You just have to accept you aren't in the city. Got FOMO because you not level 27? Sounds unhealthy.
I live in a populated suburb and I'm only lvl 6. No clue how you got 17 "in the middle of nowhere".
If you aren't having fun just doing your thing within your means, then you probably should just take a break.
There was a bit of a cascade effect that hit me hard at first, but I'm good now. It mainly just reminded me of how isolated this place is. I grew up in the suburbs and lived very close to some hot spots in Pokémon Go, so it just made me reflect on a lot. I got to level 17 by paying for Pokéballs and Lucky Eggs. I am lucky enough to find Pokémon here, and I've even found some fairly rare or uncommon ones, with Ivysaur being my favorite catch so far (found a Snorlax here too, but meh). It's just that there are no stops or gyms. There are a lot of places that could or should be stops but haven't been marked in the game (churches, a fire dept, etc).
You're right though, it was a heavy case of FOMO. I've always been pretty okay living out here. It's quiet and chill despite being out of the way, but PoGo came out and really just sent some nasty kind of existential vibes at me. I've since accepted that there's pretty much nothing I can do in the short term and it's just how things are. Just going at my own pace and not really paying much mind to the game now, especially with the server issues. Yep, taking a step back from the hype and recalibrating my focus has helped a lot.
Come to think of it, fomo hit me really hard when I first jumped into mechanical keyboards too, haha. It's easy to get overwhelmed, but then you just take a step back and realize it's best to do your own thing.
