Blog 2-Fun

How much fun do we have in our lives these days? How does it compare to the fun we had as children or the fun that we see children have?

Less? A lot less? I imagine so for all of us. Why is that? Here are a few of the reason we might initially come up with.

Not enough time
Too busy with work
Too busy with stuff
Too tired
Too stressed

I don’t think any of these are true at all. The real reason is we don’t know how to, as naturally as we used to when we were children. We have learnt and been taught that after a certain age, fun is some thing in the past to be revisited occasionally, something childish, a phase we have passed through and now our lives are for something else. Where did this come from? Lots of places I imagine, the legacy of Victorian Britain, religious interference and doctrine, education, and our culture of aspirational progression perhaps.

A dear and wonderful friend of mine said in relation to work: “Work is what we do in between having fun.”

How many of us have fallen into the trap of getting this precisely the other way around? And knowingly accepting this as part of our life.


We are born as pleasure seeking creatures, Babies seek it out at every opportunity, they play, they learn; they learn they play. We are designed as pleasure seeking and playful and yet we choose to somehow unlearn this.

So much so that innocent play is now difficult for a lot of us. We seek to access it with the assistance of alcohol or other substitutes.
Occasionally and spontaneously we may access real fun, the type or fun that exists not just in the moment but resonates in our body long after. It can cause us to laugh so much it hurts but is really a delicious pleasure.
Ask yourself when was the last time you laughed like that?

That sort of fun and ecstasy is nourishing for us, it releases all sorts of positive chemicals into our system, it also balms our soul, puts us back in touch with our playful self; a part of us that we have accidentally abandoned somewhere along the way.

I think the problem or draw back with alcohol-fuelled fun is that it does exist in the moment but doesn’t deliver the lasting impact nor does it touch our soul. I wouldn’t want to come across a puritan I have had my fair share of alcohol fuelled fun nights and I am sure I will have more. But alcohol is after all a depressive and will counteract the positive chemicals naturally generated from real fun.



Whilst writing this, I wonder whether a better word for us to explore is play or playfulness rather than fun. These words seem to be to have a better quality to them; they bring to mind innocent enjoyment, a lightness of spirit, less about striving but more about being in the moment.
I don’t think young children set out to have fun to achieve anything they simply play, for its own sake.
I am reminded of a weekend I spent in Cambridge visiting with some friends. There were six of us, 3 couples, it was a glorious day, we walked out across the common, which prompted a severe hay fever attack for me. We arrived at the park and played rounders. Girls against boys naturally, I shall omit to mention who won for fear of recriminations if any one of the other 5 people should ever read this. I can remember now, over 4 years later the feeling, the expressions on other peoples faces, the playful shouting and arguing, the playful accusations of cheating. The lying on the grass afterwards exhausted hot, but totally satisfied and content, smiling and enjoying as much the smile on others faces too. A powerful sense that all was well with the world and this simple pleasure of 15 minutes of play had created that. And my hayfever had magically disappeared despite lying in the grass
I have had many fun drunken evenings, as I am sure most of us have, but they are incomparable to that day in Cambridge, or other moments of real play.

So how about conducting a playfulness audit of your life?
When was the last time you played?
Could you get some friends together and go to the park and play rounders?
Make a picnic?
Avoid alcohol?

Try it and let me know what happens.

Let’s Play!!