I awkwardly shift my weight from leg to leg, trying to make myself look busy on my phone while I waited in a coffee shop. I check, then double and triple-check that I had the correct time for my plans to meet my friends. I knew that they had been hanging out earlier and I just hope that I won’t be stuck feeling left out – as I sometimes do. It’s not their fault that I can’t always spend time with them: we’ve all got other time commitments and other friends we also spend time with; it’s unreasonable to expect to be invited to join my friends every time they make plans, but that still does not calm my fears of being the one who is always left out.

In the social media age, it seems like it is all but impossible to not know the plans, pastimes and activities of those around you. It is suddenly easy to know what all of your friends are doing, where they are doing it, and who they are doing it with. Between Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat, there are plenty of sources to share your social life with others. However, these constant reports of social engagements can easily leave you feeling left out and lonely, especially when it is so easy to see all of your friends spending time together – without you.

This increasingly common sinking feeling is none other than FoMO: Fear of Missing Out. After all, who knows what kind of moments could be shared or memories could be made when you are not around; who knows how many inside jokes and stories you will suddenly be excluded from.

FoMO makes it impossible to be certain which plans you want to take part in and when to handle other responsibilities. Nothing is more disappointing than having to stay in to study while all of your friends have fun – that is, other than making plans that either fall through or turn out to be no fun all while preventing you from spending time elsewhere that would have been more enjoyable. When imagining how things could have turned out differently had you made different plans, it is easy to see how FoMO can lead to this perpetual fear of making the wrong choices of how to spend your time.

I find myself struggling with this constantly: the back-and-forth of attempting to make plans, the worrying of what I could possibly be missing when I chose to stay in as opposed to going out, and even the fear of missing so much that I won’t even be invited to future plans. What’s worse is that it is obvious that the more friends you make and the more responsibilities you take on, the worse the FoMO will be.

Amidst all of the fear and frustration associated with FoMO and the social anxieties that come with it, it is critical to be aware of all of the commitments you are making; never over-commit yourself simply because you are worried that you will miss out on all of the fun if you decide to stay in. Scholastic and professional commitments should never be jeopardized because your social life is too active. Furthermore, everyone needs downtime alone to recharge; without it, you will be too tired to even enjoy your social life.

Still, knowing all of this doesn’t make the attempt to balance everything any easier or the FoMO diminish at all. What’s important to remember is that you are not alone in your fear of being left out or missing something; just about everyone has to juggle multiple responsibilities and social circles, so it is entirely reasonable that a good portion of the population knows what it is like to experience FoMO.

Knowing this, try to not spend too much time worrying about how things could have gone if they had been planned differently; focus instead on how things actually are going and how they will go with better planning in the future. It benefits no one to dwell excessively on the past and how it could have been different.

I see my friends enter the shop together, talking and laughing as they recall what they had been doing before meeting me. I try not to panic for fear of being left out in the conversations that were about to ensue; I try not to let my fear show as I greet them. I ask them how they are, bracing myself to learn about all that I had missed out on because I was studying, resulting in me failing to be able to fully engage in conversations for lack of context.

Instead, I am continuously drawn back into conversations as my friends fill me in on the few things I had missed, allowing us all to engage in conversation. I am reminded that I was missed when I was not able to join my friends and even invited to their next outing. I smile as I feel myself relax – regardless of whether or not I will actually be able to join them. As we plan to meet again, I feel my heart soar because I know that even if I am not able to accept every invitation I am offered, those who truly care about me will make sure that I am not left out. It is with whole-hearted appreciation that I say to my friends (multiple times): “Thank you for inviting me.”