you’re going to school full-time while also working full-time. Look at the benefits of going part-time, see if you can rework your budget and make it work.
In the long run, these changes might require that you stay in school longer than you expected, or change your current living situation, but your mind and body will thank you.
Above all else, be selective with your overall workload and what favors you do for people. Prioritize what household chores need to be done, what bills must be paid right away, and know when to say no.
If someone else is asking you for help, then chances are good they understand what it means to have too much on your plate.
Putting tasks off until the last minute can add a tremendous amount of stress to your life, especially if they’re important tasks with a specific deadline. And while it’s often hard to get things done in a timely manner, it’s not impossible with a regular routine.
Whatever tasks you need to accomplish, it’s important to write them down on a To-Do list or use an online project manager to help you stay on track. This can be for your personal or work life, or you can even have separate lists for both.
Put the tasks that are most important at the very top of your list, paying close attention to whether they are actually of upmost importance or not (it’s easy for us to prioritize the tasks we actually enjoy doing over the ones that truly move the needle in our personal or business lives), and then make your way down the list. Be sure to include due dates, too.
And avoid scheduling tasks back to back, leaving chunks of time in between each one. You can use this time to reset, or to just do something that you enjoy doing.
It’s important to feed your soul throughout the day, as that’s an easy and natural way to relieve stress.
For example, if you are responsible for more than one project at your job, prioritize the one with the earliest deadline and put it at the top of your to-do list.
Break it down into segments throughout your day, allowing time for coffee breaks, and some social interaction.
By breaking up their processes so that while they are in a sprint they are laser-focused on the task at hand, while also knowing that a mental and physical break is coming up, they are able to stay focused while also ensuring they recharge and reset.
The same goes for household chores, too.
If you feel overwhelmed by everything that needs to be cleaned and organized around your home, then create a to-do list or download a household printable that makes it easy for you to keep track of your objectives.
This will help you keep track of the progress you’ve made so you aren’t feeling overwhelmed. Then work your way down the list to the very last chore that needs to be done.
Remember that when we’re stressed, it often affects how we think and that will reflect in our work.
Quite often, we realize far too late that pushing ourselves beyond our mental capabilities results in not only poor output and quality, but we end up taking longer to do simple tasks because we aren’t giving ourselves a chance to recharge.
Managing stress requires self discipline and if you want to know more about harnessing the power of self discipline, check out the featured resource below for a free report; download, read it and take action 🙂
