73: FOMO: What you really give up (and gain) when moving abroad

Who gets FOMO? I'm raising my hand over here! 

Worried about what you’ll miss out back at home if you move abroad? That was definitely me when I was thinking about move abroad. In this episode, I break down the fear of missing out—why it happens, the cultural pressure to stay close to home and how to reframe your mind so you don't let that FOMO get to you. 

We'll also dive into:

What You Gain by Moving Abroad: Personal growth, new career and life opportunities, stronger relationships, and an expanded community.

How to Stay Connected: Plan visits wisely, use technology to stay in touch, create new traditions, and accept that missing out is part of the journey.

What would you regret more—missing some events at home or never taking the leap? Tune in now to find out!

👉Take the free quiz: Which European city should you move to? 🤔

Grab my free guide: 5 Exact Steps to Move Abroad

Website: jordangiberson.com
Instagram: @jordan.giberson

Transcript

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So you can still maintain a sense of home, even from far away to start your new traditions as well. And I think it's just giving yourself permission and grace to miss things. It's okay to feel sad sometimes. It's okay to feel FOMO, but it doesn't mean that you made the wrong choice. Hey, my name is Jordan Giberson. I'm a Texas girl living and thriving in London. The best thing I've ever done? Moving abroad, hands down. And I'm passionate about helping others do the same. Are you curious about finding a job abroad? You're in the right place, friend. I'll teach you the tried and true secrets of how to make moving abroad a reality for you and how to live a fulfilling life once you get there. We'll cover topics like choosing the best visa for you, how to get a job offer in another country, how to get over your fear of moving abroad, and how to live a life you love once you get there, this is The Move Abroad Podcast. Hello and welcome to another episode of the move abroad podcast. Today we're going to be talking about moving abroad and missing out on things back home with your friends and family. So raise your hand if you are a major sufferer of FOMO. I am raising my hand over here because I am constantly getting FOMO. I really hate missing out on all the fun with my friends and family. If there are plans to do something and I am free and able to do it, I am always a yes girl. I don't know if you're the same. Maybe you're like heck no. That's not me at all. But that is definitely me. I love being involved in everything that's going on with my friends and family. If there's an activity going on, if there's some fun going on, if there's you know, a family dinner or my friends are all getting together to do something for a lake weekend or going to dinner together or have some fun activity together. It doesn't matter what it is, even if it's not an activity I love, like if my friends are like, we're all going camping. We're gonna be intense. We're not gonna shower for a week, and we're gonna like go on tons of hikes. Like, I like hiking, but my goodness throw me in a tent for a week without a shower and I am not a happy camper. Pun intended, but yeah, I mean, I would still say yes because I like to be with my friends and I don't like missing out because I get FOMO. So whenever I moved abroad, I experienced FOMO and still experience FOMO quite a bit. So I just wanted to talk about that topic today because maybe that's a hesitation that you have. When it comes to moving abroad maybe you also get FOMO, fear of missing out, and maybe that's one of your hesitations about moving abroad is you don't wanna miss out on what's happening with your friends and family. So that is what we are going to discuss today. So whenever I was thinking about moving abroad, it definitely was in my mind that I did not wanna miss out on what my friends were doing. I didn't want to miss out on fun with them, or things that were happening with my family. I didn't want to miss out on relationship and I didn't wanna miss out on time with them. But the more I thought about it, the more I was like, well, if I don't move abroad, I will regret it for the rest of my life. And I also realized that, moving abroad does come with it's sacrifices, which we'll talk about more in a little bit. But yeah, it was something that I struggled with a little bit before I was wanting to move abroad. And once I did move abroad, I did notice that I did miss out on some things that were happening. You know, whether it be birthdays for family members or my friends were getting together to do a dinner, or they were meeting up for a quick weekend trip that I didn't have time to get to Texas for, or the tradition of Thanksgiving and being able to celebrate that with my family back home. I've never actually been back for Thanksgiving. I don't normally go back for Thanksgiving. I stay in London for Thanksgiving and then I go back for Christmas instead because Thanksgiving and Christmas are so close together. So maybe someday I will go back for Thanksgiving, but it's just been something that I've pretty much always missed out on. You know how I used to celebrate it back home, but this past year, I actually had a group of friends over and we celebrated Thanksgiving and we did more of a Friendsgiving and it was honestly so much fun. It was so last minute, spur of the moment I ended up having I think it was probably like 7 or 8 people come over and we had pumpkin pie and sweet potato casserole and some of those traditional things. Food items that you would have back home. And then we had some also very random, like definitely non-traditional food items as well that were partially British. So yeah, it was an interesting and fun experience. So you kind of make your own tradition sometimes, but you do miss out on time with family and actual Thanksgiving, I did call my parents as well and talk to them on the phone, and I actually had them pass the phone around on a video call and chat with some of my family members. So I still got to be a part of it, but it just looks quite different from whenever I used to live in Texas. So you do make some of those sacrifices like that, so I just wanted to acknowledge that, but I feel like there are so many ways to fight off FOMO as well. So we'll talk about what some of those things are during this episode, but I just wanted to say that it is normal. Our brains are wired to resist change and to not want to miss out on things that are happening with the people that are closest to us. So that's what FOMO is, which I again get very commonly and I know that some of my friends also get FOMO quite a bit, if they're living abroad. So I did just want to say that it is very normal to get FOMO whenever you move abroad. And I also wanted to acknowledge that there is a cultural and societal pressure to stay close to home, which I think kind of also adds to that feeling of FOMO because depending on where you're from, I think you can feel that pressure to stay where you're at so that you don't have FOMO. But I will say that you also do miss out on a life abroad if that's kind of the direction that you decide to go in instead. But I mean, I'm from Texas, so people from Texas don't often leave Texas. They don't move out of Texas. I thought it was actually quite funny. My dad, whenever I was graduating from college, I remember him telling me, you can live anywhere you want as long as it's in Texas. I feel like someday I need to make a t-shirt about that and make some joke about how I ended up moving not only out of the state, but outta the country onto a completely different continent. But, I found that kind of funny that that was what he had said. So I do think that it is a bit of a societal pressure to stay where you're at, and I feel like that kind of contributes to having FOMO because you basically realize that if you move outta the country and if you move outta the state, then you do miss out on things that are happening from back home. And I also feel like with FOMO, social media makes it a bit worse because you can see events unfolding in real time. You can see all the outfits for Thanksgiving that people are talking about and see everyone kind of scanning the room and looking at the food and talking with each other. Focusing on just Thanksgiving. But this can go for any event that's happening, whether it be a smaller dinner or a bigger life event like a wedding or a bachelorette party or a holiday, like an Easter dinner or something like that. So I do think that social media does kind of make it feel a little bit worse because you're seeing everything that's happening in real time and realizing you're looking around your living room and you're like, oh man, I'm not there. And I'm not with people right now, but all my friends and family are together for the 4th of July back home, and they're popping fireworks right now. So I think that social media does make it feel a little bit worse. But yeah, I think that's just kind of understanding some of the groundwork of FOMO and why you'd be feeling it, and that, I guess, just stating that I do think that it's really normal, but what I do want to say is that you do have to just remind yourself of what you actually gained by moving abroad and what you would sacrifice if you didn't move abroad. So, whenever you move abroad, you gain so many new experiences and growth. You just develop so much independence and new skills and new perspectives. I mean, you're getting to live abroad and if you choose to move to Europe, I mean, it's absolutely incredible, the life, the lifestyle that you get to have. So I feel like you have to think about those sacrifices of, yeah, you might miss out on a family dinner or going on a quick weekend trip with your friends and you're feeling FOMO, fear of missing out, and you feel sad that you're missing out, but you also are gaining new experiences. So it's like you have to think about that, trade off that you're giving to be able to live abroad where you're getting those new skills and new perspectives. So I think it's just reminding yourself that you have to realize you chose to make that trade off. And is that trade off worth it to you? Is it worth it to miss a weekend trip with your friends? versus being able to live abroad and have those experiences abroad as well. So I think that's something to consider. And it's also just thinking about, okay, I might miss out on 2 trips, like 2 weekend trips and maybe 3 big holidays that I care about and maybe 1 great, I don't know, experience with my mom that I might have if I were to be back home where, you know, I was living my life. I'm making this up, but you could think about, yeah, I might miss it all on that, all of that. But if I were to live abroad for just a year, I'm training those experiences for this year abroad where I'm getting to enjoy living abroad, living in Madrid, Spain, where I'm having all these other experiences where I'm getting to go on weekend trips. You know, I'm trading those weekend trips with my friends in the U.S where we're doing a road trip to another small town outside of where we're from. And instead I'm actually getting to hop on a plane or a train and be in a completely different country for weekend trips. So I'm trading those 3 weekend trips for these really fun weekend trips, where I'm traveling on a train or yeah, I'm missing out on those holidays like I'm an Easter dinner with my family and 4th of July popping fireworks, but I'm trading it for these new traditions that I am experiencing, like running with the bulls in Spain or, some other really interesting cultural experience. So it's like, is it worth it to me to have that trade off? So I think it's just kind of thinking about those trade-offs and whether that's worth it to you, which for me, the answer has been yes. So I think it's just something to think about. Kind of on our topic again, of reminding yourself of what you actually gain by moving abroad. So it's those new experiences and growth, but it's also perhaps deeper relationships as well. I think sometimes distance can strengthen your relationships by making your time together more intentional. I think this is definitely a kind of turning a bad situation and making it positive, but I really do believe that I have been so much more intentional with my time with my friends and family because I don't get to experience it as much. So I'm not just taking advantage like I would be if I were to have lived in Texas. So I might be visiting my family a bit more often, but maybe for shorter periods of time, like maybe I would just join my family for a quick lunch. Or if I was living in a different city, maybe I would drive in once every couple months and I would stay for a weekend. But I just think that I am so much more intentional, so I stay for longer periods of time back home, so I might stay for 2 weeks every 6 months. But I do think that I'm so intentional with that time where I'm really scheduling time to make sure that I'm having an intentional breakfast with my family, and then I'm scheduling time to have a coffee catch up where we're having really intentional, deep conversations or I'm making sure that we're doing something that's really fun. Because I do really care about maintaining those relationships, and I feel like it has almost strengthened those relationships because I am so intentional about my conversations with my friends and family whenever I'm back home or whenever I'm having phone calls with them as well. So I think that you can actually end up with deeper relationships and sometimes we need the distance, let's be honest, depending on the family member. Sometimes your relationship can actually grow, in a more positive way or maintain a more positive, sphere. I dunno if that's not the best word, but I think that it can be a bit more positive because some relationships you need a bit of distance. So I actually think that in some circumstances, your relationships could be strengthened just because you need a bit more distance from that person. Maybe, you and your mom are a bit too similar and so you clash a bit more. So I think that sometimes it actually is a positive thing for relationships too. And on our topic as well of reminding yourself of what you actually gain by moving abroad is that you get to have opportunities that you couldn't have back home. Like different career opportunities, different lifestyle opportunities, which we've touched on a little bit already, where you get to do a quick weekend trip to a different European country for like a 3 day weekend if you wanted to. And it's super easy to do that. And you're in a completely different culture, a completely different country with a completely different language. And how beautiful is that? And cool is that you get to experience that lifestyle, and just to have personal development opportunities. So I feel like you do have more opportunities that you wouldn't have back home, and I think that's a good reminder for yourself. Whenever you do feel FOMO, whenever you move abroad, and then also just building a new community, you're not losing your community back home. You are just expanding it. You're getting to experience new cultures and new communities. Whenever you move abroad. So I think it's just reminding yourself of what you do gain whenever you move abroad, that you get those new experiences and growth. You are gaining deeper relationships with your friends and family back home because you're more intentional with those relationships. And sometimes the distance and those relationships can help strengthen it as well. You can have opportunities that you wouldn't have back home, like your career, your lifestyle, and just personal development. And you get to build a new community. And you're not losing that community back home. You're just gaining new, diverse communities as well in your new European city that you're living in. So I think it's just reminding yourself of what you actually do gain whenever you do have those feelings or thoughts of FOMO. FOMO is something that's kind of keeping you from moving abroad. So let's also touch on how to stay connected and feel involved whenever you're living abroad. I do think that this is really important that you're not having those feelings of FOMO or not having those strong feelings of feeling like you're missing out back home and also feeling like you're getting a bit homesick after living abroad for a little bit. So I think one of the most important things is to plan visits back home intentionally. I think it is quality over quantity, but I will say you just need to make sure that you are planning ahead. Before I moved abroad, I had already made the decision that I was going to come back home to visit my friends and family in Texas twice a year. And that I would stay for 10 days to 2 weeks, sometimes I stay for 3 weeks actually. And that I would do that twice a year. So before I had actually moved abroad, I had already made the decision that I was going to visit back home every 6 months for around 2 weeks. I had made that decision before I even moved abroad because I wanted to make sure first of all, that I knew that I was going to be going back home because I needed to have that comfort that I had a trip back home planned and that I wasn't going to lose touch with my friends and family, but also for my friends and family so that they knew that I was going to be intentional about maintaining a relationship and that they would see me and that they knew when they were going to see me. So I think that's really important to make sure that you're still maintaining a strong relationship with your friends and family. So I think it's really important to plan your visits back home intentionally. And maybe you only plan to go back home once a year, or maybe you plan to go back once a quarter, you know, once every 3 months. I had a friend that went back 3 times a year, and that to me felt like a lot of times, but I also have a lot of trips, land this year. But I also have a lot of trips planned this year because I have a lot of really big life events. So I do think that you just need to plan your visits intentionally. So plan ahead on how many times you are going to visit and for how long you plan to visit. I remember meeting this girl who had been living in London. She moved from the U.S and had been living here for years and had not gone back home. And I found that to be one of the most sad things because she's missing out on those years with her parents missing out on those relationships with her friends back home. So those friendships are probably not gonna be as strong whenever she goes back home. So I actually found that really sad that she wasn't intentional about saving up money. Yes, it is expensive to go back and it depends on your budget and you know, what your lifestyle and what your income looks like. But I definitely think it's important to budget for that if you are a bit tighter on your budget to make sure that you are going back to visit your friends and family and perhaps there were some issues back home and it was intentional to not go back home. But if that's something that's important to you, you know, to maintain those relationships back home, I do think that you need to be intentional about saving and making sure that you're booking those trips ahead of time. So I think it's important to plan ahead, but I think it's also important to plan around big events. So whether it be, a wedding or a bachelorette trip or you want to go back to visit for Thanksgiving, maybe that's a really important tradition back in your family. Maybe it's to go back home for Christmas and that's something that's really important. Maybe you like to for me personally, I like to go back home and I plan my summer trip around. My best friends from college group, weekend trip to the lake. But basically all my friends from college, we go to the lake every summer, and it's a tradition that we've had since college. We've done that every year. So I actually plan my summer trips back to Texas around when we are planning to do that weekend trip, around when we're planning to do that. Lake trip weekend. So anyways, I think it's just important to plan your trips around what's important to you. So I just make sure that they are planning to do that weekend trip. Whenever I'm going back home in the summer and for Christmas time, I wanna make sure I'm planning my trip back home around when my sister is going to be in town because she lives in Denver with her husband and they're both nurses, so their schedule is sometimes a little bit all over the place. So I always make sure that I'm planning my trips. Surround when they're going to be in town. So I think it's just making sure that you're intentional about when you're planning your trips. And then I think in terms of planning trips intentionally, you also want to make sure that you're planning for emergencies. You wanna make sure that you have money set aside for those emergencies that might come up. In September of this previous year, my grandma unexpectedly passed away. You know, she was quite old and she lived a wonderful life. She was 97 years old, but she did end up passing quite quickly and I found out that she had passed away on the Saturday, I believe by the Sunday I had booked a trip. I had booked my flights and the next day on Monday, I was flying out in the morning and I arrived in the evening on the Monday. So I had booked a very last minute flight. It was a bit more expensive, but I also decided to do a layover, so I didn't do a direct flight, so it was a bit cheaper for me. And that was something that was really important to me before I moved abroad is I told myself I am gonna be here for my friends and family whenever it's important. I'm not going to let the distance keep me away from what's important to me because my friends and family are the most important things to me, and that is going to be my priority. My money is not my priority. My job is not my priority. My comfort of needing to do a long haul flight last minute on a Monday morning and needing to do a long layover is not comfortable to me, but it is my priority to be there for my family whenever they need me, and that was a decision that I made a long time ago. So yeah, another kind of story is that this year I'm not gonna lie, I'm panicking a little bit, but I have to go back for a sales kickoff in July to, Las Vegas, which sounds very exciting, but I'm not looking forward to it because 4 weeks later I'm going to have a bachelorette trip for a weekend I'm flying all the way over to Texas to do a weekend trip to go to the Bachelorette, and then I come back to London, and then 4 weeks later I have my brother's wedding. So I'll probably stay a little bit longer for that one. I won't just go for the weekend, but I will be back for probably, I don't know, like 7 to 10 days. And then I come back to London for about 3 weeks and then I go back to Texas again for a friend's wedding. Now that is four long haul flights in 4 months. And I've never missed a Christmas with my family as well, so I have Thanksgiving in November and then December I might go all the way back to Texas again. Now this is gonna be very expensive for me to be going back and forth that many times. And it is going to be very exhausting. I mean, my goodness, that would be 5 long haul flights in the span of 6 months. It would be so exhausting. I might decide not to go home for Christmas this year. We'll find out. We'll see what happens, but I am planning to go back for those 4 long haul flights, I'm hoping I can get out of doing sales kickoff with the company that I work for if I'm able to. But I don't know if I'm going to be able to get out of that. So I guess my point is there are going to be times where you're going to have to make monetary sacrifices. It is not my best friend from Texas' Fault that, you know, she has a bachelorette when she planned it. It's not her fault that I have to be traveling so far for that and to come back weeks later for the wedding and to go to my brother's wedding. It is poor timing that they're not more back to back. But it is important to me, and again, I'm giving this as an example to say that it is important to me and you just have to decide what is most important to you. I've decided that it's important to me to be there for my friends and family and for these big life events, and I'm not willing to sacrifice any of these. It is really important for me to be there for my best friends and their big life events, and it's important to be there for my brother's wedding, obviously, and it's important for me to keep my company happy, so to go to the sales kickoff if I have to. So, yeah, it's just there are gonna be years where you might need to go back more often. You might have some family emergencies, you might need to go back for weddings or you might decide to plan your trips around your best friends from college and their lake weekend trips. So it's just kept figuring out what's best for you. I'm giving this as a personal example and I'm going on and on about it, but my point is that for you, whenever you are moving abroad, you need to decide how many times you're willing to go abroad and whenever you have these years where there are so many big life events that are happening, all of a sudden, are you willing to make the sacrifices to come back home? And for me, the answer is yes. But for some other people, the answer might be no. They might just, you know, say no to a few things. And I think that's okay. But I think it is important to make those decisions about how to stay connected and make sure you're still feeling involved whenever you do. You know, move abroad because it's not, your friends and family's fault that you're living so far away, but it's just kind of figuring out what is the best system for you and going back home and what does that look like for you? So I think that planning your visits intentionally is very important, but if and when you are not able to go back home, because let's face it, you cannot be there for every single dinner, every single weekend trip, every single life event that's happening, whether it be birthdays or maybe it's a baby's christening or whatever it is. Like you're not gonna be there for every single thing. So for some things you're just going to have to message them on the morning and say, happy birthday. I hope you have the best day. I hope you really enjoy, your birthday that's happening this weekend. Or hey, I know you have this really big life event. I just wanna say I'm thinking about you and I'm super excited about that. So make sure you're leveraging technology and making sure that you are still staying connected. And also, you know, doing phone calls and video calls to still be a part of an Easter lunch. Like I called my family for, Easter last year because I still wanted to be involved and I was just like, Hey, like happy Easter. Are y'all having dinner? Like, bring me around and like, I wanna say hello to everyone. So I think just technology is so amazing that you can still do an audio call or a video call and it's super easy and like the connection is so great. So I think just making sure that you're leveraging technology and I'm also constantly sending photos of what I'm doing to my friends and family, and they're doing the same thing as well. So I think just leveraging technology and just starting your new traditions as well. Like this previous year I ended up doing. A Friendsgiving very spur of the moment, but we started a new tradition perhaps like maybe over the next few years I'll start doing more Friendsgiving because I miss out on Thanksgiving with my family back home. So you can still maintain a sense of home, even from far away to start your new traditions as well. And I think it's just giving yourself permission and grace to miss things. It's okay to feel sad sometimes. It's okay to feel FOMO, but it doesn't mean that you made the wrong choice. It doesn't mean that you know, you've chosen wrongly to be back home. And I think it's just reminding yourself of why you moved abroad and reminding yourself of what you actually gained by moving abroad, which is what we had talked about a little earlier, gaining new experiences, deeper relationships, opportunities, those opportunities you wouldn't have back home, and things like that. So yeah, I think just kind of recapping and kind of talking about all this kind of circling back to everything, I think missing out on things and missing out back home is inevitable, but so is missing out on what's possible abroad. I think it's just reminding yourself of, everything in life is a sacrifice. Every single decision you make in life, you are sacrificing something else. So I think it's just deciding what is worth sacrificing to you? Is it missing out on some things back home for a year or 2 while you are living abroad and then you go back home and you get to experience that again? Or is it going to be missing out on a life abroad or, you know, maybe it's not a whole life, but maybe it's a year or 2 that you're looking to live abroad. So I think it's just reminding yourself of you know, yeah, you might be feeling FOMO, but what are you missing out on? So just kind of reminding yourself of why you moved abroad. So, you know, what would you regret more? Again, it's like missing out on some events back home, or never taking the leap to move abroad. I feel like that answer is quite clear to me, but I'm quite happy with my life abroad and yes, I do miss out on things, but I feel like I still feel really super connected to my friends and family back home because I have been very intentional and I do go visit quite often. I mean, even last night I was talking to my mom on the phone for an hour and a half and we were having a very deep conversation and catching up in general, but also having a deep conversation. So, even though you move abroad, I feel like you won't actually miss out on as much as you think. And yeah, I think that the life abroad is worth those little sacrifices that you do have to make. So anyways, that is it for me for today's episode. I hope that you left this episode feeling encouraged and I mean, I get FOMO, like I was raising my hand at the beginning of this episode, like I do get FOMO and I do get sad whenever I miss out because I like to be a part of everything. I am a social butterfly and I like to be involved in everything that my friends and family and all the people I love are doing. But I also love this life that I have in London and abroad and in Europe, and I wouldn't wanna sacrifice that for. Like it's worth the sacrifices to me is what I'm trying to say. So I hope that you feel encouraged and I hope that if you were kind of having that like, Ooh, I really don't wanna miss out, on those things back home, like, maybe I shouldn't move abroad. I hope that you leave this episode feeling encouraged and feeling like, no, it is worth it to me to maybe feel FOMO a little bit so that I can have that life abroad that I really want. So anyways, thank you so much for listening to this episode of the Move Abroad podcast. I'll catch you here again next week, same time, same place. I'll catch you then.