Salt + Soul Adventures

Getting salty, smiling, and chasing experiences

Tag: mental-health

  • FOSY (fear of saying ‘yes’)

    Many of you have heard of FOMO, fear of missing out.  Dragging yourself along to something, even if part of you is screaming, “Dooooonnn’t maaakkkke meeeeee, I just wanna stay in my sweatpants and drink hot cocoa”, because you’re anxious if you don’t go you’ll ‘miss out’.  The thing is, either way you ‘miss out’ on something.  It could be that rager party where out of nowhere Ice Cube showed up (he was just in a movie I watched, first name that came to mind) and put on a free gig, or that night staying in curled up with the dogs and getting a much-needed rest.  Whether you choose A or B, you’re missing out on the other thing.  Basically, you should have FOMO 24/7 as such. 

    Some of you may have had the life-changing experience of reading ‘Choose your own adventure’ books growing up (if you have not, get online NOW and find one, they are magical).  By life-changing, for many I mean anxiety-causing freakout reading sessions constantly worried you’d chosen the wrong adventure, and then having no flipping idea how to go back and choose again, even though you’d thought you just turned a single page.  If you have no idea what I’m ranting about, basically the book would get to a certain point of the story, and you’d either choose to go down the dark narrow alley chasing what looked like a lost puppy (please turn to page 28) or get in the cab you’d called earlier and was pulling up right as the alleged puppy gave a little howl somewhere in the foreboding darkness (please turn to page 39).  After choosing A of course (you better have picked the puppy!) and then realising it wasn’t a puppy at all but in fact a werewolf, try as you might you could never turn back the pages to find where that branch-off was and try again!  See, FOMO is everywhere, cause while every part of you was saying, “Hey dumbass don’t go down that dark, horror movie style alley”, ya did, as you were worried you just might miss out on a puppy.  Those of you who are less susceptible to FOMO, however, are currently cosied up in a cab heading home to dinner instead of turning into werewolf food.

    What about FOSY though, ‘fear of saying yes’?  As much as I’d like to say I coined this, it has been around for a few years now.  In some cases it can relate to really big stuff, like social anxiety, financial stress making people feel a need to turn down things, and lack of self-confidence.  It may even be something worth seeking professional support for, as social wellbeing is more and more showing to be one of the cornerstones of good overall wellbeing.  There is also the side of FOSY where we struggle to say “yes” as we’re concerned ‘future us’ would really wish we’d have said no.  If you’re a Facebook events responder, have a think about how many times you take that glorious ‘tentative’ option when responding…even when you know you are 100% free that day and it sounds like a pretty good time (this is me, most every time).  It isn’t like I don’t want to go!  However, the further away it is, the more time I have to think about everything else I ‘should’ be doing by the time that event arrives (ya know, laundry, meal prep, building a pizza oven from the ground up).  By the time that day arrives, I’ve either completely talked myself out of it, and also written about 4000 messages to the host in my head about why I can’t suddenly make it after panicking and clicking ‘yes’ just yesterday, or less commonly managed to rally and go because the guilt has gotten the best of me.  If the later, I then often have a wonderful time as wherever you go, there you are=I’m often too stubborn to be miserable once I get there (unless it’s after 8pm, then get me home or I often turn into the grown-up version of a cranky toddler who just wants her dogs and bed).

    Be if FOSY or FOMO, both mean you miss out on one thing but experience another.  However, we too often focus on what we didn’t do, when instead we could be embracing what we did.  Either way, it was our choice in the end (unless you have been physically forced to attend the event you so desperately wanted to avoid, in which case you may as well make the most of it anyway since you’re there=still have some choice).  Other than a Magic 8 ball, there’s no way yet to predict the future nor return to the past.  So, instead of freaking out about FOSY or FOMO, consider trying a little JOWYA, and finding ‘joy in where you are’ (t-shirts coming soon…).  Now, back to my cocoa and dogs, my ‘yes’ for this evening (and lets be honest, most nights really).

  • Be a failure

    In the spirit of having just finished marking my university students’ first of three assessments, this blog seemed fitting.  When I first started as an academic, everyone warned me that marking is one of the worst parts.  You spend your evenings, weekends, and what feels like half your year grading things, and then once you release these grades back into the wild the other half of the year is spent dealing with disgruntled emails opposing said grades.  What they don’t mention is, marking is often something you can do anywhere!  In the ‘good ol days’ of hand-written assignments, I’d load up those boxes of chicken scratch, find myself a beautiful beach, and return many a submission with grains of sand sprinkled between the pages.  As we moved to digital submissions for many things, after learning the hard way laptop keyboards and sand aren’t friends, I discovered the cafes that won’t kick you out after an hour and parks with comfy grass and minimal biting ant or screaming children life make a delightful marking office as well.  Not sure what my colleagues are on about, but marking is one of my highlights!

    Now that we’ve set the scene about the importance of perspective (see, there was a point), let us chat about a word that instils anxiety and fear in far too many students, and people in general: FAILURE.  Firstly, I was hoping using ‘Gothic’ font would help make that a bit more chilling, looked better in my head than in Word unfortunately.  Anyway, it is almost inevitable some students will fail an assessment, and also that all of us (yes reader even you!) will fail at hopefully multiple things throughout our life.  Failing at least means you have tried…maybe not very hard or well, or maybe it was your all and just not in the right direction or way (side note, technically students can fail by not submitting something at all, but I classify that as a ‘null submission’ so its not relevant to this rambling!).

    When we fail something at school, we’re most likely given feedback and encouraged to reflect on what we could have done differently, and hopefully what we can change in approaching the next assessment.  Heck, we might even get some tutoring, personal extra chats with the teacher, or if we’re lucky a resubmission attempt!  Noooot always the case when we fail at something in the ‘real world’ though (gag whoever started the notion that university isn’t part of the real world…as much as it often feels like I’m in a movie with the strange things that happen).  I mean, we might have those super ‘helpful’ friends or family members who are VERY ready to give us feedback, potentially in the form of ‘I told you so.’  We’ll also have the other kind of ‘helpful’ friends or fam (guilty at being this person…) who shower us with unwelcome optimism about how ‘it wasn’t meant to be’ but we’ll get it the next time or find something else just as great!  JUST LET ME EAT CHOCOLATE AND FEEL SORRY FOR MYSELF IN PEACE PEOPLE.

    Either way, what comes next is our move.  I mean, I’m not saying retreating to a cave for a few days with baked goods and self-pity isn’t okay in some situations.  However, it’s also unlikely to serve much purpose beyond possibly having us end up in the news as a potential yeti spotting or something (I’ve got the hair for it).  Failure can leave us disheartened, disappointed in ourselves, angry, unmotivated, and a range of other less than enjoyable emotions.  One of my shining examples was very confidently going for promotion last year at work (after taking a demotion to get the job in the first place, I knew I was a shoe-in)…and then being denied.  Ouuuuuuch.  While I did have a little rant to the dogs for a few days (my partner during that time was smart and learned to just smile, nod, and where possible schedule volleyball coaching), I then realised that wasn’t really getting me anywhere.  Funny that.  Serendipitously, I’d also just started a research project around self-compassion.  Damn.  Guess I can’t keep being hard on myself either.

    Instead, it was time to pick myself up by my invisible bootstraps (I hardly wear shoes, nevermind boots), realise this was an opportunity to reexamine the situation, and make a decision: keep seeing myself as a failure, or instead reflect on how my approach was the fail and consider options.  I recommend the second one, its way more fun for everyone, including yourself, and life’s got enough challenges as it is without us making it tougher being mean to ourselves.  Don’t get me wrong, failing sucks.  Whether it’s something we worked towards for hours, months, or years, its hard for it not to hurt somehow, or to take personal.  And yes, it may very well be 110% your fault, but it’s also 110% your opportunity to view it as a learning and life experience (once that cave time and baked good wallowing is finished).  Failure lets us work out what doesn’t work, just like succeeding lets us work out what does.  It’s then up to us to experiment with other approaches or even change direction all together…or heaven forbid maybe even ask for help.  While there’s a quote attributed to Julian Michaels that, “If you’re not failing, you’re not trying hard enough” that isn’t always the case.  Maybe we’re just not trying the right way, or trying for the right outcome.  Time to get out there, screw up, learn something, and enjoy the messiness of life.  And if all else fails, there’s always a cave and brownies.