FASHION Magazine

  • JOMO is the new FOMO: Why we need to stop being so busy

    by Olivia Stren
    JOMO is new FOMO
    Photographed by Gabor Jurina. Styled by George Antonopoulos.

    In an age when it is socially unacceptable to have loads of free time, Olivia Stren wonders why being busy has become the ultimate symbol of success.

    “How are you?” a barista asked me recently. “Super busy?” He was presumably too busy frothing almond milk for another customer to wait for my answer.

    “Yeah. SO busy. Crazed!” I replied. And lied. I wasn’t crazed that day (at least not from busyness). Granted, I was busy feeling guilty, a low-grade panic about not being busy enough. But I was hardly going to shame myself by revealing the vacancy of my calendar to my barista (especially as he was clearly too busy to care). I fetched my latte and proceeded to check my iPhone with a socially acceptable sigh of tension and frustration. (See George Costanza in Seinfeld: “When you look annoyed all the time, people think that you’re busy.”) Today, being busy is code for being important, successful and valid, and admitting to not being busy is admitting to hopeless loserdom.

    Posted in April 2014, Fomo, Health, Print edition