Christina Crook, the Author of the Joy of Missing Out

Christina is the author of The Joy of Missing Out, after experiencing isolation from moving away from her home town in Vancouver to Toronto and seeing the negative role social media and technology was playing in her life, Christina decided to write JOMO, a play on FOMO. Writing about her own relationship with technology and the wider effects it has on culture, and asking the wider questions of what it means to be human and the role technology plays in this life.

Christina's FOMO takeaways are an overarching theme of negativity when it comes to social media, constantly comparing yourself to others and what they are doing and never feeling like you are enough. She wonders how that could be a positive experience for anyone in a world where you can compare yourself to 100s of missions of people, rather than just those around you. She goes on to explain that you have to find the positives in your own life rather than the positives in others, the most important thing you should reflect on is knowing what you find joy in your everyday and digital life.

The way you can “Marie Kondo” your digital life into something more enjoyable is by simply asking if the app or people you follow is truly adding to your life and sparking happiness in a positive way or if its not important enough to keep. Another way to create positivity is by not waking up and going to sleep with your phone by your side. Christina explains that by ending your day by reading a book or enjoying a hobby not driven around your smartphone is a good way to recenter yourself, she says charge your phone somewhere else besides your bedside table. Leave it out in the hall!

“The offline has to outweigh the online time” Christina urges. She thinks we are forgetting how to have good conversations and connections in person. Although it's not a negative to stay connected on the internet, you have to find the balance and know when its time to catch up in person rather than stalking someone's facebook. Christina has even made the leap to using social media strictly for business purposes, and says she uses only text and phone calls for personal conversations and catch up.

Christina recommends these books and podcasts:

• “Becoming Human” by Jean Vanier
• Caterina Fake podcast “Should This Exist”
• Christina's own JOMO podcast
• “The Joy of Missing Out” by Christina Crook

Written by Darian Kovacs, host of the Marketing News Canada News Show and founder of Jelly Digital Marketing and PR.