A good book by the fireplace, the laughter of my small siblings, my mom sipping tea as my dad poked the fire — in other words, a perfectly quiet spring break with my family in Rochester, Minnesota.

I’d been impatiently waiting to spend time relaxing with my loved ones, and it was grand — mostly. But during the past few days, the buzzing of my Motorola was a constant companion; in fact, since starting this column my phone has buzzed about five times.

Sending and receiving at least 20 messages per hour (this includes texting, Snapchat and Facebook), I have not really been alone with my family in Rochester. I have been in Sioux Falls, in Alabama, on a beach in San Diego, on a plane to Mexico and even back in the Twin Cities. Except I haven’t actually been anywhere but here, distracting myself by trying to keep up with everyone’s lives away from mine.

“Fear of missing out” is something I have touched on before, but it is so prevalent in our generation that I thought it worth exploring further. I experience FOMO on a daily basis; sometimes it causes great anxiety; other times it is but a small nagging thought in the back of my mind. However, after speaking to friends about it, I have good reason to believe most people experience some sort of FOMO and, after considering my spring break, I would say this fear is often sparked by social media.

The various forms of social media can be handy, but they are often used to put our lives on display and to gain reactions from others. On the other end of this, we are constantly bombarded by people telling us what they’re up to and not focusing on our own present reality. We are all guilty of both; we put our lives on display to get reactions, and we react to others’ displays.

FOMO, though sparked by social media, is rooted more deeply. The anxiety I feel when I fear I am missing out on something springs from the fear of being alone. Even without social media, what we all desire is connections with others; we are social beings to the core. Even before social media I remember crying when I found out my best friend from grade school could not come over for New Year’s, or not wanting to throw a 13th birthday party fearing no one would come. Since early childhood most of my life has been underlined by fear of loneliness.

With social media in the picture I was provided with a seemingly immediate solution, as phones and laptops are often at an arm’s reach and using them does not require much effort. Even now, I constantly Snapchat my friends because I want to feel like I am still part of their lives even when I am not physically there. I want to be part of everything simultaneously so as to not feel alone.

This fear is irrational, something I verified when I went unplugged for a day: Those who really wanted to be with me made it happen, and I did not miss much. What was interesting, however, was the fact that some people had grown so accustomed to being in constant virtual contact that when I became unreachable, they did not make the effort to see me. It dawned on me that our lives grow virtually intertwined with many more people than the ones we share our physical lives with.

These virtual connections cause anxiety when we receive stimuli from places we cannot be, moments we cannot experience and other lives we cannot be living. We want to be part of all the lives we are connected to, but our reality makes this impossible. Therefore, we experience FOMO — we are partly tied to many, but not fully present anywhere.

With social media so interwoven in our lives, then, is it possible to rid ourselves of FOMO? I dearly hope so. But what we can do is try our best to be present and live the life we really can live: our own.

Letizia Mariani can be reached at mari8259@stthomas.edu.