no more FOMO

FOMO is an acronym for the phrase "fear of missing out." I learned about it from a friend on my Appa trip this time last year, and love saying it, and have since spread its use around to my friends and now to the other AJY-ers. Fear of missing out is basically the feeling of knowing that something is going on and you're not there, or doing something not really because you want to, but because you don't want it to end up being the most awesome thing ever...that you missed. Everyone has FOMO, though all to different extents. For instance, my FOMO is extremely high all the time. I want to be everywhere at all times with all people and always invited to everything because I never want to miss out. This fact has become a source of humor for my friends in the program, but I'm just glad the term FOMO has caught on so quickly...

This post is entitles 'no more FOMO' because I really do have too much FOMO towards things going on back home. Last week was BC Spring Break and all my friends were gone doing awesome things, and I was suffering from FOMO. I mean, I'm abroad in freakin' Germany doing my own awesome things, I should not be having FOMO. Being abroad though has made me realize how much I love BC and my friends at BC because I do miss them a lot. A close friend of mine pointed out to me, much to my dismay, that perhaps I'm clinging a little too much to life back at BC. I'm 5,000 miles away, but with technology, it's not even like I'm gone. I can see people via webcam on Skype, we can chat through Facebook, and through gmail, I can even call and text people's phones. This friend of mine forced me to remember many months ago that I told him that my time abroad was going to be Sabrina time. I told him I was going to enjoy being so far away with all new people in a new country speaking a new language and just being away from all the drama that consumes our lives at school. Although I took his words kind of harshly, he's right. I did say all of that. Tomorrow will mark three weeks that I've been here, and that seems like the point where I can no longer give the excuse that I'm still settling in and getting accustomed to everything and what not. I'm enjoying my time abroad, but it's not fantastic...yet. I just need to stop having FOMO towards school and friends back home, and capitalize on all these opportunities I have here to do new things.

I actually think that one of the reasons I'm not having a fantastic time yet is due to lack of adventure. I've been to Europe quite a few times before I came here to Heidelberg, and although this city is new to me, this country and continent in general are not. Also, most of the places I want to travel are all very similar (Amsterdam, Brussels, Vienna, Geneva, Paris...) but the one place that is really different is Istanbul. Some others in my group have expressed interest about traveling to Turkey but no one is really very committed. We've got nine days off though, beginning April 1st, and I want to take advantage of that big chunk of time to travel someplace I couldn't just go on a weekend. So right now I'm seriously considering traveling to Istanbul SOLO. I talked to mom about it, and although wary, she is okay with the idea. I've traveled a lot in my life, but haven't really done any independent traveling and I think this is a good chance. The big European cities for weekend trips will all be visited with friends, but Istanbul is really somewhere I could go and experience myself and just work according to my own agenda.

Now, this is obviously just an idea in the very initial stages of planning. I've been looking at flights and trying to think of anywhere else I'd want to go while I'm that far east. It's a plan in progress and who knows if it's even going to happen. But that's what I'm thinking right now... Sabrina time abroad! No more freakin' FOMO, I'mma make my own adventures and make my time abroad a fantastic experience.