FOMO vs. JOMO
Most people recognize the acronym FOMO which stands for Fear Of Missing Out. I recently learned a new term (for me anyway) JOMO; which is the Joy Of Missing Out. I immediately fell in love with JOMO and began using it (some may say over-using it).
I was not sure why JOMO struck a chord with me, but I surmised it was because it was something I have experienced many times before, but I never had a name for it. As I continued to ponder this question, I soon realized that it went much deeper than just my previous experiences with those feelings.
It turns out that JOMO is also something a lot of my most successful clients experience on a regular basis. I first noticed this in my athlete clients but soon began to see it in my more successful coaches and business clients as well.
On the flip side, I began to notice that there was an abundance of FOMO and a lack JOMO in many of my clients over the years who were struggling to find happiness. This was despite their often having achieved outsized financial and career success.
As I began to pay more and more attention to what I was observing in my clients, I began to see patterns in their development directly related to how JOMO and FOMO manifested in their lives. My clients with a stronger sense of JOMO rarely missed or re-scheduled their appointments with me (though this may partly be due to my strict cancellation policy). While the ones with more FOMO cancelled at a higher frequency.
I used to, only half-jokingly, say that the worst day of every year for me was the day the new Madden football video game came out because most of my NFL football clients were obsessed with it. Not just because they loved playing it and wanted to be first to play it (FOMO), but they were also looking for validation in seeing how they measured up in the game. Incidentally, no one I worked with felt they were as good in the video game as they were in the NFL, the programmers always had them a step slower, with lesser abilities, etc. in their opinion.
Whereas my clients with FOMO tend to be consumed by the need to say yes to every invitation, my clients with a lot of JOMO would look at missing parties, events, or not having to travel as opportunities to better themselves and get a leg up on their competition. Their rewards were intrinsic and they did not feel the need for most of the extrinsic rewards the more FOMO motivated personalities are addicted to.
The drive in my clients with JOMO also seems to be more purpose driven, making the work they put in more productive. I have had several FOMO driven clients who worked very hard at their craft and maybe even put in just as many hours, but the did not get the same bang for their buck as my JOMO driven clients.
I even recently learned that JOMO can be experienced retroactively when news broke on March 12th of this year about a college admission scandal (code named Varsity Blues by the FBI) via several high-profile indictments. You see, I was supposed to meet with the man who was the ringleader (Rick Singer) back in August of 2012 to possibly help some of his company’s high-end clients with their performance. Serendipitously, his flight was delayed out of San Francisco and our attempts to re-schedule were unsuccessful so we never met. Needless to say, I experienced major JOMO when that news broke.
That whole episode reminded me of a piece of age-old advice I often heard growing up: Be careful what you wish for as you may get it. So next time you have to ‘miss out’ on something, please remember that sometimes missing out can turn out to be better.
You can follow Sam on Twitter @SuperTaoInc
Happy B-day CC
