In February of 2023 I started an article called “Lost Your Mojo? 5 Ways to Get it Back.”
And then I apparently lost my own Mojo because I never even got to the first of the five ways to get it back.
I abandoned the article after a few sentences. Into a drafts folder it went, along with 16 other “great ideas” I recently discovered languishing there that I’ve been attempting to dust off.
I hit “delete” on most. Send them to the trash can
One or two in that drafts folder have proven to be potential gems in need of polishing that, with an hour or so of revision, I’ve completed and published.
I suppose I could have mustered the MOJO to get my Mojo article up and running with 5 simple, stereotypical tips such as:
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- Start small! Small steps lead to big gains!
- Just get started! Action breeds momentum!
- Time-block per Pomodoro, 25 min on, 5 min off!
- Get over your perfectionism! Done is better than perfect!
- Set rewards to look forward to! Netflix and Chill, anyone?
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Hey, those aren’t bad tips. I feel more MOJO already. So, there you go. Article done!
But, as I revisit, I want to take that initial inspiration in another direction, as I often do, which I believe is very much my MOJO.
Some of my favorite posts have been similarly revised. The comical Hell Hath No Fury: How to Piss Off a Woman at Work was once an instructional guide to fostering strong workplace relationships. It seems I’m better suited to snarkily reporting the exact opposite.
Are You the Office Cauliflower? came from an article about doing too much work for too little reward that I conceived while chopping up the cruciferous vegetable, and voila! A recipe for success.
Today, while almost deleting the original post, I started thinking about a shorthand way to finish the work, and voila! A recipe for what follows.
I realized it’s possible I lost my MOJO for the original Mojo article because I felt FOMO, the Fear of Missing Out, and abandoned the project to do something else like… I don’t know… learn to play pickleball or buy wide-legged pants.
Perhaps that came from a sense of YOLO, You Only Live Once, and sitting down to write and regain my MOJO is not as interesting as the YOLO which made me want to play pickleball or buy those pants so I wouldn’t suffer from FOMO.
Are you following me?
It’s possible that if I had JUJU, considered to be good luck or fortune, I might have felt more MOJO, that personal energy or effectiveness or success that was missing.
To be honest, I most often feel FOMO when I see another business person’s success because of what I perceive as their MOJO and their JUJU and the fact that they say YOLO and go all in on their dream to run writing retreats in exotic locales like Tulum or Greece.
Which isn’t what I want to do, if I think about the logistical nightmare of planning such an excursion. What I’m feeling is JOMO, the Joy of Missing Out, which is the opposite of FOMO because YOLO and you don’t want to send your time creating a business trip for picky clients when all you want to do is go to Tulum or Greece on your own because you have FOJI which I’ve learned is a Fear of Joining In.
I’m sorry, is this TMI?
Are you reading this thinking WTF, but you can’t say that aloud because it’s NSFW and you are reading this at work right now, suffering from FOMO because you’ve lost your MOJO to say OMG, IDK TBH this isn’t what I want to do with my life and YOLO so I’m going to go find my MOJO somewhere on a beach in Greece.
BRB…
OK, here I am again.
IMHO it can be confusing to follow all these acronyms and what they mean particularly when you’ve lost your MOJO which is what you were planning to write about in the first place!
I don’t know whether I should be SMH or ROTFLOL.
ICYMI, this post was supposed to be about regaining your MOJO. As a result of writing this bit of shorthand silliness, I think I’ve found mine.
So, TTYL, I’ll be AFK because YOLO so I’m going to do something as soon as I decide what it might be.
Most likely, with my newfound MOJO and a bit of JUJU, it’ll be NSFW.
Valerie Gordon is an author, humorist, and longtime storyteller whose feature work has appeared on ESPN, HBO Sports, and CBS News. She founded The Storytelling Strategist in 2017, a communications firm drawing on the power of storytelling for personal and business success. She’s a Gen X-er trying to understand today’s shorthand, SMH LOL!