What you Should Fear is the Fear Of Missing Out

You have the ability to create value for a lot of people in hundreds of different ways. People are going to offer you opportunities to participate in their projects, knowing that your participation will help them succeed. The work will be interesting and enjoyable for you, too.

If you don’t say “yes” to these opportunities, these projects will move forward without you. Most of them will turn out to be nothing. However, some of them are going to succeed; people are going to make a difference and make a lot of money along the way. You fear missing out. You don’t want to be later embarrassed when people ask you how you were crazy enough to say “no” to what turned out to be something spectacular.

Sometimes you say “yes” just because you want to be nice, and you don’t want to hurt someone’s feelings.

By saying “yes” to projects just because you can create value for the person requesting your help, you crowd out the projects that are most important to you, your mission, your purpose, and your results. The fact that you can create value is no indication that you should create that value or that you should say yes to the project.

Just because a project is going to move forward without you doesn’t mean you are being left behind. The projects that move you forward are your projects. You cannot allow them to take a backseat because you are worried about missing out.

During your life, you’ve missed almost every major move in the stock market. You didn’t buy Apple when it was cheap. You didn’t buy Google when it was cheap. You weren’t in on Facebook early on either. You are fine having missed these moves. Saying “yes” to a project because you are worried that it may succeed and make money without you is like worrying that you are going to win the lottery. And you are not going to win the lottery. So there’s no reason for you to fear missing out.

We fear the wrong dangers. You should fear the fear of missing out. The real danger is committing to things outside your major goals and initiatives.