You’ve probably heard the term FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out). Maybe you also know YOLO (You Only Live Once). But do you know about JOMO – the Joy Of Missing Out?

JOMO is an acronym I learned not too long ago, and I think it perfectly describes what the past year of the COVID-19 pandemic has meant to me, and perhaps many of you as well. As we approach March 13th, which for me personally marks the one year anniversary of my world shutting down due to the Coronavirus outbreak, I’ve been reflecting on how life has changed during this time in quarantine, and on the positives that can be drawn from this experience.

 

There have been many difficult changes and sacrifices we have all had to make during this time period.

First of all, I recognize that I am extremely lucky that my husband’s job has remained secure during the pandemic (knock on wood) and that he has been able to work from home. Neither of us are frontline essential workers. We have a safe home and are able to supervise our children’s remote schooling. Things could be a lot worse. A lot worse. We had some very close calls with the virus and high risk loved ones at the beginning of the outbreak, but have not lost anyone in our immediate circle to COVID-19, unlike several of my friends. That said, we’ve still had significantly negative changes in our life.

It’s now been more than a year since I’ve even seen my parents in person for example. As an only child, who already lives 3,000 miles away from my hometown, this has been a difficult adjustment to make.

We used to enjoy traveling as much as possible, in as eco-friendly a way as possible. You may have read my posts about the most eco-friendly airport in the world, visiting a swiftly melting glacier in Norway, finding plastic-free souvenirs at Walt Disney World, staying at the sustainable Aulani resort in Hawaii, and being in awe of nature in Brazil among other travel highlights.

Since March 13th, 2020, we haven’t set foot in a plane, train, or boat, let alone a restaurant, theater, mall, or other places where people congregate. My kids miss playing with their friends. We have missed out on important moments in the lives of our extended family and friends because of the pandemic. It’s been an isolating time, but a liberating one in many ways as well.

 

Embracing the JOMO of life

JOMO – the Joy Of Missing Out – if you think about it, is akin to living a minimalist lifestyle. Many aspects of being eco-friendly are about reducing your eco-footprint by not buying as much, consuming as much, being more intentional about your actions, and appreciating nature and the existing things in your life.

 

Minimalism is essentially what JOMO is all about.

 

And I have to say that, aside of the obvious negatives of being isolated from most of your family and friends for way longer than you originally anticipated, there really has been a lot of joy for myself and my family during this unusual year as well.

 

Here are some reasons I’ve found to lean into the JOMO in your life now and in the future:

 

JOMO Saves Money

During this COVID-19 pandemic time, my husband – who had zero prior hairstyling experience – has been cutting my hair in our backyard. First he chopped off my ponytail to donate to charity. He’s now cut my hair and our son’s hair several times since then (and I, his). We have saved several hundred dollars this past year just by cutting our own hair.

We’ve also saved so much money on outside entertainment. It sometimes used to feel like we had to “go do something” to have fun as a family and create memorable experiences for our kids. This pandemic has shown us that what they truly want and need is just quality time with their mama and daddy.

From doing eco-friendly Halloween activities at home to finding eco-friendly ways to express our gratitude, we have been able to create memorable (and economical) experiences for our children at home. While our kids do miss being able to be at school and play freely with their friends, they also say this has been the best year ever because they get to spend all day with us (for better and for worse lol).

 

JOMO Helps The Environment

A typical week pre-pandemic might have involved me driving the kids to and from school every day, then to and from extracurricular activities, running out to do errands in between, ordering take out, shopping etc. I’m exhausted just thinking about how much I used to have to do in the car. This past year, which for my family has mostly been spent working and schooling from home, has meant we do a lot less driving.

In fact, in the initial weeks of the pandemic here in Southern California, the air quality was at its best level in decades because of the collective reduction in car traffic.

Because we have stayed away from dining at restaurants this past year, I’ve been cooking more at home, which means less take out container waste. We shop more in bulk now and receive a weekly CSA box from our local farm, which also helps to reduce plastic packaging waste.

When we do travel, we try to do it in an eco-friendly way by choosing sustainable resorts, seeking out eco-friendly activities (like the ones we found in Oslo), and flying airlines that are proactively trying to minimize their carbon footprint.

That said, this past year of being grounded we’ve been able to explore the nature nearby, sometimes literally in our backyard. Every day, because my husband is working from home, he’s able to take a break with the kids and take them outside. Usually this means playing in the backyard or little park across from our house. Some days, they’ll go to the beach to collect shells or hike in one of the many beautiful parks around us. The featured image above is from our local protected wetlands, where they can go see wild birds and bugs and have all sorts of fun in nature just a couple miles from our home. While we explored SoCal nature before the pandemic, we’ve really been able to deep dive into the nature around us more than ever before.

 

JOMO Is Self Care And Good For Your Mental Health

One unexpected benefit of this past pandemic year for me has been the positive effect it’s had on my stress level. The initial days and weeks as the shock waves of quarantine first spread across the globe were incredibly stressful for me and I think everyone else as well. I can’t tell you how many nights my husband and I lay awake after the kids went to sleep talking about what to do if one of us or someone we loved got sick or if the country became overwhelmed with chaos because of the virus, and how to maintain a semblance of normalcy for our kids so they wouldn’t have to feel scared or worried like we secretly did.

Despite these scary dark early days, once we fell into a rhythm of our day by the late spring, life became surprisingly peaceful. I found my JOMO because of the pandemic.

No more awkward small talk interactions while waiting in line at the grocery store or at school pick up. No more worries about having to get to various appointments on time or getting stuck in traffic. No more running all over town on the weekends attending various social functions.

It’s been just months full of nothing beyond our four walls and small nuclear family unit, and the calm has been surprisingly glorious.

I have found the joy in cooking again. Instead of making the 5-10 same recipes I make week after week because they’re easy and quick and everyone likes them, I have started trying new recipes from all over the globe, because we are no longer traveling but want to still taste the foods of other countries.

I sleep more. Because all of our usual evening plans either got cancelled or moved to Zoom, I was able to get more done without losing time driving to and fro, and therefore am making it into bed earlier.  (Sometimes, but not all the time because, you know, I still am a parent of young kids after all). And because our children’s schooling has been virtual and my husband has been working from home as well, there’s no longer any need to wake up early to get dropped off at school or beat traffic into the office.

Nowadays, the commute is as long as it takes to walk from the dining table to our home office a few feet away.

My family and I eat healthier as a result of my cooking more at home versus taking out food. We also go on regular post-dinner walks to stretch our legs, which helps with digestion and keeping our metabolisms up. I’ve also started working out again after a years-long hiatus due to parenthood and am in the best health I’ve been in for years. I’ve even taken up weeding in the yard, which has had both positive mental and physical benefits!

 

JOMO Makes You Thankful

When you spend a year not doing the things you want to be doing, and away from the people and places you want to see, it really makes you appreciate things more than you ever did before. As they say, absence makes the heart grow fonder. For instance, while we appreciated our children’s teachers before the pandemic, having now seen the amazing job they have done adjusting to teaching remotely and the incredible dedication it takes to teach children well, we are even more in awe of them. Thank you teachers!

We are also thankful for our good health, for our superhero healthcare workers, and to all the people working on the frontlines of this pandemic from epidemiologists to grocery workers and every essential worker in between. I would not be able to embrace the JOMO in life from the comfort of my home if it weren’t for others putting in the time to keep the wheels of society moving forward.

 

JOMO Helps You Focus On What’s Most Important In Life

With all the noise of modern life stripped away – no more driving, social events, never ending errands, frequent travel, vapid chatter with vapid people – we’ve been able to spend tons of quality time together as a family. And I guess we have found ourselves lucky in that we genuinely, truly enjoy each other’s company. I have discovered so many more facets to my kids’ personalities now that I’ve spent a year watching them grow, helping them learn, having their help around the house, and being their steadfast companion.

I have had the joy of watching my children become true friends and caretakers for each other and their treasured ones. I have learned more depths to patience than I ever thought myself capable of, and have deepened my understanding of what it means to be a present and supportive parent.

And though I have lost many friendships this year as the virus and political upheavals have drawn lines in the ethical and moral ground where I stand on principle, I have also deepened my relationships with those that truly matter in my life, that share my commitment to social justice, the environment, humanism, and education. I have even made great new friends through the magic of Zoom and texting memes to each other all day long.

In those dark early days of the pandemic, when my husband and I lay awake at night worrying about the future we also talked about, what if we only have days left? What if we have to flee the country? What would we do? What would we bring? And the answer, we discovered, was that all we really needed or wanted to do was to be together.

No matter what happens to us now in the future, whether we return to a “new normal” with a forever changed world or go back to life as it was before as if the pandemic never occurred, the JOMO of this year will stick with me, as I hope it will stick with you. Hopefully we can all remember the positive lessons that these 365+ days of the COVID pandemic have taught us.

JOMO isn’t a bad word. It’s been a gift. A gift of time with our loved ones that we otherwise would not have had to this extent. A gift of learning to see the world with fresh eyes. A gift of grit and self-reliance. And a gift of focus, for us to rediscover what it means to learn, to grow, and to be truly happy on this planet.