Onism: Make Sense of the Desire to be Everywhere

Have you ever looked up at the constellations or into the windows on a skyscraper and wondered, What is going on up there? How many moments are happening around me?  This yearning to know what’s going on across the hall, down the street, or in the plane flying above my head leaves me craving to experience everything there is in the world all at once. Here is where “onism” and its almost fateful definition met me.

Graphic by Emily Koch

Onism, from its exact definition, says:

Onism: n. the frustration of being stuck in just one body, that inhabits only one place at a time, which is like standing in front of the departures screen at an airport, flickering over with strange place names like other people’s passwords, each representing one more thing you’ll never get to see before you die—and all because, as the arrow on the map helpfully points out, you are here.

Onism puts into words that all-encompassing hunger of knowing that even though we are in the same place right now, we have different histories and even more complex futures that are impossible to fathom. It is because of this limit that the desire to be elsewhere burns so much brighter. We are stuck inside one body, destined to have enough experiences for only one lifetime, while our friends, family, and neighbors are all living entirely different lives. It’s this, the realization that there are moments we will never be a part of, simply because of the physical limitations we have, that can cause so much grief.
Though this feeling seizes me at times, it is the impetus for realizing that I am the only one experiencing my life from beginning to end. I am existing in the universe through my senses only, so I must make this experience count. I must live authentically, eat delicious foods, and intake as much of the humanity around me. Share stories, listen intently, care viscerally, and have reverence for the perspective of the only Earth we have been given to enjoy.