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FOMMO (Fear of Missing Money Opportunities)

Following more than a decade of working in the entertainment industry and managing Grammy award winning R&B music artists, I am just now realizing that many of the decisions I made in my career were out of fear. Actually, I am pretty sure I knew that my decision-making was fear-based at the time, but I am now finally able to admit it. It was challenging, to say the least, to walk in integrity and maintain a high level of work ethic in such a dark and compromising business: shamefully, a challenge that I often failed.

Many of the compromises that I convinced myself were okay to make were as a result of justifying the opportunities with the need to generate income, further my career, or fulfill my self-inflicted job duties and responsibilities as a young entrepreneur. I reduced myself, my morals, and my values so much to try to maintain relationships, continue business, and further opportunities that I thought would eventually translate into additional income.

I did not realize at the time that I did not have to accept every single opportunity that was presented to me, especially the ones that were devaluing and demoralizing. However, being a single mother with the responsibility of generating the only income for my household inflicted daily anxiety on me and kept me awake at night. As a result, I hoarded every possibility for making money that I could find in order to ensure that my daughter and I would lack for nothing. Unfortunately, this “FOMMO” caused me to run myself into the ground, negatively affecting my health, my marriage, and my spirit.

It was not until I grew weary of being mistreated, taken advantage of, consistently falling ill, and being constantly tired, that I finally started combining two little letters together that I never used to know how to pronounce properly in the past: “N” and “O”. Finally forcing myself to say “No!”, “No thank you!”, and sometimes even “Hewwwww Nooo!”, allowed me the opportunity to see that my bills are still being paid when I pass on questionable deals, people still live without me when I don’t say “yes” to everything they ask of me, and I actually rest and sleep in peace with my integrity intact when I make better decisions.

Being fearful of missing opportunities to make money is not nearly as bad as the consequences faced from making poor, impulsive decisions that cause moral compromises and decreased integrity. Know yourself. Know your worth. Choose not to prostitute your integrity for temporal compensation. It will pay more in the long run.

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