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Has anyone talked about how much of toy collecting is predicated on "Keeping up with the Joneses" and this forces a lot of us to go down rabbit holes that we might not otherwise go down ourselves?
It's so easy to get caught up in the hype, when everyone is out there hunting for a hot new item or posting pics that they found 'em, subconsciously some of us feel as though we have to be part of that or else we're missing out.
There's absolutely an element of FOMO (fear of missing out) at play here as well. If everyone else has that hot new item and you don't, you're left "empty handed". A question is do many of those folks who are posting their pics even want it? Or are they just going along?
I think the internet has kicked the door off it's hinges when it comes to this FOMO mentality. When folks post photos of themselves living their "best lives" in posh settings, fancy cars, exotic locations, you're sitting there on the crapper thinking "I wish that was me".
I think the internet has changed our psychology as well. When we were kids a lot of us might have had that one friend who had every cool toy there was. Going over was awesome because we got to play with them but when you left you had to leave them all behind.
Now instead of competing with the kid down the street who had like, every Transformer, we have to compete with each other in the age of social media. Instagram posts, Tweets, haul and unboxing vlogs on YouTube.
If you follow certain folks you're going to get hit with a constant stream of pics of stuff. This begins to feed into the FOMO. The guy who snaps a picture of himself outside Target holding the TMNT Mutagen Tour set. "WOOH! I GOT IT"
When you actually start getting jealous and envious of folks because of what they found maybe it's time to take a step back and reevaluate. I know I have had to do this myself. You're not doing anything wrong but it's just so easy to get caught up in that hype.
This is something I am constantly working on myself. I have been trying to eliminate distractions. Anything that doesn't help me achieve my goals is a distraction. Not all distractions are bad but too many can make you lose your focus and lead you to stray off course.
This is of course not to criticize anyone. We are living in uncertain times and many of us look to our hobbies for escape. If finding that hot new item is what it's going to take to bring you a little joy, then by all means, you find it and enjoy having it in your collection.
