This past week I spent time in Sweden, Copenhagen, and even Norway for a little while. I rode 5- to 7-hour long trains, I spent more money on booze (legally) than I ever have in my life, I learned how to navigate cities like a boss, and I was taught a very important lesson.

As I was on the second of two long train rides, from Stockholm to Malmö, I watched the Swedish countryside go by. I stood with my head poking out the window, watching this amazingly beautiful countryside go by. Farms, flowers, windmills and towns, it was absolutely amazing to see this world go by at a glance.

Photo: Me looking fabulous on the train ride

At this point we were closer to the end of the trip and this allowed for some retrospection time. And I thought about this whole other world going by at a glance, and I was so grateful that in the future I will probably be able to go back and see more of it. And I was grateful for what I had already seen, but another thought popping around my head was, "Man, I wonder what is happening in Boston right now." It was a very surreal moment, in which I learned two things. Traveling is freaking awesome, and I really love what I have at home. I mean, what an amazing feeling it was to come back excited about continuing my life in my hometown in Massachusetts.

I'm sure most of my readers will have heard about the term FOMO, or fear of missing out. It is a strange phenomena, in which the person with FOMO worries that they are not experiencing the right thing or the best thing. It is pretty self explanatory.

I had this yearning for Boston and my hometown, and I thought to myself, "Why don't these people want to be in Boston?" Everyone I had met in the past week, why don't they want to be in the hub of life that is Boston. I thought, "They're missing out on all that great stuff!" Of course it took me about a millisecond to change this thought. What I was thinking was about my own admiration of the place I call home and that I was only able to realize that when I was traveling. Of course to anyone I had met or seen, Stockholm or Copenhagen or Norway or anywhere, that is their home. That is why they (maybe/hopefully) look forward to going back to their homes.

Photo: A boat in a harbor in Stockholm

So I have changed my thoughts on FOMO. It doesn't have to be an anxiety-driven thing that pushes you to go out to parties or hang with a different crew, but it can be EOMO, excitement of missing out. Excitement in knowing that there are so many things to be seen and done. Excitement that there is no possible way that you can do all the amazing things in this world, but you can spend your life trying. Excitement in the realization that there is a little patch of heaven right beneath your feet, because that is what you call home. I am excited by the little I have seen because I know that whoosh of life that went past my train window is still there. And life is still happening out there. I am excited because while there is so much to miss out on, there is so much to experience.

And you don't have to go to a foreign country to do it.