In praise of Jomo, the joy of missing out

In today's economy of hyper-attention, where every ping is a summons and every calendar a battlefield, a delicious luxury has emerged: Jomo, a.k.a. Joy of Missing Out. Unlike its fretful cousin Fomo, which drives otherwise sane people to weddings they barely recall and events they barely understand, Jomo is the art of staying back with smug serenity. Why endure a 3-hr networking event when one can cultivate one's exclusive network by not being there? The true power broker is the one whose absence is felt more keenly than their presence. Jomo is the invisible hand of social life, guiding the market of invitations by declining them.

Economists might call it opportunity cost inverted: the gain of not spending time badly. Psychologists hail it as mindfulness with a dash of mischief. The rest of us simply relish the guilty pleasure of slippers over stilettos. The joy lies not merely in missing out but in knowing that others are enduring the speeches, the PPTs, the traffic jams - while you are luxuriating in another episode of another season. In a world obsessed with productivity, Jomo is the ultimate contrarian investment: a portfolio of peace, yielding dividends of sanity. The next time your phone buzzes with an invitation, consider the chic-est RSVP of all: a polite decline, followed by a grin. Missing out, dear reader, is the new keeping up.