Tune out the current thing
You need unshakeable pride
For many of you reading this, FOMO is probably more of an issue in your life professionally than personally.
The other day, I went to a friend’s office to say hi to the team and give them some feedback on a new product that they’re launching soon. Vibes were high and everyone could feel it. There was a feeling of nervous excitement slowly simmering. I was listening to two of the engineers talk about how confident they were in the new trend the team is betting on.
Immediately, I felt a surge of FOMO and frustration go through my body.
For about five minutes, I wanted to drop everything I was doing and go all-in on what they were talking about. In that blip, it felt like all the work I’d put into Engineering Agency and my own intellectual rabbit holes was useless.
“Like how could that matter?” I thought. “This blog probably won’t work anyways.” “Of course, I have to join in on what these guys are doing.”
And then, for the following five hours, I felt extreme frustration and anger at myself. How could I have been so easily swayed?
I’ve spent months staying true to my curiosities and exploring them in authentic ways. In fact, I literally went off Twitter for two months in order to unplug from the opinions of the herd. I’m so sure that this blog is what I’m meant to do right now. It’s my thing.
So why is it that I went through a roller coaster of emotions?
Well, after sitting on it for a few days, I think there’s three things.
FOMO is a human reflex, not a lack of discipline. I was hard on myself. No matter how committed you are to the craft, it’s human to feel fomo. The goal is not to skip fomo completely but to be aware of it.
Me feeling fomo does not take away from the fact that I am still in fact committed to my craft and mission.
I’ve never set boundaries on personal mission creep. Of course I’ll feel all over the place if I haven’t put up safeguards around my mission.
On a tweet from a few months ago, Tamara Winter commented this fantastic piece of advice which I’m going to have to remind myself over and over and over again.
Everyone needs to read this.
“Be wary of personal mission creep, both IRL and online. Maintain a ruthless focus on what matters to you. Don’t pay too much attention to what’s capturing the zeitgeist (read: tech twitter) at any given moment. And don’t attach yourself too strongly to other people’s narrow ideologies, especially those of you don’t fully grasp.
The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing. It can be so difficult to tune out The Current Thing, but it’s probably worth it if you want to make your own brain an interesting place to be.”
Just keeping this thought online in my subconscious will already make such a big difference in how I approach future feelings of fomo. I’ll be able to better identify when my professional borders are being “attacked”.
And, like any useful skill in life, it’s a muscle I’ll have to strengthen over time. This week was a harsh reminder that I can barely even bench the bar in defending my own mission.
This doesn’t mean locking myself in a room. Awareness is a strategic advantage, but it needs to be paired with discernment. I want to be able to look at a trend, take what’s useful, and leave the rest behind without it shaking my foundation.
I bookmarked this tweet by Anu ages ago but am now finally starting to understand how important it is for any founder or creator.
Everyone reading this is super ambitious. We all just need to remember that our gut feeling is absolutely important and deserves to receive attention from you no matter what the current thing is.
My work on Engineering Agency deeply matters to me and it’s my moral obligation to work on this craft and gift it to the world.