Some of things that were 'fun' when I was 22 just simply would not be anymore... I don't recover as well! Ha! But I do think of 'fun' as a bit different than pure 'enjoyment' or rest... Reading and learning can be 'fun' (and is) but it doesn't quite have that exhilarating quality that I think you're referencing. I think there's a certain carefree aspect to "fun" that is simply hard to replicate as an adult with real-world possibilities. When I think of pure fun I mostly think of college - not really the wild times out, those were sort of frantic and usually ended it not fun ways - but the freedom of that time, the possibilities - and just the lack of responsibility frankly. we went to school on the river and we would swim at sunrise or go on long hikes or make campfires in the woods and just the freedom and recklessness of this time with good friends, well there really is nothing like it. I think also how when you become a parent there's a part of your brain that is now FOREVER WORRIED. Like even if you get a night out or time away or even when you're asleep (or trying to sleep) there's a part of you that is always thinking of and worried about your kids. There's also this meta awareness of your body and self as being so needed and I think fun requires you to forget yourself and this is kind of impossible when you have humans depending on you and your survival, ha. So I don't know if it qualifies as 'fun' or if you really have 'fun' in that pure way in adulthood BUT what I really 'enjoy' is being outside, whisky or wine nights with friends, a good film, a good mystery novel, watching shows/reading/debating with my husband, a hot shower, coffee in the afternoons. The closest I think I get to that exhilaration is horseback riding which I have less and less time for, but the physicality of it allows you to lose yourself a bit more. Thanks for this thought-provoking topic, Christy... And I'm with you in the Grandmotherly interests!! We were just ahead of the game (I was a coastal grandmother long ago)
Hahaha, yeah I do not find fun what I found fun in college...and I guess that's probably what leaves though of us who have gone through a major transition like motherhood wondering what we do like to do for fun. Again, I like going thrift shopping and think it's fun! I think doing a puzzle can be fun! But is it fun or recharging or rest or hobby? I find for myself that I find myself needing fun when I think my life and rest and routine and things are humming along well but there's a bit of a need for something to look forward to. Maybe that should be part of what I define as fun? It definitely is so personality dependent, and dependent on where you are in life! No one lives in high school forever, thanks movies and tv!
Super interesting topic/questions! My mum has always joked that she is “not a fun person” and I think of myself the same way. And btw, I am an only child who was pretty independent pretty early on and my mum was plenty financially comfortable, so I don’t think this was something she connected to her motherhood so much as her personality. I would say my mum knows how to enjoy herself but would also have to agree that “fun” is not a word that comes to mind when I think about her or how she spends her time. Same for me. I *enjoy* similar things to those you mention - book clubs, travel, a glass of wine or several with friends. I guess those things can be fun, but it’s hard for me to think of times in recent years when I’ve had that somewhat exhilarating feeling of “wow, that was really *fun*”. Maybe it’s because there has to be an element of the carefree to have fun, and it’s so hard to be carefree when you have kids because your responsibilities are always present? Like staying up until 2am with friends drinking cocktails is not very appealing because I am very aware all that time that I cannot just lounge in bed until whenever the next morning, and even if I agreed with my husband that I could, I would know that at some point I would have to emerge to face my responsibilities, which inevitably would have stacked up in my absence.
Anyway tl;dr - good question, I have no answers, but interesting topic!
This is really interesting, Gina. I agree with you that fun is not carefree when you're an adult who has kids and responsibilities and a mortgage and a job and a kid can't eat gluten! There's just so much on our mental plates that it's hard to know what will be relaxing let alone what will be fun. And is there a difference between relaxing and fun? I love having silly things happen to friends and I or me and my husband when we're out doing something boring. That's fun! I love a scheduled night out, I love book club, I love watching YouTube videos alone in my bedroom when I should be folding laundry! I think the definition of what we find fun has to be helpful for us personally and for our personalities only to help us better make room in our lives for more of it, or at the bare minimum, make sure it actually happens!
Also though, Covid aside, I feel like we are in a place socio-politically where we’re supposed to feel bad and terrible about everything all the time and having fun is made to feel frivolously selfish? Like we are all supposed to feel very serious and concerned all the time or else we are being bad humans? I mean I definitely am a person who leans towards being too serious and can be judgmental about how others have fun, so I am not excluding myself from being part of that problem, but it does seem that we are at a particularly unfun collective moment in history.
This is really very true. And it feels like a very extreme culture we live in where we are either pulled in the direction of it's the end of the world and everything terrible, OR, look at this influencer and her completely unreal life where she's paid to go to five star hotels and post pictures by the pool. It feels like there's no moderate middle. And our culture is deeply, deeply UNFUN. I honestly would write a whole post on that point alone.
I hear you! I think we have to land somewhere between the extremes of “how can you have fun when the world is horrible” and “only think of yourself and what pleases you”. Different personalities will definitely be pulled one way or another.
Christy, this has been on my mind so much lately. I think once the intense oppression of Covid lockdown and mandates eased up and I was able to pull myself out of the trenches, I realized that fun was no longer in my vocabulary. Maybe it had been missing for a long time (6 kids?) but I'm pretty sure that it really disappeared and was forgotten during the Covid years. We all have scars from the past 3 years and I think a big part of the healing for me will be figuring out what fun is again.
This summer I thought about it a lot and I even made myself go down a waterslide with my kids. It was fun, so I did it a second time and got water up my nose. My oldest teen wants to go skydiving, maybe that's the ticket. I did it once when I was 19 but I don't exactly remember it being fun, more like the most terrifying thing that I was grateful to survive.
I'd really appreciate your tips, however I don't like gin and I'm lousy at crocheting. I think out of the examples you gave, skiing (or in my case snowboarding) or board games with adults come closer to fun than time alone, crafting, book club, or sneaking chocolate in my bedroom with the door locked. Those are the things I crave too, but I agree they probably fall into the rest/recharge category. Do we need to fill our cups with rest first before we can have fun? Or can we just jump right in?
This is all really true. We all need to heal and recover from the trauma of the last three years. I have no idea what the answers are other than to maybe just do the things and try them out in hopes that one really resonates with you so that you can try to figure out more of that in your life?? I feel like fun is the last thing we look for. I feel like it's gotta be one of those nutritional pyramids with rest at the bottom, then mental health, then things you enjoy, then fun at the very tippy top. A pyramid of personal happiness, if you will. I know I have a harder time even getting out with friends if I'm exhausted. If I'm depressed, nothing I like doing brings me much happiness. And I definitely am not looking for "fun" if I haven't been able to do the things I like that make me feel like a person all week because of stuff hitting the fan. But there's also moments of fun in our regular days that maybe we need to pay more attention to. Singing along to a dumb song with my kids, watching a hockey game with my boys, beating my husband at wordle, we should maybe pay attention to those little things too, in addition to finding our way back to big fun.
Full disclosure, I didn't finish this book because I just felt like I already had too many things going on, but your thoughts are reminding me of the first few chapters of Annie F Downs' Chase the Fun. I think there a lot of value in asking ourselves what we think is fun, why we stopped doing certain things, etc. And I definitely think solitary activities can be fun, while also always wanting something to look forward to. Perhaps we all have multiple fun receptors?
After reading the comments, I'm happy to see there are so many fellow non-fun people in the world. Or is this a massive problem? Hmmm. Every winter it seems everyone around us flees every weekend to ski and Dave and I wonder whether we should start skiing. But at this point, we're old, and the prospect of gathering gear for 5 people is super daunting. And what would I do with the baby? So, we continue to not have fun. 😆 I've never been one for traveling; the act of taking a family on the "road" is very stressful to me, but lately I've appreciated that once we get to the destination, we do tend to have fun! So I need to be a big girl and embrace the process of getting to the destination I think. It helps that most of my kids are capable of sleeping in different places now. Anyway, such a good conversation and it will give me some food for conversation with Dave over my Sunday drink tomorrow. Because, of course, I gave up my one means of fun during Lent this year.
Haha! I love you, Ellen! It's hard to see super fun things in a world where people think flying to Mexico every other month is fun, or other outrageous impossible things! But that's sorta why I admire people who find random things fun like, playing bridge or pickle ball! I wish I found more fun in physical activities! I think a lot of people find fun in going to the gym and that's my idea of purgatory! I had so many little kids for so long that I really never found much fun that was worth the amount of work it took to do anything, but I have so many fun friends who do so many crazy things with their millions of kids that I'm in awe! It's a hard spot for us non-fun/disagreeables! Ok, I realized I used exclamation points on every sentence here. I'm just enthusiastic about this topic. If we were in person I'd be getting really loud and moving my hands a lot. That's why the exclamation points stand in for.
I’ve actually thought about this recently. When I think of fun I think of college. That was a looong time ago 😂 I don’t know if i could even define fun now. I find things deeply fulfilling - book club, kids’ softball, reading to my kids, reading, knitting, writing. But fun? Hmmm not sure if those count. If someone asked me what something fun was I literally don’t think I could answer. Actually, maybe swimming with my kids. Oftentimes that is great fun. I do it maybe twice a year 😂 not sure I can come up with any more. Is it wrong that I equate fun with alcohol? I don’t drink really so maybe that’s why I have no fun 😂
I feel you here! I think that's why it's good to talk about because we can't just let fun be something that happened in college and then live the rest of our lives thinking we're done with that, you know? I agree that I really enjoy doing some things, and find different things fulfilling and important, and other things where I feel a great sense of accomplishment having done them. But fun is so much harder to define and I feel as if it's something that is missing. I especially feel it sometimes with our marriage, sometimes things are mostly fine but what we could just use is some fun together. Just a night off doing anything together, having some kind of fun! And I think that's sort of what's needed when I'm in a mom funk, I need something to shake me out of it.
I think in my mind, fun has a connotation of something unexpected. Perhaps because I don't see myself as a "fun" person. I guess if I do something I would classify as "fun" I surprise myself, haha.
I had already saved the title of that book. Now I *really* want to read it!
This is interesting! Fun as something unexpected. That's a good thing to think about. Especially for me as someone who's not spontaneous and naturally is a good planner and likes to plan things out. Maybe it being unexpected also releases expectations?
I love your curmudgeonly-ness! I’m glad I learned how to firmly say no to things I don’t enjoy when I was younger-but it was largely in response to social structures like school constantly imposing activities on me that are stereotypically “fun.” As a very independent introvert I knew myself but suffered for many years of being forced into mandatory “fun” that I didn’t enjoy. The most egregious example was the all-night lock-in we were “required” to attend after high school graduation under the pretenses of preventing celebratory drunk driving incidents and “enjoying” our last hurrah as “kids” before going off to college. I was so exhausted from exams, studying, and managing a baseball tournament that all I wanted to do was go home & sleep. But instead I spent the night crying in a corner trying to ignore a hypnotist show because the adult chaperones wouldn’t even let anyone lie down (again, ostensibly to prevent other mischief from happening).
I am all for having fun alone. I am only 2 kids in but am really feeling the deprivation of alone time! I don’t think rest and fun are mutually exclusive, but I’m constantly trying to reclaim a “leisure “ habit a la Josef Pieper.
Yes, I find so many "fun" things not fun at all! And I have not much guilt anymore about not doing those things, but every once in a while I think, "Wow, it would be so much easier if I just found x y and z fun like everyone else." I think maybe I should reread that Pieper book and see if he makes a bit more of a distinction between leisure and fun, or if he sees it as the same thing. Because I think that alone time is a hundred percent necessary for a mom, and interests and hobbies and friends are a hundred percent necessary for a mom. But does that always mean that those things are "fun"??
Yesterday I dropped my youngest off for for an hour of drop in care, and I sat in my car and cross stitched while listening to a podcast for an hour. So I know ALL about fun. 😏
The most fun I have had in years was about a year ago taking a trip with my dearest girl friends since high school. None of us live in the same place anymore so we have to travel to see each other. The closeness of these old and deep friendships allows space, time, and freedom to be just myself instead of the roles I play in everyday life (mom, wife, house cleaner). Fun, for me, really needs to be given time to flourish. Yes, I have small moments of delight and enjoyment in my day to day, but fun takes more time. I have to be intentional about blocking out enough time for this- but as time is so valuable, that doesn’t happen much for me!
I’m glad you brought this topic up, and glad to be given more time to think about it, because gosh, it can be really guilt inducing to think “am I not having any fun in life??” Good to see by your post and these comments that I am not alone!
Time is a really big deal. Because I'm just like you and try to squeeze in things I enjoy in the time I've got available which is not a lot. So then does fun have to be something that's really scheduled and organized? It feels so complex doesn't it? I don't mean for it to be guilt-inducing either! Because I feel the same way, when did I do something fun? But I think it can and should be simply and not over complicated, right?
Also, obviously the most fun you had was with me drinking Pimms beside Tower Bridge! That trip was definitely extremely fun for me, and hanging out in pubs is definitely fun but impossible where I live!
I definitely don't have enough fun and, like you, don't even know what I might experience as fun. For a few years now, I have thought about this when my birthday comes around, thinking I should organise a trip with some friends to an escape room or sip and paint or something like that. But then it just feels like a lot of work to find a time everyone could do it and organise it. So I haven't done anything. Do we actually have to put in work in order to have fun at this age? I spend enough time organising all my kids' stuff, it is easier to just sit home and watch Netflix!
Yes! Exactly this. We spend so much time organizing and arranging and facilitating our kids social lives we have no time for ours. There is many a time where it just feels like way too much work to even try to figure out if a friend will have any time for something frivolous like fun! And I've spent a bunch of time all week figuring out everyones logistics the last thing I want to do is figure out more logistics for myself! But if we don't schedule it it doesn't happen and that's a problem. This year I am intentionally planning out things to celebrate my birthday because just like you, I've always thought I should do something fun but feels like it's too much work. I'm going to try the opposite and plan something this year!
My husband, who recently took up skateboarding again (he has no issues having fun),asked me what I even think is fun anymore and I was pretty much stumped. Reading in bed? I don't drink at all, so I can't even say reading in bed with gin. Maybe I should start drinking?
Haha, I mean, I am with you! Do my old lady activities count as fun??? I have lots of hobbies I enjoy, but is that fun?? I like spending time with friends and family, but it can also be draining and involve a good chunk of actual work. Haha, it is such a weirdly complex topic! And I always recommend taking up drinking, I am that friend.
I listened to Kendra’s podcast episode as well, and some of it just didn’t click for me. I don’t love the way it suggested we need to fit things in boxes of “fun”, “relaxation”, etc. and create a problem that we never had in the first place if we don’t have enough “real fun” in our lives. That being said, I am a huge overthinker and regularly create problems that I don’t have.
I totally agree with you and her that fun is important and necessary. I also agree with you that we often prioritize our kids’ fun over our own. I just spoke to a mom who ran herself ragged to give her kids a fun time and they didn’t even enjoy it :(.
I think a big problem is buying into the materialistic or overly organized versions of fun that are so common in our culture. Some examples include: clubbing, big expensive concerts, and driving 3 hours for organized sports. They aren’t necessarily bad (okay maybe clubbing lol), but if that’s what we chase as fun we are going to feel a void. One piece that I see missing is a sense of community and family, where we feel safe to let our guard down. I think Rebecca is spot on when she says we need a full cup to really have fun. This topic really resonated with me!
Haha, well welcome to my overthinking party! I feel like I'm over thinking it too. But I have lately been noticing the slight difference in my life, and maybe its just from big kid privilege? Again, is it a big problem? No. But also, wouldn't we want people in our lives to be having regular fun? Why not ourselves?
I definitely don't want materialistic answers to this either, I think you're totally right. I am not envying a rich person's lifestyle of jetting off every month to a different island or something, but truly interested in finding achievable and realistic fun for my life right now.
And yes, I'm conflicted about the boxes just like you are. Does my gardening that I really enjoy but is mostly by myself count as fun? Do I have to be around other people? I have a houseful of teenagers and I think it's very unrealistic to have perfect connection with all of them at the same time! But I do enjoy spending time with them and doing fun things with them, but a lot of the time what is fun about an activity or time spent with them is a very small amount of time compared to what's actually going on. Does that even make sense?
I think I understand what you are saying. It’s almost like fun is the little nugget inside of the required set up. With gardening, you have all the planning, starting of seeds, prepping the bed, weeding, etc. before what maybe is the actual “fun” of cutting and arranging. Which parts are work, relaxation, or fun? Tangentially, I have been meaning to read Pieper’s “Leisure the Basis of Culture” based on your and Haley’s recommendation.
Haha, yeah, so should I adjust my expectation of the nuggets?? I think I need to reread that Pieper book to see if he more adequately defines the differences in types of leisure. I'm sure he does and I'm blanking!
Oh my goodness, yes! Thank you for putting my life to words! I think you are right on when you question whether rest and recharging are the same as fun, and the list of fun I enjoy is probably more like rest (enjoying an empty house, reading, etc.). You’ve got me thinking!
I feel like I've been noticing a difference between what I do to recharge/rest/do as a hobby around January when I had recovered from Christmas, gotten back into a good routine of making time for myself, but noticed that I just desperately wanted something to look forward to. And to do something that would be really fun! I get really burnt out from Christmas because as a mom we literally work straight for December, then have the chaos and enjoyment of Christmas, but actually we're doing a lot work while we're partying and seeing people and all the things! Then we have to clean up after Christmas! And then I realize I'm exhausted and wonder why.
Some of things that were 'fun' when I was 22 just simply would not be anymore... I don't recover as well! Ha! But I do think of 'fun' as a bit different than pure 'enjoyment' or rest... Reading and learning can be 'fun' (and is) but it doesn't quite have that exhilarating quality that I think you're referencing. I think there's a certain carefree aspect to "fun" that is simply hard to replicate as an adult with real-world possibilities. When I think of pure fun I mostly think of college - not really the wild times out, those were sort of frantic and usually ended it not fun ways - but the freedom of that time, the possibilities - and just the lack of responsibility frankly. we went to school on the river and we would swim at sunrise or go on long hikes or make campfires in the woods and just the freedom and recklessness of this time with good friends, well there really is nothing like it. I think also how when you become a parent there's a part of your brain that is now FOREVER WORRIED. Like even if you get a night out or time away or even when you're asleep (or trying to sleep) there's a part of you that is always thinking of and worried about your kids. There's also this meta awareness of your body and self as being so needed and I think fun requires you to forget yourself and this is kind of impossible when you have humans depending on you and your survival, ha. So I don't know if it qualifies as 'fun' or if you really have 'fun' in that pure way in adulthood BUT what I really 'enjoy' is being outside, whisky or wine nights with friends, a good film, a good mystery novel, watching shows/reading/debating with my husband, a hot shower, coffee in the afternoons. The closest I think I get to that exhilaration is horseback riding which I have less and less time for, but the physicality of it allows you to lose yourself a bit more. Thanks for this thought-provoking topic, Christy... And I'm with you in the Grandmotherly interests!! We were just ahead of the game (I was a coastal grandmother long ago)
Hahaha, yeah I do not find fun what I found fun in college...and I guess that's probably what leaves though of us who have gone through a major transition like motherhood wondering what we do like to do for fun. Again, I like going thrift shopping and think it's fun! I think doing a puzzle can be fun! But is it fun or recharging or rest or hobby? I find for myself that I find myself needing fun when I think my life and rest and routine and things are humming along well but there's a bit of a need for something to look forward to. Maybe that should be part of what I define as fun? It definitely is so personality dependent, and dependent on where you are in life! No one lives in high school forever, thanks movies and tv!
I also like the idea of something to look forward to... Travel (sans kids) would fit the bill for me there
Have you heard of these "early night" clubs? Clubbing is not my idea of fun but clearly there are lots of people of a certain age trying to incorporate fun into their lives.. https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/09/arts/music/before-midnight-annie-mac.html
Super interesting topic/questions! My mum has always joked that she is “not a fun person” and I think of myself the same way. And btw, I am an only child who was pretty independent pretty early on and my mum was plenty financially comfortable, so I don’t think this was something she connected to her motherhood so much as her personality. I would say my mum knows how to enjoy herself but would also have to agree that “fun” is not a word that comes to mind when I think about her or how she spends her time. Same for me. I *enjoy* similar things to those you mention - book clubs, travel, a glass of wine or several with friends. I guess those things can be fun, but it’s hard for me to think of times in recent years when I’ve had that somewhat exhilarating feeling of “wow, that was really *fun*”. Maybe it’s because there has to be an element of the carefree to have fun, and it’s so hard to be carefree when you have kids because your responsibilities are always present? Like staying up until 2am with friends drinking cocktails is not very appealing because I am very aware all that time that I cannot just lounge in bed until whenever the next morning, and even if I agreed with my husband that I could, I would know that at some point I would have to emerge to face my responsibilities, which inevitably would have stacked up in my absence.
Anyway tl;dr - good question, I have no answers, but interesting topic!
This is really interesting, Gina. I agree with you that fun is not carefree when you're an adult who has kids and responsibilities and a mortgage and a job and a kid can't eat gluten! There's just so much on our mental plates that it's hard to know what will be relaxing let alone what will be fun. And is there a difference between relaxing and fun? I love having silly things happen to friends and I or me and my husband when we're out doing something boring. That's fun! I love a scheduled night out, I love book club, I love watching YouTube videos alone in my bedroom when I should be folding laundry! I think the definition of what we find fun has to be helpful for us personally and for our personalities only to help us better make room in our lives for more of it, or at the bare minimum, make sure it actually happens!
Also though, Covid aside, I feel like we are in a place socio-politically where we’re supposed to feel bad and terrible about everything all the time and having fun is made to feel frivolously selfish? Like we are all supposed to feel very serious and concerned all the time or else we are being bad humans? I mean I definitely am a person who leans towards being too serious and can be judgmental about how others have fun, so I am not excluding myself from being part of that problem, but it does seem that we are at a particularly unfun collective moment in history.
This is really very true. And it feels like a very extreme culture we live in where we are either pulled in the direction of it's the end of the world and everything terrible, OR, look at this influencer and her completely unreal life where she's paid to go to five star hotels and post pictures by the pool. It feels like there's no moderate middle. And our culture is deeply, deeply UNFUN. I honestly would write a whole post on that point alone.
I hear you! I think we have to land somewhere between the extremes of “how can you have fun when the world is horrible” and “only think of yourself and what pleases you”. Different personalities will definitely be pulled one way or another.
Christy, this has been on my mind so much lately. I think once the intense oppression of Covid lockdown and mandates eased up and I was able to pull myself out of the trenches, I realized that fun was no longer in my vocabulary. Maybe it had been missing for a long time (6 kids?) but I'm pretty sure that it really disappeared and was forgotten during the Covid years. We all have scars from the past 3 years and I think a big part of the healing for me will be figuring out what fun is again.
This summer I thought about it a lot and I even made myself go down a waterslide with my kids. It was fun, so I did it a second time and got water up my nose. My oldest teen wants to go skydiving, maybe that's the ticket. I did it once when I was 19 but I don't exactly remember it being fun, more like the most terrifying thing that I was grateful to survive.
I'd really appreciate your tips, however I don't like gin and I'm lousy at crocheting. I think out of the examples you gave, skiing (or in my case snowboarding) or board games with adults come closer to fun than time alone, crafting, book club, or sneaking chocolate in my bedroom with the door locked. Those are the things I crave too, but I agree they probably fall into the rest/recharge category. Do we need to fill our cups with rest first before we can have fun? Or can we just jump right in?
This is all really true. We all need to heal and recover from the trauma of the last three years. I have no idea what the answers are other than to maybe just do the things and try them out in hopes that one really resonates with you so that you can try to figure out more of that in your life?? I feel like fun is the last thing we look for. I feel like it's gotta be one of those nutritional pyramids with rest at the bottom, then mental health, then things you enjoy, then fun at the very tippy top. A pyramid of personal happiness, if you will. I know I have a harder time even getting out with friends if I'm exhausted. If I'm depressed, nothing I like doing brings me much happiness. And I definitely am not looking for "fun" if I haven't been able to do the things I like that make me feel like a person all week because of stuff hitting the fan. But there's also moments of fun in our regular days that maybe we need to pay more attention to. Singing along to a dumb song with my kids, watching a hockey game with my boys, beating my husband at wordle, we should maybe pay attention to those little things too, in addition to finding our way back to big fun.
Full disclosure, I didn't finish this book because I just felt like I already had too many things going on, but your thoughts are reminding me of the first few chapters of Annie F Downs' Chase the Fun. I think there a lot of value in asking ourselves what we think is fun, why we stopped doing certain things, etc. And I definitely think solitary activities can be fun, while also always wanting something to look forward to. Perhaps we all have multiple fun receptors?
After reading the comments, I'm happy to see there are so many fellow non-fun people in the world. Or is this a massive problem? Hmmm. Every winter it seems everyone around us flees every weekend to ski and Dave and I wonder whether we should start skiing. But at this point, we're old, and the prospect of gathering gear for 5 people is super daunting. And what would I do with the baby? So, we continue to not have fun. 😆 I've never been one for traveling; the act of taking a family on the "road" is very stressful to me, but lately I've appreciated that once we get to the destination, we do tend to have fun! So I need to be a big girl and embrace the process of getting to the destination I think. It helps that most of my kids are capable of sleeping in different places now. Anyway, such a good conversation and it will give me some food for conversation with Dave over my Sunday drink tomorrow. Because, of course, I gave up my one means of fun during Lent this year.
Haha! I love you, Ellen! It's hard to see super fun things in a world where people think flying to Mexico every other month is fun, or other outrageous impossible things! But that's sorta why I admire people who find random things fun like, playing bridge or pickle ball! I wish I found more fun in physical activities! I think a lot of people find fun in going to the gym and that's my idea of purgatory! I had so many little kids for so long that I really never found much fun that was worth the amount of work it took to do anything, but I have so many fun friends who do so many crazy things with their millions of kids that I'm in awe! It's a hard spot for us non-fun/disagreeables! Ok, I realized I used exclamation points on every sentence here. I'm just enthusiastic about this topic. If we were in person I'd be getting really loud and moving my hands a lot. That's why the exclamation points stand in for.
I’ve actually thought about this recently. When I think of fun I think of college. That was a looong time ago 😂 I don’t know if i could even define fun now. I find things deeply fulfilling - book club, kids’ softball, reading to my kids, reading, knitting, writing. But fun? Hmmm not sure if those count. If someone asked me what something fun was I literally don’t think I could answer. Actually, maybe swimming with my kids. Oftentimes that is great fun. I do it maybe twice a year 😂 not sure I can come up with any more. Is it wrong that I equate fun with alcohol? I don’t drink really so maybe that’s why I have no fun 😂
I feel you here! I think that's why it's good to talk about because we can't just let fun be something that happened in college and then live the rest of our lives thinking we're done with that, you know? I agree that I really enjoy doing some things, and find different things fulfilling and important, and other things where I feel a great sense of accomplishment having done them. But fun is so much harder to define and I feel as if it's something that is missing. I especially feel it sometimes with our marriage, sometimes things are mostly fine but what we could just use is some fun together. Just a night off doing anything together, having some kind of fun! And I think that's sort of what's needed when I'm in a mom funk, I need something to shake me out of it.
I think in my mind, fun has a connotation of something unexpected. Perhaps because I don't see myself as a "fun" person. I guess if I do something I would classify as "fun" I surprise myself, haha.
I had already saved the title of that book. Now I *really* want to read it!
This is interesting! Fun as something unexpected. That's a good thing to think about. Especially for me as someone who's not spontaneous and naturally is a good planner and likes to plan things out. Maybe it being unexpected also releases expectations?
I love your curmudgeonly-ness! I’m glad I learned how to firmly say no to things I don’t enjoy when I was younger-but it was largely in response to social structures like school constantly imposing activities on me that are stereotypically “fun.” As a very independent introvert I knew myself but suffered for many years of being forced into mandatory “fun” that I didn’t enjoy. The most egregious example was the all-night lock-in we were “required” to attend after high school graduation under the pretenses of preventing celebratory drunk driving incidents and “enjoying” our last hurrah as “kids” before going off to college. I was so exhausted from exams, studying, and managing a baseball tournament that all I wanted to do was go home & sleep. But instead I spent the night crying in a corner trying to ignore a hypnotist show because the adult chaperones wouldn’t even let anyone lie down (again, ostensibly to prevent other mischief from happening).
I am all for having fun alone. I am only 2 kids in but am really feeling the deprivation of alone time! I don’t think rest and fun are mutually exclusive, but I’m constantly trying to reclaim a “leisure “ habit a la Josef Pieper.
Yes, I find so many "fun" things not fun at all! And I have not much guilt anymore about not doing those things, but every once in a while I think, "Wow, it would be so much easier if I just found x y and z fun like everyone else." I think maybe I should reread that Pieper book and see if he makes a bit more of a distinction between leisure and fun, or if he sees it as the same thing. Because I think that alone time is a hundred percent necessary for a mom, and interests and hobbies and friends are a hundred percent necessary for a mom. But does that always mean that those things are "fun"??
Yesterday I dropped my youngest off for for an hour of drop in care, and I sat in my car and cross stitched while listening to a podcast for an hour. So I know ALL about fun. 😏
The most fun I have had in years was about a year ago taking a trip with my dearest girl friends since high school. None of us live in the same place anymore so we have to travel to see each other. The closeness of these old and deep friendships allows space, time, and freedom to be just myself instead of the roles I play in everyday life (mom, wife, house cleaner). Fun, for me, really needs to be given time to flourish. Yes, I have small moments of delight and enjoyment in my day to day, but fun takes more time. I have to be intentional about blocking out enough time for this- but as time is so valuable, that doesn’t happen much for me!
I’m glad you brought this topic up, and glad to be given more time to think about it, because gosh, it can be really guilt inducing to think “am I not having any fun in life??” Good to see by your post and these comments that I am not alone!
Time is a really big deal. Because I'm just like you and try to squeeze in things I enjoy in the time I've got available which is not a lot. So then does fun have to be something that's really scheduled and organized? It feels so complex doesn't it? I don't mean for it to be guilt-inducing either! Because I feel the same way, when did I do something fun? But I think it can and should be simply and not over complicated, right?
Also, obviously the most fun you had was with me drinking Pimms beside Tower Bridge! That trip was definitely extremely fun for me, and hanging out in pubs is definitely fun but impossible where I live!
I definitely don't have enough fun and, like you, don't even know what I might experience as fun. For a few years now, I have thought about this when my birthday comes around, thinking I should organise a trip with some friends to an escape room or sip and paint or something like that. But then it just feels like a lot of work to find a time everyone could do it and organise it. So I haven't done anything. Do we actually have to put in work in order to have fun at this age? I spend enough time organising all my kids' stuff, it is easier to just sit home and watch Netflix!
Yes! Exactly this. We spend so much time organizing and arranging and facilitating our kids social lives we have no time for ours. There is many a time where it just feels like way too much work to even try to figure out if a friend will have any time for something frivolous like fun! And I've spent a bunch of time all week figuring out everyones logistics the last thing I want to do is figure out more logistics for myself! But if we don't schedule it it doesn't happen and that's a problem. This year I am intentionally planning out things to celebrate my birthday because just like you, I've always thought I should do something fun but feels like it's too much work. I'm going to try the opposite and plan something this year!
My husband, who recently took up skateboarding again (he has no issues having fun),asked me what I even think is fun anymore and I was pretty much stumped. Reading in bed? I don't drink at all, so I can't even say reading in bed with gin. Maybe I should start drinking?
Haha, I mean, I am with you! Do my old lady activities count as fun??? I have lots of hobbies I enjoy, but is that fun?? I like spending time with friends and family, but it can also be draining and involve a good chunk of actual work. Haha, it is such a weirdly complex topic! And I always recommend taking up drinking, I am that friend.
I listened to Kendra’s podcast episode as well, and some of it just didn’t click for me. I don’t love the way it suggested we need to fit things in boxes of “fun”, “relaxation”, etc. and create a problem that we never had in the first place if we don’t have enough “real fun” in our lives. That being said, I am a huge overthinker and regularly create problems that I don’t have.
I totally agree with you and her that fun is important and necessary. I also agree with you that we often prioritize our kids’ fun over our own. I just spoke to a mom who ran herself ragged to give her kids a fun time and they didn’t even enjoy it :(.
I think a big problem is buying into the materialistic or overly organized versions of fun that are so common in our culture. Some examples include: clubbing, big expensive concerts, and driving 3 hours for organized sports. They aren’t necessarily bad (okay maybe clubbing lol), but if that’s what we chase as fun we are going to feel a void. One piece that I see missing is a sense of community and family, where we feel safe to let our guard down. I think Rebecca is spot on when she says we need a full cup to really have fun. This topic really resonated with me!
Haha, well welcome to my overthinking party! I feel like I'm over thinking it too. But I have lately been noticing the slight difference in my life, and maybe its just from big kid privilege? Again, is it a big problem? No. But also, wouldn't we want people in our lives to be having regular fun? Why not ourselves?
I definitely don't want materialistic answers to this either, I think you're totally right. I am not envying a rich person's lifestyle of jetting off every month to a different island or something, but truly interested in finding achievable and realistic fun for my life right now.
And yes, I'm conflicted about the boxes just like you are. Does my gardening that I really enjoy but is mostly by myself count as fun? Do I have to be around other people? I have a houseful of teenagers and I think it's very unrealistic to have perfect connection with all of them at the same time! But I do enjoy spending time with them and doing fun things with them, but a lot of the time what is fun about an activity or time spent with them is a very small amount of time compared to what's actually going on. Does that even make sense?
I think I understand what you are saying. It’s almost like fun is the little nugget inside of the required set up. With gardening, you have all the planning, starting of seeds, prepping the bed, weeding, etc. before what maybe is the actual “fun” of cutting and arranging. Which parts are work, relaxation, or fun? Tangentially, I have been meaning to read Pieper’s “Leisure the Basis of Culture” based on your and Haley’s recommendation.
Haha, yeah, so should I adjust my expectation of the nuggets?? I think I need to reread that Pieper book to see if he more adequately defines the differences in types of leisure. I'm sure he does and I'm blanking!
Oh my goodness, yes! Thank you for putting my life to words! I think you are right on when you question whether rest and recharging are the same as fun, and the list of fun I enjoy is probably more like rest (enjoying an empty house, reading, etc.). You’ve got me thinking!
I feel like I've been noticing a difference between what I do to recharge/rest/do as a hobby around January when I had recovered from Christmas, gotten back into a good routine of making time for myself, but noticed that I just desperately wanted something to look forward to. And to do something that would be really fun! I get really burnt out from Christmas because as a mom we literally work straight for December, then have the chaos and enjoyment of Christmas, but actually we're doing a lot work while we're partying and seeing people and all the things! Then we have to clean up after Christmas! And then I realize I'm exhausted and wonder why.