Speaker 1: Oh hey, it's the coworker that you didn't recognize without
Speaker 1: his beard, Ali Ward. And if you click this for fun,
Speaker 1: let's have at it.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: This guest hugely popular twenty twenty two Ted Talk.
Speaker 2: It racked up millions and millions and millions of views.
Speaker 1: It's titled why Having Fun is the Secret to a
Speaker 1: Healthier life? Scientifically, what is fun? Who has it?
Speaker 2: How?
Speaker 1: And As a science journalist, she has researched topics like
Speaker 1: the culture of wellness, what's fact, what's flim flam? All
Speaker 1: about screen life balance, and wrote the book The Power
Speaker 1: of Fun, How to Feel Alive Again. So when I
Speaker 1: put out the call for questions at patreon dot com sashologies,
Speaker 1: one patron, Tabitha Delangelo, upon hearing that the topic was fun,
Speaker 1: not knowing who we were interviewing, offered, if you have
Speaker 1: not yet read it, check out The Power of Fun
Speaker 1: by Catherine Price. Uh Tabitha, we were one step ahead
Speaker 1: of you. Also, thank you to all the patrons who
Speaker 1: support the show. We literally could not do it without you.
Speaker 1: And thanks to everyone tagging their photos in ologies merch
Speaker 1: so we can see where you've been this summer and
Speaker 1: repost them. Merch is at ologiesmerch dot Com also thinks
Speaker 1: to everyone who leaves reviews, because yes, I read every single,
Speaker 1: single one of them. And this week's select is from
Speaker 1: Walker Barrow, who wrote, pick any episode and you will
Speaker 1: be instantly hooked. So if this is your first one,
Speaker 1: I hope it hooks you. Or maybe you're already hooked
Speaker 1: from the one on worms. Okay, let's get to theology. So,
Speaker 1: as you're about to learn, there's very little on this
Speaker 1: as an independent discipline. So this is a rare episode
Speaker 1: where I have to task myself with fabricating an ology
Speaker 1: for it, which we never do.
Speaker 2: We do not like to do.
Speaker 1: So I started designing a word based on Latin and
Speaker 1: Greek origins, and I came up with godiology, from the
Speaker 1: Latin for fun or the harder to say but more
Speaker 1: impressively spelled dia skeatis tecology, and a search for those
Speaker 1: words came up with nothing, no previous uses, And then.
Speaker 2: I did it.
Speaker 1: I googled funology, being like, no one's used that, right,
Speaker 1: wouldn't you know it? Hundreds of previous uses of that listeners, friends, children.
Speaker 1: I don't want this to be funology. I don't want
Speaker 1: that to be the title, and neither do you. I
Speaker 1: know it, but I cannot argue with precedent, So with
Speaker 1: a cringing heart, I'm sorry, it's got to be funology.
Speaker 1: Don't blame me because there aren't any real funologists out there,
Speaker 1: as you'll hear anyway we're going with it. But yes,
Speaker 1: this writer spent again years digging into the research and
Speaker 1: is an expert on what scientifically fun actually is. So
Speaker 1: limber up, shake off your troubles, fill your ears with
Speaker 1: info about adult versus childhood fun? What even is fun?
Speaker 1: By definition? Do introverts have special alone fun? What's the
Speaker 1: difference between happiness and laughter and fun? What is fun
Speaker 1: due to your actual meat body? Do animals have fun?
Speaker 1: Do substances mean more fun? How can you have more fun?
Speaker 1: How to have it when the world is crumbling in
Speaker 1: cinders all around you? And why it's important that you
Speaker 1: do with Award winning journalist and speaker and author literally
Speaker 1: wrote the book on fun and yes, funologist Catherine Price.
Speaker 3: I am Catherine Price, and.
Speaker 1: She okay fun expert? I mean pretty much you wrote
Speaker 1: a book about this. How often do people in casual
Speaker 1: social situations like your friends? How much are you pressured
Speaker 1: to bring the party or be uplifting in situations.
Speaker 2: Does that happen to you?
Speaker 3: I don't know how often I'm pressured to be the
Speaker 3: fun person per se, although when I go to conferences
Speaker 3: and stuff, I definitely have had people refer to me
Speaker 3: as the fun lady, and that feels like it comes
Speaker 3: with a bit of an expectation.
Speaker 2: Well, how did you steer your job toward this?
Speaker 1: Because we get paid to do jobs because typically they
Speaker 1: are not fun, although hopefully people can get into a
Speaker 1: field where they are somewhat inspired by it or it
Speaker 1: is fun. But I mean, this is a question that
Speaker 1: you must get asked at every single conference and dinner party,
Speaker 1: you know.
Speaker 3: I actually don't get asked that question too often. I
Speaker 3: basically never had a field other than writing that I
Speaker 3: was interested in, and I also have always been consumed
Speaker 3: by an awareness of my own mortality, and so I
Speaker 3: think I've had a personal I don't know, compulsion to
Speaker 3: want to feel like I'm living as fully as I
Speaker 3: possibly can. And I have a hard time taking orders
Speaker 3: from anybody who's also that. So I had a professor
Speaker 3: in college who had this philosophy of what he called
Speaker 3: creative drift, and the basic idea was that you should
Speaker 3: do whatever you're doing in the moment as well as
Speaker 3: you possibly can, and then have faith that that is
Speaker 3: going to open up opportunities for you that you couldn't
Speaker 3: possibly predict, and that that's going to lead to a
Speaker 3: more interesting life than if you try to achieve your
Speaker 3: goals head on. Like his example, I think was that
Speaker 3: he wanted to be in the National Park Service somehow,
Speaker 3: and he could have become an intern and then worked
Speaker 3: his way up the ranks, but instead he took the
Speaker 3: secutest route and eventually was invited to be a pretty
Speaker 3: high up member of the Parks Service that he never
Speaker 3: would have been offered had he taken the direct route.
Speaker 3: So anyway, that's kind of how I've tried to lead
Speaker 3: my life. I always knew I was interested in writing.
Speaker 3: I pursued freelance journalism after college, which is not a
Speaker 3: great career idea. It wasn't then and it certainly is
Speaker 3: not now.
Speaker 2: Been there.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So my first major book was about the history
Speaker 3: of vitamins and nutrition, and that was in part because
Speaker 3: I have Type one diabetes and in part because Michael Polland,
Speaker 3: the Food Writer, was my journalism school mentor, and also
Speaker 3: in part because my husband had a dream one night
Speaker 3: in which for some reason he was thinking what's a vitamin?
Speaker 3: And asked me what's a vitamin the next day and
Speaker 3: I said I don't really know, and he said, you
Speaker 3: should write a book about it, and so off I went.
Speaker 3: But then, more relevantly, how I got to this project
Speaker 3: is that we had our daughter in twenty fifteen, and
Speaker 3: a certain point I realized that I was spending a
Speaker 3: lot of time looking at my phone when I was
Speaker 3: with her, and she was looking at me as I
Speaker 3: was looking at my phone, and I really did not
Speaker 3: like that. I have a background in mindfulness, and again,
Speaker 3: I try to live a meaningful and joyful and present life,
Speaker 3: and so that led me to write this book, How
Speaker 3: to Break Up with Your Phone. And then I had
Speaker 3: this realization that if you take back the time that
Speaker 3: we spend on our phones, you end up with a
Speaker 3: lot of free time, and if you're like me, that
Speaker 3: can lead to a minor existential crisis where you suddenly
Speaker 3: don't know what you want to do with yourself and
Speaker 3: feel just panicked. But long story short, that led me
Speaker 3: to a new journey of exploration that led to me
Speaker 3: becoming very curious about the feeling of fun, and so
Speaker 3: that's how I got to this point. I really have
Speaker 3: tried to follow my interests, and yeah, there have been
Speaker 3: ups and downs, but right now I'm working on fun.
Speaker 3: I'm working on writing about how we can feel a
Speaker 3: live more generally.
Speaker 1: And Catherine says that being a parent has also shifted
Speaker 1: her focus to enjoying life more and being an example
Speaker 1: of more mentally healthy routines, especially after her twenty eighteen
Speaker 1: book about scrolling habits came out and her daughter nine
Speaker 1: has been listening as children do.
Speaker 3: I mean, she started giving copies of How to Break
Speaker 3: Up with Your Phone to her babysitters, which is way
Speaker 3: more confrontational than I am, but I'm like, yeah, we
Speaker 3: really do try to model the idea that it's really
Speaker 3: important to have fun and be present with each other
Speaker 3: and be playful and connected.
Speaker 1: When you started researching fun, how did you start to
Speaker 1: crack into that? How many different types of experts like
Speaker 1: multidisciplinary did you have to talk to, because I imagine
Speaker 1: there are so many different aspects of play and fun
Speaker 1: and relaxation and distraction. How did you start to crack
Speaker 1: into that?
Speaker 3: Well, she'll probably give me the backstory of like how
Speaker 3: the phone led to fun and so I had a
Speaker 3: mini existential crisis when I started spending less time on
Speaker 3: my phone, but I hadn't yet identified what I wanted
Speaker 3: to spend time on. And in one of these mini crises,
Speaker 3: critical moments, whatever, I was in the middle of a crisis,
Speaker 3: I asked myself this question I'd ask people when I
Speaker 3: was writing how to break up with your phone, which was,
Speaker 3: what's something you say you want to do but you
Speaker 3: supposedly don't have time for. And the logic there was
Speaker 3: that we do have more time than we realized, we're
Speaker 3: just spending a lot of it mindlessly scrolling. And so
Speaker 3: my answer to that question was I wanted to learn
Speaker 3: how to play guitar because I played piano since I
Speaker 3: was a kid, and I love music and I have
Speaker 3: a guitar, but I didn't really know how to play it.
Speaker 3: So I ended up signing up for this adult music
Speaker 3: class at what was actually a children's music studio, but
Speaker 3: it was like byob It met on Wednesday nights. It
Speaker 3: was this group of other parents who were there to
Speaker 3: just play together, like I'm like, both literally and metaphorically,
Speaker 3: because we weren't going to perform. This was not like
Speaker 3: going to become a rock stars. And I started just
Speaker 3: really looking forward to Wednesday nights in a way that
Speaker 3: felt a little bit foreign, especially because at that point
Speaker 3: I was a new parent and I think that, you know,
Speaker 3: i'd been so engrossed in like early parenting. There was
Speaker 3: just this feeling of freedom and euphoria that I was
Speaker 3: having in this class. It felt very foreign at that time,
Speaker 3: and I started getting curious about what that feeling was.
Speaker 3: And it took me an embarrassingly long time to put
Speaker 3: a word to it, and eventually I was like, Oh,
Speaker 3: I'm having fun. I'm having fun. This feels really good.
Speaker 3: I want more of this. And then that's when the
Speaker 3: science journals really kicked in. I was like, well, what
Speaker 3: is fun? What is this? And then I got very
Speaker 3: curious about like what is this doing to me? It
Speaker 3: feels so good emotionally, is it doing anything physically? What
Speaker 3: do we know? What's the research about fun? And that's
Speaker 3: when I think it got really interesting because when I
Speaker 3: tried to look into a definition of fun, what I
Speaker 3: found was totally inadequate in terms of how well it
Speaker 3: matched what I was experiencing. The dictionary definition basically said
Speaker 3: it was enjoyment or amusement or lighthearted pleasure, which is true,
Speaker 3: but this was lighting me up for the entire week,
Speaker 3: and it was bringing out this feeling of joy that
Speaker 3: was just so nourishing. It was not just kind of
Speaker 3: simple pleasure.
Speaker 4: Sounds so nice.
Speaker 3: And then I looked into the research. So I started
Speaker 3: to look into PubMed, you know, the biomedical database, and
Speaker 3: just seeing what was there, like looking in textbooks and stuff,
Speaker 3: and there was basically nothing like when I looked in
Speaker 3: PubMed the first time. One of the absolute top hits
Speaker 3: was this article that was called Putting the Fun in
Speaker 3: Fungui and it was about toenail fungus. And that was
Speaker 3: kind of when I knew I needed to write a
Speaker 3: book about it, because I was like, Okay, that's hilarious.
Speaker 3: Definitely not the type of fun I'm talking about. And seriously,
Speaker 3: if that's the top hit on research on fun, like
Speaker 3: that's crazy because this is a word we use all
Speaker 3: the time. So I started to look into some of
Speaker 3: what the other non fungal papers were. Most of them
Speaker 3: really didn't apply, but there were a couple that said
Speaker 3: things like fun is not a term in any index
Speaker 3: of any psychology textbook of which we're aware. That struck
Speaker 3: me as really weird.
Speaker 1: Catherine was shocked to see that there were experts in
Speaker 1: play but not in fun. She couldn't even find a
Speaker 1: scientific definition of fun, and so she embarked on some
Speaker 1: of her own research, speaking to experts about the elements
Speaker 1: of fun, which we're going to learn in a second,
Speaker 1: and also doing some sociological data gathering.
Speaker 3: So that's how I kind of got into it. But
Speaker 3: I was genuinely shocked that there was so little out
Speaker 3: there about fun, considering we'll use that word all the time.
Speaker 3: We all think we know what fun is, but what
Speaker 3: is fun?
Speaker 1: And how is fun different from play and different from joy?
Speaker 3: So basically like what I did for the research for this,
Speaker 3: and I should note this was in by this point.
Speaker 3: It was like April of twenty twenty when I signed
Speaker 3: the book contract, so this was like full on lockdown.
Speaker 1: And folks, people are still getting COVID, so be careful
Speaker 1: out there. But during the lockdown, a lot of time
Speaker 1: at home to work on a sociology mission.
Speaker 3: So it was a very interesting period of time to
Speaker 3: be thinking about fun and to be asking other people
Speaker 3: to think about fun. But anyway, I asked people on
Speaker 3: my mailing list to if anyone was interested, fill out
Speaker 3: a survey where I asked people to share with me
Speaker 3: three examples from their own lives that they would describe
Speaker 3: of memories they would describe as having been quote so fun,
Speaker 3: with the so capitalized. Because I'm a science journalist, I
Speaker 3: didn't know how else to phrase it. It wasn't very technical.
Speaker 3: And then I asked them, can you describe an experience
Speaker 3: or something you might plan that would feel fun if
Speaker 3: you could do anything right now? And it was absolutely
Speaker 3: fascinating because I got thousands of responses to this survey,
Speaker 3: and it was from people all around the world, and
Speaker 3: the details they shared with me were obviously different, right,
Speaker 3: but there were commonalities that kept popping out, like the
Speaker 3: feeling was the same, so the emotion was the same,
Speaker 3: And then there were themes that popped out. One thing
Speaker 3: that really stood out to me is that there was
Speaker 3: something very powerful, emotionally moving about these stories people were
Speaker 3: sharing that did not, again match up with the Dictionary
Speaker 3: definition of fun just being lighthearted pleasure. So when I
Speaker 3: read through people's stories, I often found myself simultaneously with
Speaker 3: a huge smile on my face, but also feeling like
Speaker 3: I was about to cry, like there was something very
Speaker 3: moving about these stories. And there were also three themes
Speaker 3: that kept popping out again and again and again, to
Speaker 3: the point that I came to conclude or hypothesize that
Speaker 3: they constitute a definition of what fun truly is that's
Speaker 3: more accurate than the idea that it's just lighthearted enjoyment.
Speaker 3: And then I ran my definition by the people who
Speaker 3: had shared their stories with me to see if they
Speaker 3: agreed that this would match their experiences, and the vast
Speaker 3: majority of people said it did capture it. So my
Speaker 3: hypothesis is that true fun is the confluence of three states.
Speaker 1: Okay, so pay attention. Fun has three ingredients, and they are.
Speaker 3: And those three states are playfulness, connection, and flow. So
Speaker 3: playfulness is often misconstrued by adults as meaning you need
Speaker 3: to act like a child, or you need to be
Speaker 3: silly or somehow be immature, which makes a lot of
Speaker 3: people very uncomfortable. But to clarify, I'm actually talking more
Speaker 3: about the attitude that you bring to a situation or
Speaker 3: your life, like a playful attitude, finding ways to laugh,
Speaker 3: not taking yourself too seriously, you know, letting down your
Speaker 3: guard regardless of what the actual activity is, and that
Speaker 3: is nearly Actually, I would say it was universal in
Speaker 3: people's stories, this spirit of playfulness, the element of connection
Speaker 3: was interesting because truly, the vast, vast, vast majority of
Speaker 3: stories people shared with me, there was another person involved,
Speaker 3: and that was true even for people who self describe
Speaker 3: themselves as introverts. And I found that fascinating. Sometimes dogs
Speaker 3: were involved, but really it was normally people. And it
Speaker 3: was to the point that, you know, I asked people,
Speaker 3: did anything surprise you about what you just told me?
Speaker 3: And there were a number of people who said something like,
Speaker 3: I'm an introvert, but all the stories I just told
Speaker 3: you had another person in them. So there seems to
Speaker 3: be this element of having a shared experience, like a
Speaker 3: special shared experience. And that was actually one of the
Speaker 3: top picks when I gave people a list of descriptors
Speaker 3: that they could choose to describe their fun experiences. Special
Speaker 3: shared experience was one of the top, alongside laughter.
Speaker 1: Just brutal to be reading these during lockdown too, Yes.
Speaker 3: Exactly, that was the depressing part. I was like, oh,
Speaker 3: human connection.
Speaker 1: But that also gives us such an insight into why
Speaker 1: maybe the last few years have been so difficult exactly.
Speaker 3: And it also that was helpful in that particular moment
Speaker 3: because it meant that if any possibilities for human connection arose,
Speaker 3: I should take them, like you know, a zoom happy hour.
Speaker 3: Would I want to do that right now?
Speaker 5: No?
Speaker 3: But like then yes, yes please, because that's like as
Speaker 3: close as you're.
Speaker 1: Going to get. So so far we have one playfulness too,
Speaker 1: shared experience maybe a human or an animal connection. And
Speaker 1: then the last.
Speaker 3: Element was flow and flow is a is your listeners
Speaker 3: mar or you know, it's a term that describes a
Speaker 3: state we get into when we're totally actively engrossed in
Speaker 3: something that we're doing, like up often to the point
Speaker 3: where you lose track of time. So the quintessential example
Speaker 3: is an athlete playing a game. Or the psychologists who
Speaker 3: coined the term chick sent me high He actually used
Speaker 3: the example of rock climbers. He did a lot of
Speaker 3: interviews with rock climbers, because if you're scaling a rock wall,
Speaker 3: your mind is not wandering, You're totally focused on what
Speaker 3: you're doing in that moment.
Speaker 1: And me Hi cheek sent me high e. It's quite
Speaker 1: a name. A Hungarian psychologist and author coined that term
Speaker 1: flow after many, many interviews with painters and rock climbers
Speaker 1: and hobbyists, factory workers, people across all these different vocations
Speaker 1: and interests, and he kept hearing about being swept away
Speaker 1: in something like a river of focus. Hence the term flow,
Speaker 1: and his nineteen ninety book Flow, the Psychology of Optimal
Speaker 1: Experience was on so many artists and politicians nightstance it
Speaker 1: probably still is, and in it he wrote, flow happens
Speaker 1: when a person's skills are fully involved in overcoming a
Speaker 1: challenge that is just about manageable, so it acts as
Speaker 1: a magnet for learning new skills. So too easy, you
Speaker 1: get bored too hard, and it sucks in provokes anxiety.
Speaker 1: But flow happens also where there are some clear goals
Speaker 1: and some high stakes and being in your body chicks.
Speaker 1: Meai was not a fan of TV, and though he
Speaker 1: died just a few years ago at age eighty seven,
Speaker 1: he probably would not have thought highly of the amount
Speaker 1: of time I've spent looking at an algorithm of DIY
Speaker 1: home renovations, especially since I'm not doing any DIY home renovations.
Speaker 1: In fact, some sociologists have noted that the ubiquity of
Speaker 1: television in the nineteen forties and fifties has a direct
Speaker 1: correlation to a drop in hobbies and in inventions. People
Speaker 1: were too occupied with the Ed Sullivan Show to go
Speaker 1: tanker on things in the garage, and now we're too
Speaker 1: occupied with content of people tinkering in their garage to
Speaker 1: tanker in our garage. But why did he cite rock
Speaker 1: climbing so much? What was to deal with that? Well,
Speaker 1: he was also a rock climber, and he said in
Speaker 1: his book that the mystique of rock climbing is climbing.
Speaker 1: You get to the top of rock glad it's over,
Speaker 1: but really wish it could go on forever.
Speaker 2: He writes.
Speaker 1: The justification of climbing is climbing. I will note it's
Speaker 1: always a good day when you don't fall to your death.
Speaker 1: And for more on that in particular, you can see
Speaker 1: the show notes for our Quasi Thanatology episode about near
Speaker 1: death experiences.
Speaker 3: But we all can get into in less dramatic situations
Speaker 3: like this conversation, for example, or in a work project.
Speaker 3: But it's basically like you're not distracted. You were actively
Speaker 3: engaged and focused. It's not the same as losing track
Speaker 3: of time. If you're watching TV, which I always like
Speaker 3: to clarify, that's what you sent me high called junk flow,
Speaker 3: and that's a different state. It's very active. So what
Speaker 3: I came to conclude for myself and propose is that
Speaker 3: true fun is the center of that Venn diagram where
Speaker 3: you have playfulness, end, connection, and flow all existing at once.
Speaker 3: I think that kind of answers your question about play,
Speaker 3: that play is part of fun or playfulness is part
Speaker 3: of fun. I'd also want to clarify, like fun as
Speaker 3: a feeling, it's not actually an activity. I think a
Speaker 3: lot of times people will say, oh, you know, like
Speaker 3: what's fun, and they'll say, oh, I don't know, Like
Speaker 3: going to concerts or pickleball was very common for a while,
Speaker 3: But it's like we all have times when we went
Speaker 3: to a concert and it was incredibly fun, and then
Speaker 3: we went to a concert and maybe even the same
Speaker 3: performer and it wasn't so fun. So it's not so
Speaker 3: much about the activity itself, but rather the feeling that's produced.
Speaker 3: And then, in terms of joy, when you're asking about
Speaker 3: what do I see the difference being between fun and joy?
Speaker 3: I think that fun is a type of joy, like
Speaker 3: they kind of fit together, but they're not the same.
Speaker 3: Like you can have joy that's not playful, like the
Speaker 3: example I always uses the birth of a child, right,
Speaker 3: or you're not laughing necessarily, no, I'm crying. So I
Speaker 3: think that they're related, but they're not the same. But
Speaker 3: that fun, the feeling of fun produces joy, Like if
Speaker 3: you're having fun, you're probably also feeling pretty joyful in
Speaker 3: that particular moment.
Speaker 1: When we think that we're relaxing or having fun by
Speaker 1: by scrolling and by consuming other people's fun on a
Speaker 1: tiny screen, how do you think that's different from the
Speaker 1: lasting feeling we get when we're doing something with someone
Speaker 1: else and we're in flow and we're losing track of
Speaker 1: time and we're being goofy and we're not being so
Speaker 1: hard on ourselves or self conscious. Why do we get
Speaker 1: sucked into doing things that are not actually great for
Speaker 1: us or our brain, but they eat up so much
Speaker 1: of our time when they're not really fun.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I think you bring up a number of important
Speaker 3: points there, because first of all, those are different experiences.
Speaker 3: Like mindlessly scrolling or passively consuming stuff is not the
Speaker 3: same as having this like joyful interaction with people or
Speaker 3: having an experience, And that's part of the reason I
Speaker 3: think it's so important to get dorky about what the
Speaker 3: word fun means because we use the word fun to
Speaker 3: describe both of those things. You know, anything we do
Speaker 3: with our leisure time we typically think of as well,
Speaker 3: we did that for fun, but as social media scrolling fun.
Speaker 3: I think if you actually thought about that, most people
Speaker 3: would say, no, no, that's not fun, that's just something
Speaker 3: I do to relax, or it's a waste of time.
Speaker 3: But I also think it's important to clarify. I think, sorry,
Speaker 3: first of all, thank you for asking me all these
Speaker 3: detailed questions, because I often feel like people will be
Speaker 3: totally bored by me getting this detailed. So hopefully your
Speaker 3: listeners are into this. Hell yeah we are.
Speaker 2: Oh, let's get nerdy about it, right.
Speaker 3: I think about our leisure time as being dividable into
Speaker 3: three buckets, and one bucket would be the things that
Speaker 3: lead to this feeling of true fun, right, this feeling
Speaker 3: of playful, connected flow. And to me, those are the
Speaker 3: things that I at least want to prioritize the most
Speaker 3: because that is such a wonderfully nourishing feeling and it's
Speaker 3: so good for us on so many levels, which we
Speaker 3: can talk about more. And then on the other side
Speaker 3: of the spectrum, I think of activities that produce the
Speaker 3: feeling of what I call fake fun. And that's why
Speaker 3: I keep saying true fun instead of just fun, because
Speaker 3: I think opposite is fake fun, and that's stuff like
Speaker 3: scrolling through social media for too long or watching TV
Speaker 3: to the point where you actually just feel gross. It's
Speaker 3: kind of like junk food. So I think a fake
Speaker 3: fun as being activities or products or services that are
Speaker 3: marketed to us as fun, but they don't actually produce
Speaker 3: this feeling of playful, connected flow, and they're kind of
Speaker 3: like junk food, where they're very easy to binge on,
Speaker 3: and in fact, they're designed to be easy to binge on.
Speaker 3: To answer your question about why we do that so
Speaker 3: often even if it doesn't feel good, but then we
Speaker 3: feel gross afterwards, kind of like when you eat an
Speaker 3: entire bag of tato chips and then you're like, what
Speaker 3: did I just do? But then I also think it's
Speaker 3: important to note there's this big middle category of things
Speaker 3: we just enjoy, kind of an acquietor way, like solitary
Speaker 3: hobbies or interests like reading or going for a walk
Speaker 3: or doing a craft or even watching TV or movies
Speaker 3: to the point where it's still enjoyable, like just watching
Speaker 3: a couple episodes of your favorite show instead of watching
Speaker 3: seven hours of it.
Speaker 1: So solitary hobbies and passive consumption can be enjoyable and healthy.
Speaker 1: But if we're getting real dorky and real pedantic, they
Speaker 1: are not the same as what Catherine calls capital TF
Speaker 1: true fun.
Speaker 2: But solitary or passive hobbies are.
Speaker 1: Also not mindlessly unhealthy junk or fake fun.
Speaker 3: And that's really important for us to recognize because those
Speaker 3: activities are often more accessible because you can do them alone,
Speaker 3: and they're very nourishing in kind of a different way.
Speaker 3: They're kind of like rejuvenating in a quieter way than
Speaker 3: the things that might lead to true fun.
Speaker 1: What about people who have different types of fun? Do
Speaker 1: people experience fun different ways? If you've got let's say,
Speaker 1: ADHD and you're a little bit more wired for dopamine,
Speaker 1: or if you are on the autism spectrum and maybe
Speaker 1: you are more introverted, did you find that there was
Speaker 1: a lot of variance or did you find that those
Speaker 1: kind of three aspects of fun were pretty universal?
Speaker 3: I found that those aspects of fun are those three
Speaker 3: ingredients of fun were pretty universal playfulness and connection and flow.
Speaker 3: But what that looks like to different people is different,
Speaker 3: and I don't want to hypothesize about anyone's particular individual experience,
Speaker 3: but I can say more broadly speaking that I mean,
Speaker 3: I think about the concept of what I call fun magnets,
Speaker 3: and each of us has a different collection of fun magnets.
Speaker 3: So an activity that often leads to me feeling this playful,
Speaker 3: connected flow like for me made me not the same
Speaker 3: as what does it for you, And that would apply,
Speaker 3: I think in the neurodivergence situation too, But it doesn't
Speaker 3: even have to do with neurodivergence as much as it
Speaker 3: does the diversity of people and our interest and how
Speaker 3: we respond to situations. So, just as a concrete example,
Speaker 3: a one hundred percent fun magnet for me or nearly
Speaker 3: all the time is playing music with friends like that
Speaker 3: just tends to generate the feeling of fun for me.
Speaker 3: So that is a fun magnet for me. My husband,
Speaker 3: on the other hand, does not play an instrument. That
Speaker 3: wouldn't be it's not fun to him at all, Like
Speaker 3: that is not a fun magnet. That's like horrible. And
Speaker 3: also if he were to tag along, it wouldn't be
Speaker 3: fun for me because I'd be aware of my husband
Speaker 3: and that he's not having fun. So it's been very
Speaker 3: helpful in our relationship to recognize, like, that's one of
Speaker 3: my fun magnets, it's not one of his. On the
Speaker 3: flip side, he really loves like multi day camping trips,
Speaker 3: you know, in remote locations where you hike up hills
Speaker 3: and then like sleep on the ground, and I have
Speaker 3: really bad knees and I like my bed, So like
Speaker 3: that's not a fun magnet for me. He reaches out
Speaker 3: My point being like I do think that the feeling
Speaker 3: of fun and the energy it produces in those three ingredients,
Speaker 3: the playfulness and connection and flow, those appear to be universal,
Speaker 3: but each of us reaches that state via a different path.
Speaker 3: And so that's why when I collected people's stories, all
Speaker 3: the details were different. People were doing very different things,
Speaker 3: and they were with different sorts of people. Sometimes they
Speaker 3: were alone, you know, but the resulting feeling tended to
Speaker 3: be the same.
Speaker 1: So while fun tends to incorporate those three elements play, connectedness,
Speaker 1: maybe with a horse or a friend or the universe,
Speaker 1: and flow, we may have different activities that present that
Speaker 1: ven diagram of true fun. So mulling over yours, staring
Speaker 1: into space at a bus stop, recalling the good times,
Speaker 1: maybe looking through your phone's photos to be like, hey,
Speaker 1: that was fun, or just thinking of yours is a
Speaker 1: great place to start. Scientifically speaking, do they know, like
Speaker 1: an functional MRI, what parts of the brain are lighting
Speaker 1: up when you're having fun, like what networks go on
Speaker 1: or offline, or what happens physiologically.
Speaker 3: Well, again, there's no research on fun. Oh, and I
Speaker 3: think it'd be very difficult to get someone into an
Speaker 3: fMRI s you're like, let me, let me put you
Speaker 3: this thing on your head while you're playing soccer. I
Speaker 3: don't think that would work. So no, I don't think
Speaker 3: I mean for fun per se. I don't think that
Speaker 3: we can say for sure what's happening. But I would say, like,
Speaker 3: what I came to conclude is that if you buy
Speaker 3: my hypothesis that it is the confluence of these three states.
Speaker 3: There is research about what happens when we're experiencing social connection,
Speaker 3: for example, or when we're inflow.
Speaker 1: Okay, take for example, the twenty seventeen study the connection
Speaker 1: prescription using the power of social interactions and the Deep
Speaker 1: Desire for connectedness to empower health and wellness, which notes
Speaker 1: that there is significant evidence that social support and feeling
Speaker 1: connected can help people maintain a healthier body composition, can
Speaker 1: control blood sugars, improve cancer survival, decrease cardiovascular mortality, decrease
Speaker 1: depressive symptoms, Feeling connected can mitigate PTSD symptoms, and improve
Speaker 1: overall mental health, and that the opposite of connection, social isolation,
Speaker 1: they say, has a negative effect on health and can
Speaker 1: increase depressive symptoms as well as mortality. There's also the
Speaker 1: twenty ten meta analysis titled Social Relationships and Mortality risk
Speaker 1: and that dug through like one hundred and fifty papers
Speaker 1: and it crunched some numbers to find that social connections
Speaker 1: with friends and family and neighbors or colleagues improves the
Speaker 1: odds of survival by fifty percent. And if you're alone
Speaker 1: in a room, a dark room that's like a closet,
Speaker 1: like I am recording this right now, how bad can
Speaker 1: isolation be?
Speaker 2: Well?
Speaker 1: To quote the study, low social interaction was reported to
Speaker 1: be similar to smoking fifteen cigarettes a day, having alcohol addiction,
Speaker 1: or not exercising at all, and low social interaction is
Speaker 1: twice as harmful as having unhealthy body composition. So more
Speaker 1: fun is playfulness plus social connections plus flow equals a
Speaker 1: longer life. But more importantly for United States citizens not
Speaker 1: having to make a GoFundMe to cover chemo or physical
Speaker 1: therapy bills. So get THEE to a carnival or a
Speaker 1: knitting circle, or a kickball league or a kazoo band,
Speaker 1: like your life depends on it, because it does.
Speaker 3: One thing I found particularly interesting in terms of a
Speaker 3: physiological thing is the idea of what fun is the
Speaker 3: opposite of Oh, so if you think about things we
Speaker 3: know that are very very bad for us over time,
Speaker 3: like emotional stress, right, very bad for us because it
Speaker 3: raises our levels of cortisol, which is a stress hormone
Speaker 3: that is there to help us run away from immediate
Speaker 3: physical threats. Yeah, because it does things like I mean,
Speaker 3: you guys probably know this, but like you know, it
Speaker 3: spikes your blood sugar and it increases your heart rate
Speaker 3: and your blood pressure. Those are great things if you
Speaker 3: have to run away, But if that happens over time,
Speaker 3: you can see why that might lead to increased risks
Speaker 3: for all sorts of health conditions, like you know, walll
Speaker 3: high bloo pressu itself or heart attack or stroke or
Speaker 3: type two diabetes, et cetera.
Speaker 2: So stress the opposite of fun.
Speaker 3: Emotional isolation, social isolation, and loneliness, those have the same effects,
Speaker 3: The same health risks are associated with those states, and
Speaker 3: probably because of the cortisol levels that come from we
Speaker 3: as a social species being isolated alone. So if you
Speaker 3: know that emotional stress and then loneliness and isolation are
Speaker 3: very bad for us physically and actually do increase health risks,
Speaker 3: I think it stands to reason that an intervention like
Speaker 3: fun that does the opposite might also have the opposite effect,
Speaker 3: by which I mean when people are having fun, it's
Speaker 3: a very relaxed and open state, and it's also, as
Speaker 3: we were just talking about, usually a state in which
Speaker 3: you're feeling socially connected. I didn't read any stories from
Speaker 3: people's fun experiences where they said they were lonely during
Speaker 3: the experience, But I think that given the fact that
Speaker 3: fun is an open, relaxed state that often involves social connection,
Speaker 3: it makes sense to hypothesize that it would be good
Speaker 3: for us on a physical level.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: It's interesting too, because I feel like after the lockdown,
Speaker 1: so many people started working from home, and I'm feeling
Speaker 1: there's probably been a bit of a shift in general
Speaker 1: about how isolated we are because we realized we could
Speaker 1: be and it was more convenient in some cases. And
Speaker 1: you know, there's still spikes in the pandemic and things
Speaker 1: like that, so it's just kind of more inbuilt into
Speaker 1: our society now, into our culture.
Speaker 3: But yeah, it's really tricky because it's so much easier.
Speaker 3: I mean, we're doing this interview, it's three pm where
Speaker 3: I am, and I am still in my pajama pants
Speaker 3: because I've been working from home all day and just
Speaker 3: Zoom calls right, oh boy, okay, cheers literally safe.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, I changed my shirt before I locked down,
Speaker 1: still in Phagamma.
Speaker 3: I'd like to say I did, but I think if
Speaker 3: I'm being honest with I think I fell asleep in
Speaker 3: this shirt because I wore yesterday. Anyway, we need that,
Speaker 3: get into that, moving on. But you like, this life
Speaker 3: is so much more convenient not going to I never
Speaker 3: had an office, but like if you had an office,
Speaker 3: it's more convenient not to go into the office. It
Speaker 3: feels easier to just because it is because it's inertia.
Speaker 3: So it actually I think it really does require us
Speaker 3: to think, wait a second, like does this feel good?
Speaker 3: I think to some degree it feels good. It's lovely
Speaker 3: to be able to work from home. But I've always
Speaker 3: had a freelance rule for myself where if it is
Speaker 3: past noon and I'm still in my pajama pants, that's
Speaker 3: not a good day. And I think it is worth
Speaker 3: kind of like thinking about that individually and as a
Speaker 3: society and as you know, your workplace whatever. Is like,
Speaker 3: how do we bring back that feeling of genuine human
Speaker 3: connection because I think it's really lacking right now and
Speaker 3: it's causing a lot of problems.
Speaker 1: Well, I'm wondering when you were talking about fund magnets
Speaker 1: and making time for fun, how do people work that
Speaker 1: out for themselves? Is it trial and error? Is it
Speaker 1: sitting down with a piece of paper and figuring out
Speaker 1: what gives them excitement.
Speaker 3: There's a couple of different ways you can do it.
Speaker 3: I mean maybe if you're listening to this, you've already
Speaker 3: kind of started to reflect and like, oh, yeah, that
Speaker 3: is fun to me. But I think you could have
Speaker 3: a conversation with a friend, say that you listen to this,
Speaker 3: you know, conversation between us and like let's try to
Speaker 3: figure out, like what are your fund magnets. If you
Speaker 3: have the journaling type, you could do it on paper.
Speaker 3: One way and is to just think back on some
Speaker 3: of your own fun experiences, like things that stand out
Speaker 3: in your own mind as having been so fun. But
Speaker 3: you might be surprised to find, like to notice the
Speaker 3: people that keep popping up, because maybe you have one
Speaker 3: friend that you really enjoy having like intense emotional conversations with,
Speaker 3: but they're not the same person that you feel the
Speaker 3: most joyful and free and alive with, you know, and
Speaker 3: you might be surprised by the settings. I've had a
Speaker 3: lot of people who will say things like, oh, I
Speaker 3: thought I hated being outside, but like all of my
Speaker 3: fun memories Inbove horseback riding or something like that, they
Speaker 3: were outside. But like, you might just be kind of
Speaker 3: surprised if you just start to write down some past
Speaker 3: fun experiences by what themes emerge. And that's a way
Speaker 3: to find fun magnets. And then what you do with
Speaker 3: that is you can look at your list to be like, oh, well,
Speaker 3: these are my priorities in your limited leisure time. These
Speaker 3: are the things you should prioritize and try to just
Speaker 3: spend more time on and then you can go a
Speaker 3: step further if you want. This is for the real,
Speaker 3: real dorks out there, is like ask yourself what characteristics
Speaker 3: these things share. I think these as like fun factors,
Speaker 3: like maybe maybe nature and outdoorness. Outdoorness, I'm not sure
Speaker 3: that that is a word. Being outside is like popping
Speaker 3: up again and again and again. Well, then you know
Speaker 3: that if you have the option to do something outside,
Speaker 3: it's probably a good idea or like maybe you know,
Speaker 3: for me, like music is a fun factor. If there's music,
Speaker 3: I'm probably going to enjoy it more than something else.
Speaker 3: Or maybe it's physicality, or maybe it's performance. For some people,
Speaker 3: you know, maybe it's risk, maybe it's thrill. Like there's
Speaker 3: all these kind of characteristics that you might start to
Speaker 3: notice like oh yeah, I typically really enjoy myself when
Speaker 3: that's present, and you can use that to start to
Speaker 3: curate what you spend time on.
Speaker 1: So if you were to think back on your most
Speaker 1: fun memories, what might they have in common? Like what
Speaker 1: were you doing? What made you become a real goof
Speaker 1: without caring? What made you feel seen and accepted and connected?
Speaker 1: And what did you lose yourself in and In her book,
Speaker 1: Catherine also notes this hierarchy of needs that have to
Speaker 1: be fulfilled to even think about fun, things like safety
Speaker 1: and food and water and shelter, which in some societies
Speaker 1: and conditions are simply too difficult to secure. But if
Speaker 1: you are lucky and privileged and safe enough to be
Speaker 1: able to think about making your life more enjoyable, those
Speaker 1: are the elements.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: As a science writer and someone who spent years researching
Speaker 1: and interviewing experts and lay people, Catherine saw these greater
Speaker 1: patterns that help individuals figure out their own sources of
Speaker 1: true fun, which we also need to survive in the
Speaker 1: long run.
Speaker 2: All work, no.
Speaker 1: Play makes the guy with the acts a real asshole.
Speaker 3: But I think it's really important to note that what
Speaker 3: I'm talking about right now is a very engineered approach
Speaker 3: to fun, where it's like, figure out your fun magnets
Speaker 3: and then schedule outurday afternoon. And that's, like, I think,
Speaker 3: is actually essential for a lot of adults, because for adults,
Speaker 3: our lives are so busy that spontaneous fun is less likely.
Speaker 3: Like when you're a kid, you just are having fun,
Speaker 3: you didn't really think about it, But as adults, we
Speaker 3: actually do need to go through these kind of seemingly
Speaker 3: academic exercises to kind of figure that out and make
Speaker 3: sure we're prioritizing it. But on the flip side, we
Speaker 3: also just need to be a little bit more open
Speaker 3: to spontaneous fun and maybe try to like get into
Speaker 3: more of what I think of as a fun mindset,
Speaker 3: or just make a bit more space in our lives
Speaker 3: reduce distractions so that when you see like a friend's
Speaker 3: number pop up in your phone at three o'clock, you know,
Speaker 3: in the afternoon, and you normally would silence it to
Speaker 3: instead be like, you know what, I'm going to talk
Speaker 3: to them for fifteen minutes because that might actually be
Speaker 3: fun and it's spontaneous. Or if someone proposes or if
Speaker 3: you propose a spontaneous activity, like say yes to it.
Speaker 3: So there's two sides. There's like the engineered fun and
Speaker 3: there's also just like opening ourselves to opportunities for fun
Speaker 3: that probably are floating around us already, or creating those
Speaker 3: kind of spontaneous opportunities.
Speaker 1: Okay, here are some things that sound fun to me.
Speaker 1: You did not ask, but I asked myself, So I'm
Speaker 1: telling you checking out maybe some outdoor movie screenings, mini golf,
Speaker 1: I would hit that. I'd do it a county fair,
Speaker 1: finding out who has fruit trees that you're welcome to
Speaker 1: pick from, and then going for a walk and taking
Speaker 1: that fruit, baking a new recipe with someone you like,
Speaker 1: volunteering oddly fun, trust me. So it was a craft
Speaker 1: night or a game night, a fun photographic bug hunt.
Speaker 1: See the Apaiology episode about that, always down for that.
Speaker 2: Making stuff out.
Speaker 1: Of clay also sounds like a blast. These may not
Speaker 1: be your ideals, but think about what has those elements
Speaker 1: of getting lost in the moment, or hanging out with
Speaker 1: another a live thing and just getting to kind of
Speaker 1: dick around with no stakes, or even just picking up
Speaker 1: the phone and saying, oh, hey, I got fifteen minutes.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about something of zero importance.
Speaker 3: And if I took a step back, I'd be like, Catherine,
Speaker 3: what are you actually doing at three fifteen? You're scrolling
Speaker 3: through the news and checking the email over and over again,
Speaker 3: and the work quote unquote is just that you're still
Speaker 3: sitting in front of the computer. If you were more
Speaker 3: thoughtful about it, you'd take the call, walk around the
Speaker 3: block while talking with your friend, and then come back
Speaker 3: to your computer, refreshed and be more productive.
Speaker 1: Ugh, oh that's so true. I have one billion questions.
Speaker 1: May I ask them? All of them, every single one
Speaker 1: of them, word for word, in great detail.
Speaker 3: I'm already in my pajamas. We can go all night.
Speaker 1: But before we dive into your questions, let's take a
Speaker 1: fistfall of cash and let's toward a worthy cause. And
Speaker 1: this week, Catherine would like it to go to Breakthrough
Speaker 1: te d dot org, which was founded in nineteen seventy
Speaker 1: by families whose loved ones had been diagnosed with type
Speaker 1: one diabetes T one D. If you're cool and Breakthrough
Speaker 1: t one D is a leading global Type one diabetes
Speaker 1: research and advocacy organization, all with the goal to make
Speaker 1: T one D a thing of the past. So a
Speaker 1: donation will go to them in Catherine's name, in the
Speaker 1: name of her pancreas thinks, to sponsors of the show. Okay,
Speaker 1: let's leap into the ballpit of your questions. Get your
Speaker 1: hand sanitizer. Okay, first question, Hi, this is Eliot.
Speaker 4: I'm in Seattle, Washington, and my question is is fun
Speaker 4: contagious the same way that laughter is? I know, if
Speaker 4: I start laughing about something other people will laugh along
Speaker 4: with me. But if I am having fun, will other
Speaker 4: people have fun just watching me? Or will they just
Speaker 4: kind of walk on by scratching their head?
Speaker 1: Is fun contagious?
Speaker 4: Oh?
Speaker 3: I like that question. I've never been asked that question.
Speaker 3: I think it can be. I don't think it always is,
Speaker 3: because you could have a situation where the people are around
Speaker 3: are total wet blankets.
Speaker 5: I know.
Speaker 3: I mean that too dismissively of the other people. I
Speaker 3: think that a lot of us are so stressed and
Speaker 3: so tense that it's really hard for us to actually
Speaker 3: open ourselves to fun. With that said, yeah, I think
Speaker 3: it is contagious if you see that people are having
Speaker 3: fun and you're involved in that and they're laughing. I mean,
Speaker 3: fun and laughter are so intertwined. Laughter, I think, is
Speaker 3: the number one sign that you're having fun. So if
Speaker 3: laughter is contagious, yes, fun is also contagious. I'd also
Speaker 3: say one thing I've observed that I thought was just
Speaker 3: really beautiful is that if you just listen to other
Speaker 3: people talk about memories of their own fun experiences, it's
Speaker 3: energizing and joyful as a listener.
Speaker 1: Patron TJ. McKenna also wanted to know if fun was contagious.
Speaker 1: So there you go. And after this interview, I was
Speaker 1: so pumped. I tore through Catherine's book and she has
Speaker 1: some great anecdotal examples of people surveyed. They're called her
Speaker 1: Fun Squad about some of their most prominent memories. I
Speaker 1: mean a radio couple. She reads them in her audiobook too,
Speaker 1: and they're great. So some examples of fun she collected
Speaker 1: include the first thing that came to mind was squishing
Speaker 1: mud through my toes. Walking in mud is fun and gross.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure the most recent time I've done this,
Speaker 1: but I suspect my sense memory is from sometime in
Speaker 1: high school, along a particular path, and probably with my
Speaker 1: friend Margaret. Another person said playing fetch with an exuberant
Speaker 1: silly dog. This was last weekend. I'm thirty two. Another
Speaker 1: person's fun time included dance class. I'm often overwhelmed by
Speaker 1: the fun I have on a Friday morning in a
Speaker 1: church hall with a bunch of older ladies. I've been
Speaker 1: doing this class since i was forty one, and I'm
Speaker 1: forty six now. I'm usually the youngest in the room.
Speaker 1: We do things like dance are imaginary tales like swishy
Speaker 1: peacock feathers or a fluffy bunny tail. We tickle clouds,
Speaker 1: squawk like birds, claw the air, or move as though
Speaker 1: our feet are in marshmallow. Yeah, it's fun. One person
Speaker 1: told Catherine that they travel to remote northern Siberia when
Speaker 1: it was still the USSR, when they were twenty two
Speaker 1: formerly closed towns that had never seen westerners, and it
Speaker 1: was a one month environmental volunteer exchange and one weekend
Speaker 1: they visited a children's camp, spending a day singing and
Speaker 1: playing and splashing in a small lake. And they write,
Speaker 1: I couldn't speak their language, and aside from translators, they
Speaker 1: couldn't speak mine. The most unadulterated joy of my life
Speaker 1: occurred that summer day, the deep essential to survival creativity
Speaker 1: of one hundred children inviting us into their world with
Speaker 1: such pure wholeheartedness, silliness, song, and wonder. The experience is
Speaker 1: imprinted now on my DNA. So it was, for lack
Speaker 1: of a better word, fun. So asking family or friends
Speaker 1: or strangers this question, or even an internet form can
Speaker 1: be really inspiring to figure out when your brain and
Speaker 1: body were in sync and you were having an actual
Speaker 1: good time, which I promise you. Unfortunately, is not going
Speaker 1: to be scrolling for products to buy on your phone
Speaker 1: screen as much as our phone screen. Wats that so bad?
Speaker 3: Just go back and forth, like reminiscing about past fun
Speaker 3: and notice how just that reminiscence feels both your own
Speaker 3: reminiscing and just feeling that. I don't know, it sounds
Speaker 3: so like cheesy to say, like the other person's energy,
Speaker 3: but truly like the way their face lights up, and
Speaker 3: how you feel listening to and witnessing them get so
Speaker 3: happy and excited telling you the story. So long, answer short, Yes,
Speaker 3: it's contagious.
Speaker 1: I do feel like just hearing about other people's fun
Speaker 1: experiences is inspiring, Like the same way it would be
Speaker 1: like if you saw someone eating a corn dog and
Speaker 1: you'd be like, I kind of do want a corn dog?
Speaker 3: You know, give me that corn dog. But you know
Speaker 3: it's being in person with someone or even over a
Speaker 3: zoom call, but like sharing directly with each other in
Speaker 3: just a celebratory way, these past fun experiences.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and corn dogs and corn.
Speaker 4: Dogs spectacularly, give me fourteen.
Speaker 2: Of them right now.
Speaker 1: Pyes, I'd like you to know that corn dogs are
Speaker 1: thought to have been invented around nineteen ten when a
Speaker 1: corn bread mold manufacture put out a pan that was
Speaker 1: designed to look like a cylinder of corn bread in
Speaker 1: the shape of an ear of corn and accommodate a
Speaker 1: hot dog in the middle. And this innovation was called
Speaker 1: the Crusty corn Dog Baker and I can hear your thoughts,
Speaker 1: and I know you want to purchase an antique model
Speaker 1: for nineteen hundred dollars on Etsy, and you can also
Speaker 1: krusty and corn both spelled with keys. Also, if you're
Speaker 1: wondering why the Baker's Field, California new metal band Corn
Speaker 1: also spells their name of the k, it's because a
Speaker 1: member of the band vetoed the name Corn spelled with
Speaker 1: a C. Also, did you know that the R and
Speaker 1: corn is backwards because a few members of Corn at
Speaker 1: at one time worked at Toys RS, which as a
Speaker 1: backwards are Yeah, I can see that flow swept me
Speaker 1: away like a whitewater current. But corn dogs, they're no
Speaker 1: laughing matter. Speaking of laughter, many patrons asked about laughing
Speaker 1: and giggling and its role in fun including Elizabeth Mina,
Speaker 1: Bob b Lane, Steely Clean Church, Jenna Condon, Jen A
Speaker 1: and Stephanie Rosso, first time question asker who wrote in
Speaker 1: how do we quantify fun? Is it comparable to humor?
Speaker 1: Like a chuckle versus a belly laugh? What about laughter?
Speaker 1: How much is laughter a part of fun? Or are
Speaker 1: they kind of two different things? Is humor classified kind
Speaker 1: of as fun because it typically involves in exchange and
Speaker 1: because typically you are being playful?
Speaker 2: Oh?
Speaker 3: I love these questions. I think that humor and laughter
Speaker 3: aren't necessarily the same thing. There's so many reasons people laugh.
Speaker 3: There is a lot of research on laughter. We're talking
Speaker 3: about the positive forms of laughter here, not just like
Speaker 3: the awkward laughter or the mocking laughter not fun. So
Speaker 3: I don't think it necessarily needs to be humorous. And
Speaker 3: I say that in part because I don't want people
Speaker 3: to feel pressured thinking that you gotta be funny to
Speaker 3: have fun or to create fun. That was something that
Speaker 3: I came across my research is when I asked people
Speaker 3: to describe people from their lives who were fun, and
Speaker 3: then said why were their friends fun? It wasn't always
Speaker 3: like they're telling jokes and they're the life of the party.
Speaker 3: It was more things like they laugh at other people's jokes,
Speaker 3: or they're up for anything, or they make everybody feel
Speaker 3: comfortable in their presence. So I think that's kind of
Speaker 3: an important thing to keep in mind. But I do
Speaker 3: think that if you find yourself laughing with another person,
Speaker 3: it's highly likely you're having fun together.
Speaker 2: That's so sweet.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's really wonderful because I kind of think it's like,
Speaker 3: I don't know, laughter is kind of like fun bubbling out.
Speaker 2: That's so sweet.
Speaker 1: That's it's interesting too to think that the pressure of
Speaker 1: having to entertain someone as opposed to the pressure of
Speaker 1: just being present and relaxed and letting people feel like
Speaker 1: they can be themselves too.
Speaker 5: You know.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think it's important for introverts in particular to
Speaker 3: hear because, you know, people tend to think you have
Speaker 3: to be an extrovert to be a quote fun person,
Speaker 3: but it's not at all the case. It's like, if
Speaker 3: you're just someone who who makes other people feel comfortable
Speaker 3: and you go with the flow and you're you know, yes,
Speaker 3: anding to use improvisational comedy terminology like that creates a
Speaker 3: fun atmosphere.
Speaker 1: And for those who have never taken an improv comedy
Speaker 1: class or dated anyone in Los Angeles, the first rule
Speaker 1: of improv is yes ending, which means when your scene
Speaker 1: partner proposes something, you agree that that's where you are
Speaker 1: and what you're doing, and then you add to it.
Speaker 1: So let's say you're in an improv class or show
Speaker 1: and you're on a bear stage and the scene starts
Speaker 1: with the other actor saying, I can't believe it. We're
Speaker 1: finally astronauts out of spaceship. You don't say, what do
Speaker 1: you mean, We're not in a spaceship, We're in the valley.
Speaker 1: You say, yes, we are on a spaceship and can
Speaker 1: we find a place to stop for a snack and
Speaker 1: p or yes, we are on a spaceship and what
Speaker 1: time do you think we're going to land to kill
Speaker 1: all the earthlinks? Yes? And I have heard comedians reference
Speaker 1: yes and in their wedding vows. So yes, ant just
Speaker 1: go with it, keep building something together.
Speaker 3: What's not fun is when you shut people down and
Speaker 3: you're a wet blanket. When you're like I don't want
Speaker 3: to do that, or like you're like that was a
Speaker 3: stupid comment, like that kind of stuff. We're just kind
Speaker 3: of judging other people or criticizing them. That's when you're
Speaker 3: not a fun person. Ah know, you can be an
Speaker 3: extrovert and be a jerk.
Speaker 1: So yeah, but haters need not apply, necesariously need not apply.
Speaker 1: So many people had a great question about fears and thrills.
Speaker 1: Looking at you patrons Rika Putten and Arwin don Ewell,
Speaker 1: Lauren Cooper, Earl of Grammelkin, Tessa Gleeson, ariel bel Sdi Lennox,
Speaker 1: Jamie Alexander, and first time question askers Ana Dylan sky
Speaker 1: Folio and Andy Pepper and Magzaroni first time question asker
Speaker 1: know why do some people find roller coasters fun and
Speaker 1: others like horror movies? Gail Starr also like, why do
Speaker 1: people find scary activities like skydiving fun and others dread them?
Speaker 1: What's going on with thrill seeking and bungee jumping and
Speaker 1: stuff like that.
Speaker 3: I'm so glad they asked this question. This goes back
Speaker 3: to the thing I was saying about fun factors, like
Speaker 3: what are characteristics of experiences or interactions that make something
Speaker 3: feel fun to one person but not to another?
Speaker 2: Think playing music versus camping.
Speaker 3: And I would say that risk and thrill are definitely
Speaker 3: dividing lines for people. To first clarify, risk and thrill,
Speaker 3: to my mind, are different because like, okay, skydiving or
Speaker 3: race car driving, that's actually risky. You might actually get hurt. Right,
Speaker 3: That's different from a thrill of a slide at the
Speaker 3: water park, where like it's safe hopefully. So I would
Speaker 3: say risk is always thrilling, but thrill does not always
Speaker 3: necessarily require a risk. But regardless, some people love risk
Speaker 3: and thrill and some people don't. I personally hate horror movies.
Speaker 3: That is like a nightmare for me. It would create nightmares.
Speaker 3: So I think that that kind of comes down to
Speaker 3: some people really enjoy the feeling of an adrenaline rush
Speaker 3: and some people don't. And I think this actually brings
Speaker 3: up a very important point and goes back to one
Speaker 3: of your earlier questions. Everyone reaches fun or experiences fun differently,
Speaker 3: and we should not feel pressured to accept someone else's
Speaker 3: version of fun.
Speaker 1: So to address Nicole Wackerley's question, who asked, why are
Speaker 1: a in fueled activities like riding roller coasters or skydiving
Speaker 1: fun for some me at nightmares for others? My significant
Speaker 1: other Nicole writes or patron Zoe Litton wrote in about
Speaker 1: their brother and their mom who love these things and
Speaker 1: they don't.
Speaker 2: What can one do.
Speaker 3: Like, if you were really good friends with someone or
Speaker 3: married to someone who loves roller coasters and you hate them,
Speaker 3: that's fine. You just that's not your fun factor, that's
Speaker 3: not a fun magnet. That's fine. Maybe don't go to
Speaker 3: the amusement park with them because you'll ruin it for them,
Speaker 3: but like let them go, do you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Yeah? And some people wanted to know in terms of
Speaker 1: you know, you mentioned risks. Some people wanted to know,
Speaker 1: like sheep In for some question, asker, where is the
Speaker 1: line that separates I'm doing this activity because it's fun,
Speaker 1: and I'm doing this activity because I have an addiction.
Speaker 1: As someone with addictive tendencies, it can feel blurry sometimes.
Speaker 1: And Jason Lowenthal wanted to know. Also curious about the
Speaker 1: instant gratification thing, as I've seen others ask here, but
Speaker 1: also how that ties with alcohol or alcoholism or drugs
Speaker 1: and addiction patrons. Mantha wanted to know where addiction to
Speaker 1: phones comes in. Ryan the Tiger asked about things like
Speaker 1: video games and gambling. Certain substances all seem to start
Speaker 1: with that initial fun feeling and then they become habitual.
Speaker 1: And Ivan Gonzales in Arizona asked what is the effect
Speaker 1: of alcohol in having fun? Because when I go out
Speaker 1: and get drunk, I have a lot of fun. Listen
Speaker 1: to wake up the following morning. Do addictions do they substitute,
Speaker 1: do they augment fun? Do they take away from it?
Speaker 1: What's going on there?
Speaker 3: Well, I think we're talking about two separate things, right,
Speaker 3: like substances that might help us let go. And then
Speaker 3: how do you tell when you cross the line from
Speaker 3: enjoyment something you want to continue pursuing to an addiction.
Speaker 3: A lot of people ask me about the role of
Speaker 3: alcohol and fun, and I would say that it is
Speaker 3: true many for adults, many fun memories involve alcohol, right
Speaker 3: like the wedding, dance party, or you know. I think
Speaker 3: that that is because alcohol loosens us up, and it
Speaker 3: reduces inhibitions and makes us more playful, makes us feel
Speaker 3: more comfortable with that letting go. Ideally, I think we
Speaker 3: would try to reach a state where we were able
Speaker 3: to do that without the help of alcohol. But I
Speaker 3: think that is why it's so often involved. And so
Speaker 3: if you're able to mindfully, you know, be aware of
Speaker 3: that and be like, all right, well, I'm going out
Speaker 3: for dinner with my friends and I know that I've
Speaker 3: a glass of wine. It's going to be more fun,
Speaker 3: and I'm okay with that. That's I think fine.
Speaker 1: Of course.
Speaker 3: The question then is whether you have an addictive personality
Speaker 3: or is this going to cause a problem. Are you
Speaker 3: going to be able to stop at one glass or
Speaker 3: are you going to have six cocktails at the holiday
Speaker 3: office party and then do something you really regret? You know,
Speaker 3: like you don't so that's tricky, but I do understand that.
Speaker 3: That's why I think that alcohol and substances are so
Speaker 3: often involved in people's memories that stand out to them
Speaker 3: as fun is because there's this lack of inhibition that
Speaker 3: comes with it that we should aspire to be able
Speaker 3: to achieve without the substance. In terms of the addiction aspect,
Speaker 3: I think that well to define addiction, I would define
Speaker 3: it is when you continue to engage in a behavior
Speaker 3: that has negative consequences, Like despite the negative consequences, you
Speaker 3: feel compelled to continue the behavior. That's kind of the
Speaker 3: simplest definition of addiction that I found. If you think
Speaker 3: about fun as being playful, connected flow, I think it's
Speaker 3: very healthy, Like those goals are healthy. The question is
Speaker 3: whether you might start to get two oriented towards, as
Speaker 3: you were saying, the quick pleasure and the quick hit,
Speaker 3: probably involving dopamine, because that's involved in our addictions of
Speaker 3: a particular activity and it starts to impede on the
Speaker 3: rest of your life. So I think that's the litmus
Speaker 3: test for any addiction. Is it something you're doing having
Speaker 3: negative consequences on the rest of your life, but you
Speaker 3: don't feel like you can stop, because then that's a problem.
Speaker 1: And for more on dopamine seeking risks or relationships with substances,
Speaker 1: we have a three part ADHD episode and we also
Speaker 1: have an addictionology episode. Those are linked in the show notes,
Speaker 1: just in case this is something that you're looking out
Speaker 1: with a more critical eye. I know, for me, what
Speaker 1: has loosened me up in uncomfortable social settings can also
Speaker 1: be tough to do in moderation, which only leads to
Speaker 1: a lot of not fun the next day, and this
Speaker 1: reinforcement of a feeling that I'm not okay as I am,
Speaker 1: which sucks.
Speaker 3: But I would argue that when it reaches that point,
Speaker 3: it's not fun anymore. Like yeah, if you really stick
Speaker 3: to the definition of fun as playful, connected flow and
Speaker 3: without negative consequences like then it's not fun. Then it
Speaker 3: crosses the line. Good to keep your eye on, though,
Speaker 3: especially if you are someone with an addictive personality.
Speaker 1: Well it's interesting too because thinking about the notion of
Speaker 1: junk fun versus true, authentic fun, I think we probably
Speaker 1: might find compulsions around fun that's not actually fun, but
Speaker 1: we think it's relaxing.
Speaker 3: That's a very good point, because that's very true. It's
Speaker 3: probably fake fun. If you're like you can't stop doing something,
Speaker 3: it's probably because you're getting these quick hits of dopamine,
Speaker 3: which is a very common sign the fake fun. The
Speaker 3: things people tend to say with like true fun. Again,
Speaker 3: it's like a shared experience. So if you're really addicted
Speaker 3: to having you feel addicted quote unquote to having really
Speaker 3: great conversations with your best friend, I don't know that
Speaker 3: that's a negative thing, you know. And that's another kind
Speaker 3: of litmus test you can do for yourself is ask yourself,
Speaker 3: how are you feeling after these experiences? Are you feeling
Speaker 3: like gross afterwards? Because then it's probably wasn't true fun.
Speaker 3: True fun. In my experience and the experiences people have shared,
Speaker 3: is this very nourishing, very joyful state that gives you
Speaker 3: a hangover that feels good. It's almost just like a
Speaker 3: joy hangover, and it's something that feels really good to
Speaker 3: look back on, and that's just very different. So I
Speaker 3: think that you're totally right. Like that's another example of
Speaker 3: how we cause problems when we use the word fun
Speaker 3: itself too broadly to refer to too many different things.
Speaker 1: And you know, when it comes to loosening our inhibitions
Speaker 1: with a substance, I know, especially if we're dealing with
Speaker 1: depression or isolation or anxiety, using something to swim which
Speaker 1: our brains off in that regard, or take our amigdalahs
Speaker 1: down a notch if we can. We didn't have to
Speaker 1: do that as kids. And so many people asked about
Speaker 1: fun changing as we age. Patrons and kids or aspiring
Speaker 1: kids at heart include Chris Curius, Lauren Galio, Samantha de
Speaker 1: Holland or Caro Young, Dianna Di Pietro, Apolonia, Pina Renil Mandre,
Speaker 1: Jennifer Simon, Marico, Mary ell And Cheney, Heather Dykes, McAllen,
Speaker 1: Sarah King, Tyler Bates, and first time question askers Judy Ritchie,
Speaker 1: Olivia JM. Jojo Emerson ESSI rue Tilly's mom, Rebecca Jackson,
Speaker 1: and Grace Davis, all of whom essentially wanted to know.
Speaker 1: In dirt Witch's words, why do so many adults stop
Speaker 1: having fun in the way the kids do. I assume
Speaker 1: it's cultural, They're right, But is it. Have you noticed
Speaker 1: any difference of how kids are able to turn off
Speaker 1: their inhibitions more quickly versus adults, or does fun change
Speaker 1: when we get older? Are people in their seventies having
Speaker 1: the most fun? Where's your peak?
Speaker 3: I don't think there's a general peak to fun, although
Speaker 3: I will say I think it's not that kids are
Speaker 3: good at turning off their inhibitions, They just don't have
Speaker 3: them yet. Their inner critics have not yet found their
Speaker 3: voices right, Like, that's so. I think that that's very true.
Speaker 3: But I think the rest of us is really just
Speaker 3: more about whether or not we are able to silence
Speaker 3: that inner critic, Like can we be kind to ourselves?
Speaker 3: I mean, it gets deep pretty fast, because if you
Speaker 3: are constantly criticizing yourself, then you won't be able to
Speaker 3: let go. There's an element of vulnerability in fun that
Speaker 3: I think is really fascinating, because to be playful you
Speaker 3: have to be a little bit vulnerable because you're letting
Speaker 3: down your guard. But I also think really important tying
Speaker 3: together a couple things we're talking about is that when
Speaker 3: we talk about like substances or the role that these
Speaker 3: things play and fun, I think that actually speaks to
Speaker 3: another misconception we have, which is we tend to focus
Speaker 3: on that type of memory as being quote unquote fun,
Speaker 3: like the crazy wedding party or whatever, and not recognize
Speaker 3: that fun happens in quieter ways all the time. You're
Speaker 3: probably having moments of playful, connected flow sprinkled throughout your day,
Speaker 3: which means you're having fun in little doses throughout your day,
Speaker 3: and those moments count like it's just a different type
Speaker 3: of fun, if that makes any sense. And I think
Speaker 3: that's so important because people tend to think, oh, wait, no, no, no,
Speaker 3: I don't want to go and get drunk and like
Speaker 3: go to this party. But if you're able to like
Speaker 3: sprinkle on a little bit of playfulness to your workday
Speaker 3: and have like a connection with a colleague you know,
Speaker 3: or chat with a stranger for a couple of minutes
Speaker 3: and you both share a laugh, like that counts. It's
Speaker 3: not going to be necessarily something you remember when you're
Speaker 3: eighty five years old, But the accumulation counts, and I
Speaker 3: think it's essential we pay attention to those small moments
Speaker 3: because then they matter to us. Like, if you ask
Speaker 3: me right now, hey, Catherine, can you reflect on, like
Speaker 3: some stressful moments from your past week. I'm quite sure
Speaker 3: I could give you ten things that cause me anxiety
Speaker 3: or stress in the past week. But can I do
Speaker 3: that as easily if you're like, can you tell me
Speaker 3: like ten moments where you had a little bit of fun?
Speaker 3: I mean, I can probably do it better than most
Speaker 3: people at this point, but most of us it'd be
Speaker 3: hard because we're not paying attention to it. It's not
Speaker 3: on our radars. So I just say that because I
Speaker 3: don't want people to This is a misperception we have
Speaker 3: that it's like the drunken party is fun, and that's
Speaker 3: the case.
Speaker 1: Very quick aside, one high point of fun this week
Speaker 1: for me was being at arrest stop charging our electric
Speaker 1: car and noticing a small white pill on the ground,
Speaker 1: flipping it over with a leaf, and then googling white
Speaker 1: pill round our twenty and realizing it was the generic
Speaker 1: form of viagra, and then finding another one and another,
Speaker 1: and another, and another and another, like confetti scattered over
Speaker 1: this twenty foot radius, fifty of them. I needed to
Speaker 1: know the mystery. How did they arrive in this parking
Speaker 1: lot in Chowchilla, California?
Speaker 2: What were they doing there? They were everywhere.
Speaker 1: Just a side note, never pick up drugs from the
Speaker 1: road bare handed. Never do it. It was a rookie mistake,
Speaker 1: but I knew what they were. I washed my hands
Speaker 1: right after. Don't ever do it. Don't ever do it.
Speaker 1: But yes, that little whimsical mystery on a long road
Speaker 1: trip was some welcome, free fun. I'll tell you more
Speaker 1: about it later. But we did not keep the pills.
Speaker 1: We have limits.
Speaker 3: You know, little things can be fun and quieter interactions
Speaker 3: a much better indicator than this kind of like alcohol
Speaker 3: fueled fun.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's funny. It makes sense.
Speaker 1: Like my friend Simone loves to do puzzles together, and
Speaker 1: I'm like, yeah, that is fun because we're like in
Speaker 1: a flow state. We're doing something together, we're talking while
Speaker 1: we're doing it, and we're solving problems. And it's funny
Speaker 1: how those things that you wouldn't think would be like
Speaker 1: a blast, like doing a puzzle with a good friend
Speaker 1: can be more fun than a big party or a
Speaker 1: bender or something you know exactly.
Speaker 3: And it's also interesting if you think about, like, is
Speaker 3: the puzzle itself the fun I would argue, No, it's
Speaker 3: the structure that's giving you, guys something to do with
Speaker 3: a goal and with your hands and like keeping your
Speaker 3: brains kind of occupied. But you're able to then banter
Speaker 3: with each other and joke around or have a conversation
Speaker 3: or whatever else. You know, So again it's not necessarily
Speaker 3: the activity. Like I personally am not drawn to puzzles.
Speaker 3: But a couple of weeks ago, I was on a
Speaker 3: trip with my mom and I know she likes to puzzle,
Speaker 3: and I was like, I want to do that with her,
Speaker 3: and it was actually really fun. And it's not because
Speaker 3: we were trying to piece together you know, a scene
Speaker 3: of cottages with like little girls and bonnets, satisfying, But
Speaker 3: the fun bar was getting to actually interact with my
Speaker 3: mom and have a shared experience.
Speaker 2: M hm. It's always there's always a cottage.
Speaker 3: There's always a cottage.
Speaker 1: There's always a cottage, and clos and the clouds so satisfying.
Speaker 3: Oh my god.
Speaker 1: Well, a bunch of people had questions about animals. Some
Speaker 1: of you wanted to know about animals, including Shelby Reard
Speaker 1: and Lindsay Bartholomew, Rebecca Fitchett, Ashley Adare, Leah La Sarte,
Speaker 1: Ewen Munroe, Chicken Chomper, Farren, Genevieve, Jellybean Rowland, Richard Klaire,
Speaker 1: Mower's poodle, Prince Asan, Deborah Gray, Emilee Krieger, Gorius of Tomsk,
Speaker 1: Deanna sterrez Nick, Dean Quincy, j Byrne, kJ Rick, d Mass, Paxen,
Speaker 1: Aaron and first time question Oscars Ruben, Kimberly Hellerin and
Speaker 1: Shannon Bartels And like Kitlin Bishop, first time question Oscar
Speaker 1: one to know how is fun expressed in non humans?
Speaker 1: Is it something that has been studied well?
Speaker 2: Like, what can we.
Speaker 1: Learn from them? Are animals having fun or are they playing?
Speaker 1: Or is it anthropomorphizing to say that cows hopping around
Speaker 1: in a field is fun?
Speaker 3: Sounds fun? I think that we can't. We can't you know,
Speaker 3: fun is a feeling. Then we're never going to know
Speaker 3: if animals are really experiencing fun in the way that
Speaker 3: we are. But there's been more research down in play
Speaker 3: and that animals play. I found some very funny research
Speaker 3: article titles it was like fish that jump, juggle, and tease,
Speaker 3: I think was wonderful.
Speaker 1: For more on fish having a better life than you,
Speaker 1: please see the twenty fourteen study highly Repetitive object play
Speaker 1: in a cicklet fish from the Animal Behavior journal Ethology,
Speaker 1: which begins whether play occurs in fishes has long been
Speaker 1: a contentious issue, and because the researchers were here for
Speaker 1: that drama, they state that behavior patterns labeled as play
Speaker 1: are enigmatic phenomena that typically have been restricted to mammals
Speaker 1: and perhaps birds, and that claims for play in non
Speaker 1: endothermic vertebrates and invertebrates have been largely dismissed as anecdotal, anthropomorphic,
Speaker 1: or immature instincts. However, they recorded hundreds of occurrences of
Speaker 1: an unusual behavior in three male white spotted cicklet fish,
Speaker 1: which are these small black and navy blue and white
Speaker 1: flecked cuties. They're native to a deep lake in Eastern Africa,
Speaker 1: but they're commonly kept in freshwater aquaria. But the paper
Speaker 1: cites these key criteria for classifying animal behavior as play.
Speaker 1: The behavior must be not functional. It's got to be voluntary, spontaneous,
Speaker 1: or rewarding. It has to be repeated but not rigidly,
Speaker 1: and has to be initiated in the absence of severe
Speaker 1: chronic stress like disease, crowding, hunger, and predation, which I
Speaker 1: don't know how the fish feel, but personally, that's tough.
Speaker 2: That's tough.
Speaker 1: It's been a rough couple of years, folks. But apparently
Speaker 1: a researcher sat and watch these fish for two hours
Speaker 1: a day while recording them, and the fish would strike
Speaker 1: this bottom weighted thermometer repeatedly, which was like a punching bag.
Speaker 1: So they'd strike it, it'd come back, and then they'd
Speaker 1: dodge it. And the study reports that the target behavior
Speaker 1: of attacking and deflecting an object that rapidly returned to
Speaker 1: its upright position not only fit the criteria for play behavior,
Speaker 1: but it differed among the different fishes. Huh.
Speaker 3: It's like, oh, that's fascinating. But you can see that
Speaker 3: in the dog park, right, Like, first of all, there's
Speaker 3: a thing called a playbow. Like dogs do a play
Speaker 3: bow when they put their butts up in the air
Speaker 3: and wag their tails. That's their indication that they're non
Speaker 3: threatening and they're ready to play, which I think is interesting, Like,
Speaker 3: what's our equivalent of a play bow? I don't think
Speaker 3: we should stick our butts up in the air and wiggle,
Speaker 3: but like, what is the human equivalent? And I would
Speaker 3: say it's a friendly smile, not f looking down at
Speaker 3: your phone, like making a comment that kind of I
Speaker 3: don't know, makes it clear that you're willing to be playful,
Speaker 3: like in your conversation. But for dogs, like that's clearly
Speaker 3: what they're doing and you can see there's no question
Speaker 3: that dogs are playing together. I mean, we can ask
Speaker 3: what's the point of play? And that's a whole area
Speaker 3: of academic debate. I personally, if I were just to hypothesize,
Speaker 3: I think part of the reason that animals play is
Speaker 3: the same that we do, which is it feels good.
Speaker 3: But yeah, there is a fair amount of research on
Speaker 3: animals in play, but not fun.
Speaker 1: It is funny too, because a lot of my memories
Speaker 1: of fun are or you know, playing around with my
Speaker 1: dog or being in the park watching her have fun
Speaker 1: and chasing her around. It is funny in that case
Speaker 1: that shared experience of trying to play fetch with a
Speaker 1: dog that does not comprehend it, or watching her chase
Speaker 1: squirrels that is contagious.
Speaker 2: I think it is interesting.
Speaker 3: Yes, I think it's really interesting too in terms of
Speaker 3: what the human animal connection is because a lot of
Speaker 3: people mention dogs to me, i'd be curious about listeners
Speaker 3: feedback did not get as many, if any stories about cats,
Speaker 3: which stereotypically makes sense. But I mean, I have a
Speaker 3: dog myself who also dances, not understand catch, but I
Speaker 3: would say, like, I get that. I think there's some
Speaker 3: element of the dogs are making eye contact with us,
Speaker 3: they've been bred to socialize with humans that clearly they
Speaker 3: have a body signal the playbow that indicates what their
Speaker 3: state of mind is in that regard. And also when
Speaker 3: you're around a dog, you're not really that self conscious, right,
Speaker 3: So that actually is a way for many people to
Speaker 3: let down their guard. You don't feel judged by your pet.
Speaker 3: And so I think there's real legitimacy to the idea
Speaker 3: that a lot of people report having real fun experiences
Speaker 3: with their dogs. In some cases, I guess other animals.
Speaker 1: I'm sure there's like a few cat folks out there
Speaker 1: that are like.
Speaker 3: What, wellimental, but yeah, like with the laser, I mean, yeah,
Speaker 3: for sure, I think that's true. It's interesting to reflect, Yeah,
Speaker 3: it's interesting to be like, oh, does that feel fun
Speaker 3: to you? If it does feel that's the other great thing.
Speaker 3: If it feels fun to you, then it was fun
Speaker 3: because you're the person experiencing this. But then you can say, like,
Speaker 3: why was that fun? Why did I have fun with
Speaker 3: my cat? Just now? Like what was it about that interaction?
Speaker 3: And maybe could you apply that to some human interactions.
Speaker 1: I don't know, cat folks, I may be allergic, but
Speaker 1: I see you and I love you. And doctor Michael
Speaker 1: Delgado is a philinologist, and of course we have an
Speaker 1: episode with her that you will love your cat. Children
Speaker 1: are gonna love it even more. Speaking of children, Patron's Hope,
Speaker 1: Lizzie Martinez learned taraka Oliver Callous and Liz had similar questions.
Speaker 1: You've got a nine year old, what about childhood development?
Speaker 1: Like Katrina Rene asked, any recommendations on how to tap
Speaker 1: into your fun, playful side. If you're a person who
Speaker 1: maybe didn't get to experience much of it as a kid,
Speaker 1: If you don't associate your chilhood with a lot of
Speaker 1: play or fun, how do you know when you're having it?
Speaker 3: I think that's a common challenge I hear from a
Speaker 3: lot of people is that, you know, a lot of
Speaker 3: people have very difficult childhoods where they weren't allowed to
Speaker 3: let go and they were you know, experiencing trauma, or
Speaker 3: they were put into positions of responsibility that were not
Speaker 3: appropriate for their age. I mean, both of my parents
Speaker 3: come from situations like that. I've heard from both of
Speaker 3: them that one of the things they enjoyed about parenting
Speaker 3: themselves is they felt like they could re experience their
Speaker 3: childhoods through me. I'm an only child, so I do
Speaker 3: think there's something to that, is that if you are
Speaker 3: one of those people who had a really challenging childhood
Speaker 3: and you do have a child of your own, is
Speaker 3: there a way to follow their lead? Because children often
Speaker 3: are naturally playful, and they are in flow a lot
Speaker 3: of the time, and they want to connect with us,
Speaker 3: So is there a way to kind of meet them
Speaker 3: on their grounds and kind of let them take the lead.
Speaker 3: And then also, I found one thing that is helpful
Speaker 3: for people then this is true if you've got a kid,
Speaker 3: but you can do it just for other people in
Speaker 3: your life. Is if it's hard for you to figure
Speaker 3: out what would feel fun or nourishing for you, what
Speaker 3: can you do for other people in your life to
Speaker 3: give them that experience to do something together that you
Speaker 3: think would be kind of a gift to them, because that,
Speaker 3: for some reason is easier for a lot of people
Speaker 3: to brainstorm, but still results in this feeling of a
Speaker 3: special shared experience that often leads to fun.
Speaker 2: So it's really sweet.
Speaker 3: Yeah to such, you know, like, how can you create
Speaker 3: delight for somebody? Like how can you just surprise them
Speaker 3: with something and take it from there and don't put
Speaker 3: pressure on yourself, you know, Like I think a lot
Speaker 3: of us are out of practice with fun if we
Speaker 3: ever were in practice with it, and we're just trying
Speaker 3: to like train ourselves to focus a bit more on
Speaker 3: positive stuff because their brains are naturally going to focus
Speaker 3: on the negative stuff. Give ourselves permission to enjoy our lives. Like,
Speaker 3: you're not an irresponsible person if you prioritize fun, and
Speaker 3: if you really feel yourself like pushing back against that,
Speaker 3: then maybe you're someone who can start to, you know,
Speaker 3: focus on creating fun for other people. But just the
Speaker 3: idea that the world has tough problems to solve is
Speaker 3: not incompatible with the idea that we should prioritize playful,
Speaker 3: connected flow, And I would argue that when we have
Speaker 3: fun with other people people, it actually erases our differences,
Speaker 3: many of the differences that cause the conflicts in the
Speaker 3: first place. Like, if you're truly having fun with someone,
Speaker 3: you're not going to see them as a political party
Speaker 3: or like a nationality or religion. And if you can
Speaker 3: erase those differences, even for a moment, it's going to
Speaker 3: make it easier to find common ground to work together.
Speaker 3: So I actually think it's a very powerful force for good.
Speaker 1: It's funny that we think that the more we hunker
Speaker 1: down and deprive ourselves of good things, the more that
Speaker 1: helps the world.
Speaker 3: But who is doom scrolling helping?
Speaker 5: Right?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I have to ask myself that question. I'm like,
Speaker 3: you're just reading the same news article again, Like, no,
Speaker 3: this is not helping solve anything. Social media, if you're
Speaker 3: ranting on social media or reading other people's rants, not
Speaker 3: solving any problems. Like, if you go out and have
Speaker 3: fun with somebody else, you are making a bigger difference
Speaker 3: in the world, even if it's someone you already know.
Speaker 3: You've created a little bit of joy, and you've experienced
Speaker 3: a bit of joy and like that can grow. For me,
Speaker 3: it was an interesting kind of like tweaking of my
Speaker 3: own thoughts to be like, who am I actually helping
Speaker 3: to stay on my couch?
Speaker 4: Oh body please?
Speaker 2: No.
Speaker 1: No, that's not to say that you shouldn't spend your
Speaker 1: efforts online spreading the word on atrocities, mobilizing folks to
Speaker 1: vote or attend protests, or organize mutual aid, or become
Speaker 1: educated on the many terrible things that are affecting our
Speaker 1: planet and our species and other species. For more on this, also,
Speaker 1: you can please see the recent Genis Ideology episode, which
Speaker 1: is neither fun nor happy, but it's very important on
Speaker 1: the topic of fun versus happy. Many of you, including
Speaker 1: Nicole s kanne Ghani, bobonni Well's how Kara Young and
Speaker 1: Bob Boberson wanted to know? Oh in this voice note
Speaker 1: from a patron, Hi.
Speaker 5: Ali, I'm Roman regular from Brooklyn. There is fun, and
Speaker 5: there's joy, and there is happiness. And although in quick
Speaker 5: glance they seem to flow into one another, it's possible
Speaker 5: to have them at any combination or lack thereof. What's
Speaker 5: actually different in the brain between the three or are
Speaker 5: there different chemicals involved?
Speaker 1: A few different people wanted to know do you have
Speaker 1: to be happy to have fun or vice versa? And
Speaker 1: what's the difference between fun and happiness?
Speaker 3: Well, this is something I was thinking about a lot, actually,
Speaker 3: because we obviously all want to be happy and a
Speaker 3: couple things. One thing I like about fun is to me,
Speaker 3: it feels more concrete than happiness, by which I mean like,
Speaker 3: if I asked you, did you have fun last weekend?
Speaker 3: You probably could answer that more easily than if I
Speaker 3: said are you a happy person?
Speaker 2: Right?
Speaker 3: Happiness is much more philosophical. There's something more concrete about fun.
Speaker 3: And then I would also say I noticed in myself
Speaker 3: and then in all the stories people shared with me,
Speaker 3: that fun is a happy state. No one was like,
Speaker 3: I had so much fun doing blot and I was miserable.
Speaker 3: It's not the case even if they might have had
Speaker 3: a very challenging life, or they might have been depressed
Speaker 3: in general, or you know, suffering in some way, in
Speaker 3: that particular moment, they were happy. And so that has
Speaker 3: made me personally think that to be happier, one way
Speaker 3: to achieve that is to focus less on happiness per
Speaker 3: se and more on having moments of everyday fun. But
Speaker 3: if you're like, Okay, I'm going to take this step further.
Speaker 3: I'm going to figure out more ways to incorporate little
Speaker 3: moments of playfulness or connect or flow into my day.
Speaker 3: And if you do that over time, I truly believe
Speaker 3: you will end up happier. Without directly aiming at that
Speaker 3: happiness goal, because I think it's too much pressure. And
Speaker 3: I'd also say a point that a friend of mine
Speaker 3: who's a psychiatrist made is that you know a lot
Speaker 3: of people are like, well, if you're really depressed, you're
Speaker 3: not going to have the energy to even try this.
Speaker 3: You're not going to be able to get off your couch,
Speaker 3: which may be true. The flip side is that it's
Speaker 3: also possible that you're depressed and anxious because you're not
Speaker 3: having enough fun or not doing enough of the things
Speaker 3: that you enjoy that bring you joy. Like there's obviously
Speaker 3: situations in which depression or anxiety or some other challenge
Speaker 3: like requires therapeutic intervention and possibly medication, et cetera. But
Speaker 3: it's also interesting to reflect that we might think that
Speaker 3: we can't have fun or we can't do things that
Speaker 3: bring us joy because we're depressed and anxious. But it
Speaker 3: might also be true that we're depressed and anxious specifically
Speaker 3: because we're not prioritizing and not putting energy into pursuing
Speaker 3: the things that are fun to us or bring us joy,
Speaker 3: so worth considering. I thought that was an interesting point
Speaker 3: raised by a psychiatrist.
Speaker 1: And for more unhappiness in general, you can see the
Speaker 1: Terminology episodes with doctor Lori Santos, who teaches courses on
Speaker 1: happiness at Yale, and that episode covers everything from mindfulness
Speaker 1: meditation to a happiness questionnaire you can take to a
Speaker 1: paper on do it yourself fecal transplants enjoy. Average Pie
Speaker 1: wanted to know why are empty boxes more fun to
Speaker 1: play with than toys?
Speaker 3: That's a great question. I was encountering that question this
Speaker 3: morning with my daughter because we were sitting on the
Speaker 3: step outside and there's this big box from a toaster oven.
Speaker 3: She's like, why can't I have that box? And we
Speaker 3: actually have an empty box collection in our basement and
Speaker 3: for her birthday one year, she actually asked this so funny,
Speaker 3: she asked her friends for boxes for her birthday. And
Speaker 3: can you imagine the delight of parents when they brought
Speaker 3: us all their empty Amazon boxes and our despair it's
Speaker 3: because there's creative opportunities. It's not a prescribed outcome. I
Speaker 3: think that's why it invites creativity and imagination in a
Speaker 3: way that I, as an adult, have lost, but my
Speaker 3: daughter maintains.
Speaker 1: That reminds me one of my most fun memories I
Speaker 1: have as a kid is building a giant robot out
Speaker 1: of boxes in the garage with my sisters.
Speaker 3: I think it's an important point though for parents, because
Speaker 3: we think, like, if we're going to help our kids
Speaker 3: have fun, we need to give them super structured activities
Speaker 3: or like toys. But kids can do so much with
Speaker 3: empty boxes and with free play, and that's actually so
Speaker 3: important for development. I mean, it's so important and it's enjoyable,
Speaker 3: but like, give them the boxes and let them just
Speaker 3: make stuff.
Speaker 1: On this note, Casey Daegall and Jemma wanted to know,
Speaker 1: in Jema's world, how has capitalism affected how we have
Speaker 1: fun and what we consider fun? And have there ever
Speaker 1: been any fun promoting campaigns led by a government organization
Speaker 1: where they're like, let's advocate for more fun. Do you
Speaker 1: think that there's something cultural that has shifted?
Speaker 3: Oh man, this is a kind of bigger answer, but
Speaker 3: like we've been trained to associate time with money, and
Speaker 3: so anything that we spend time on that doesn't result
Speaker 3: in money, we categorize as a waste of time. And
Speaker 3: so I think that that's one reason that fun can
Speaker 3: feel frivolous is that you don't make money necessarily when
Speaker 3: you're having fun. Although you could have fun at your job,
Speaker 3: but not necessarily, so it feels like it must be
Speaker 3: a waste. But I think the other misconception is we
Speaker 3: often think that you have to have a lot of
Speaker 3: money to have fun, because you have to have the
Speaker 3: money to go skiing or take the private yacht or
Speaker 3: I don't know whatever else people have, Like there're stereotypical
Speaker 3: ideas of that, but that's not the case. Like, sure,
Speaker 3: I think money can help you have experiences that might
Speaker 3: lead to fun, but you don't need to be rich.
Speaker 3: You don't need to have a lot of money to
Speaker 3: have fun. And you can see that around the world
Speaker 3: where you look at people who are quote unquote less
Speaker 3: privileged or whatever you want to call it, who actually
Speaker 3: seem like they're having a ton of fun. And then
Speaker 3: you look at these like super stressed out, very rich
Speaker 3: Americans who are essentially just like working harder and harder
Speaker 3: and harder. They can have more money, presumably to spend
Speaker 3: on fun stuff, but they're not doing that because they're
Speaker 3: just working so hard to get money to you know
Speaker 3: what I mean.
Speaker 1: And again surprising to absolutely know on is that global
Speaker 1: happiness rates drop when basic needs aren't met. And the
Speaker 1: study of happiness it's not phonology, but it's related. And
Speaker 1: in fact, the UN has been tracking rates of happiness
Speaker 1: since twenty twelve to help them inform policy, and they
Speaker 1: collect self reported rates that focus on these six main
Speaker 1: factors social support, average income, a healthy life expectancy, freedom
Speaker 1: to make life choices, generosity, and the absence of corruption.
Speaker 1: And for the first time in twelve years, this year
Speaker 1: their data showed among millennials, evaluation of one's own life
Speaker 1: drops with each year of age, while among boomer's life
Speaker 1: satisfaction increases with age.
Speaker 2: Well, that is not fun.
Speaker 1: The good news, I guess is that millennials and younger
Speaker 1: scored higher in the generosity scale. And apparently a lot
Speaker 1: of people do ask Google what is the most enjoying
Speaker 1: country in the world, and the answer is Finland. Finland
Speaker 1: is the most enjoying country in the world. The US
Speaker 1: dropped to twenty fifth Now. The least happy country reportedly
Speaker 1: is Afghanistan and many countries in the global South. So
Speaker 1: while fun is present in places and under conditions you
Speaker 1: may not expect and it's vital to living, it is
Speaker 1: a greater challenge when you're in survival mode of any kind.
Speaker 1: So if you are in a place where many of
Speaker 1: your physical survival needs are met, you do have a
Speaker 1: head start on figuring out what things give you more
Speaker 1: true fun and not passive or scrolling or fake and
Speaker 1: possibly consumerist fun. And Catherine elaborates.
Speaker 3: I think that, yes, there's two ways in which capitalism
Speaker 3: could negatively contribute, or the way we think about capitalism
Speaker 3: is like, yeah, the idea that if you're not getting
Speaker 3: paid for your time, it's a waste of time. And
Speaker 3: then also that you have to have a lot of
Speaker 3: money in order to have fun, which is going to
Speaker 3: make you feel like you need to work more.
Speaker 1: Ugh, that's such a gut punch.
Speaker 3: But fun is accessible to all as long as your
Speaker 3: basic needs are met and you're not in like a
Speaker 3: survival situation.
Speaker 1: And you have empty boxes, can you just order boxes
Speaker 1: on Amazon box? That's very meta, believe, And last listener question,
Speaker 1: which I thought was so beautiful and I love that
Speaker 1: this was asked, and this is why I love patrons
Speaker 1: and listeners for setting these in. But people's resistance to fun?
Speaker 1: Tanya magic Fingers asked why do people feel threatened by
Speaker 1: other people having fun? Are when asked, why is it
Speaker 1: that we look forward to something thinking will be fun,
Speaker 1: but we back out the last minute? Alice Reuben wants
Speaker 1: to know why does fun give me anxiety? Or Chelsea
Speaker 1: and her dog Phoebe want to know what about the
Speaker 1: fear that creeps up during a good time? Like will
Speaker 1: I have this fun again? And I think this was interesting. Beaverly,
Speaker 1: I asked, why do some people feel guilty when having
Speaker 1: fun sadly not asking for a friend? So when we
Speaker 1: have this resistance or anxiety around fun, where do you
Speaker 1: think that's coming from? Why don't we let ourselves seek
Speaker 1: it out more?
Speaker 3: Oh God, that's a really big question to end on. Sorry, thanks, Well,
Speaker 3: I think speaking to the person who is like, you're
Speaker 3: in the middle of a fun experience and then you
Speaker 3: find yourself being like, what if I never have this
Speaker 3: again when this ends? I had that just yesterday myself. Actually,
Speaker 3: I was in a pool with my daughter and her
Speaker 3: friend and my husband and we were all joking around.
Speaker 3: It was a beautiful day, the water was a perfect temperature.
Speaker 3: It was just like, you know, snapshot of childhood and
Speaker 3: me being me instead of enjoying it was like, oh,
Speaker 3: the nostalgia. She'll be a teenager someday, you know, and
Speaker 3: it's like, oh, thanks, thanks, brain. I don't know exactly
Speaker 3: why that happens, and just really empathizing there that it
Speaker 3: can be very hard to kind of allow yourself to
Speaker 3: just enjoy the moment and have fun and not immediately
Speaker 3: think about it's going to end and you're never going
Speaker 3: to have fun again. I think maybe that's just an
Speaker 3: element of like mindfulness and kindness to be like, oh, brain,
Speaker 3: there you go again. Thanks for that depressing thought. I'm
Speaker 3: going to choose not to pay attention to her right
Speaker 3: now and instead just add this lovely experience to my
Speaker 3: repository of past fun experiences, which she reflects later. So
Speaker 3: that's one thought.
Speaker 1: Life is short. It's also long, and it's lovely and
Speaker 1: heartbreaking and scary, and it's exciting and it's beautiful, so
Speaker 1: we might as well stop and appreciate all of the ingredients.
Speaker 1: That make up our mortal cast roles.
Speaker 3: I think when you're feeling guilty about fun very interesting.
Speaker 3: That's the way I'm saying. It can get deep very quickly,
Speaker 3: because I think it can be very difficult for many
Speaker 3: of us to give ourselves permission to enjoy our own lives,
Speaker 3: you know, in any capacity. And we were talking about
Speaker 3: that a bit a little earlier, in terms of feeling
Speaker 3: like you have a responsibility to make yourself miserable by
Speaker 3: reading the news stories or doing whatever you're doing, because
Speaker 3: if you have fun, you're not allowed to do that.
Speaker 1: So Catherine cites the twenty twelve book The Top Five
Speaker 1: Regrets of the Dying, which was written by a palliative
Speaker 1: care worker, Bronnie Ware, and two of those regrets were
Speaker 1: I wish I'd had the courage to live a life
Speaker 1: true to myself, not the life other expected of me.
Speaker 1: And I wish I'd had the courage to express my feelings,
Speaker 1: Catherine continues.
Speaker 3: And there were things like, you know, I wish I
Speaker 3: hadn't worked so hard, or I wish I'd maintained my friendships.
Speaker 3: But one of the top ones was I wish I'd
Speaker 3: let myself be happy. Oh, I think that's really important
Speaker 3: for us to keep in mind that that it wasn't.
Speaker 3: You know, Yeah, I wish I'd worked more, or I
Speaker 3: wish I'd spent more time doom scrolling the news that
Speaker 3: was not. And then the anxiety element of why people
Speaker 3: feel anxious. Sometimes you're just being forced into situations that
Speaker 3: genuinely are not going to be fun for you. And
Speaker 3: there's a feeling of pressure. And that comes from a
Speaker 3: misconception that, like what someone else finds fun, you should
Speaker 3: find fun. So I think we need to give ourselves
Speaker 3: some you know, permission not to find that fun. It's fine,
Speaker 3: you don't need to push yourself into something. Sometimes there's
Speaker 3: just an inertia though, And I think that's another thing
Speaker 3: to look into. If it's like, oh, I'm just feeling
Speaker 3: myself being resistant to fun, what's that about? Is there
Speaker 3: a childhood issue? But is it all that? Like it's
Speaker 3: harder to get off the couch than it is to
Speaker 3: just sit there and scroll, But like, maybe you should
Speaker 3: make a commitment to yourself to at least try to
Speaker 3: get off your couch next time and then see how
Speaker 3: that feels and then build upon that.
Speaker 2: And what pray tell of the haters.
Speaker 3: If someone is really a wet blanket on your fun,
Speaker 3: that probably means there's something much deeper going on for
Speaker 3: them and probably not your job to solve. But maybe
Speaker 3: you don't want to spend as much time with them,
Speaker 3: or maybe you want to carve out a way for
Speaker 3: you to do things that are fun for you that
Speaker 3: don't involve them, because it's not going to be fun
Speaker 3: if there's a wet blanket around like that critic is
Speaker 3: going to impact you and that's not what we want.
Speaker 3: Or even if you see someone else having fun and
Speaker 3: you're like, I'm not having enough fun. I want to
Speaker 3: feel that way, and the immediate reaction can be jealousy
Speaker 3: and just kind of resistance and wanting to shut them down.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's so interesting because before this conversation, I never
Speaker 1: would have thought of it as having those different elements
Speaker 1: and having someone be able to point out why certain
Speaker 1: times were more fun or certain activities. And it's funny,
Speaker 1: like you think about like art therapy or music therapy
Speaker 1: and you're like okay, and then you're like, oh no,
Speaker 1: that's why that works. Yeah right, that's why equine therapy works.
Speaker 1: So that's why you know, I was in a really
Speaker 1: terrible anxiety spiral for like a week, and I was
Speaker 1: convinced to go surfing, did not want to go, no
Speaker 1: interest in that, but promise someone I would. It end
Speaker 1: up getting me out of that anxiety spiral for months.
Speaker 1: And now I look back and I was like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: I was talking to the surfing instructor. I was in
Speaker 1: a totally present, like flow state, so you don't drown.
Speaker 2: You know, right right right, all of that.
Speaker 1: You can't be too self conscious when you're goofing around
Speaker 1: in the waves. And it's just funny because it's like,
Speaker 1: why was surfing that time so fun? And being able
Speaker 1: to scientifically say like, oh this was why, it's like,
Speaker 1: oh I can start finding that around me in other ways,
Speaker 1: you know, yes.
Speaker 3: And I also think you hit on something that when
Speaker 3: people are like, well, what's a hack or fun? Try
Speaker 3: something new with another person.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I wouldn't say it's guaranteed, but it's like a good idea. Yeah,
Speaker 3: try something new even if it doesn't asserally sound feeling,
Speaker 3: because you can still have fun even if it like
Speaker 3: you're like, I don't really want to go surfing again,
Speaker 3: but that particular time that was fun. I'm glad we
Speaker 3: had a shared experience. We laughed, like we were connected.
Speaker 3: I was out of my head, you know. So, yeah,
Speaker 3: do something with someone else, do something new with someone else.
Speaker 2: And what about last questions?
Speaker 1: I always ask the worst part about your job, the
Speaker 1: worst part about writing this book? What was the hardest
Speaker 1: part about writing this or about trying to find fun
Speaker 1: in your life?
Speaker 2: Oh?
Speaker 3: God, Well, I think as I was saying, it was
Speaker 3: a challenging time to write about fun because it was
Speaker 3: literally right in the beginning of Lockdown. But I think
Speaker 3: the other challenge is that I've realized that I really
Speaker 3: do enjoy I'm not necessarily a full on extrovert, but
Speaker 3: I do enjoy human interaction, and I enjoyed doing stuff
Speaker 3: out in the world with my body, and freelance writing
Speaker 3: is not really that. So I think that my challenge
Speaker 3: both with my work with how to break up with
Speaker 3: your phone fun and you know, I'm doing this sub
Speaker 3: sec newsletter how to feel alive, Like it's too much
Speaker 3: screen time, so it's tricky to live the way I
Speaker 3: want to live. But then also realize so much of
Speaker 3: a writer's life is staring at a screen. So I've
Speaker 3: been trying to kind of shift away from that which
Speaker 3: I guess is a really useful realization though. You know,
Speaker 3: it's like, can I do more stuff like podcasting or
Speaker 3: just go have more experiences to then write about instead
Speaker 3: of just staring at a computer screen all day?
Speaker 1: It also makes sense why sometimes going to a coffee
Speaker 1: shop you've never been to to write and look at
Speaker 1: the people coming in with their dogs or overhearing a conversation,
Speaker 1: like why that makes things a little bit more fun.
Speaker 1: I find that for myself at least.
Speaker 3: Yeah, for sure. And I think also the hard part
Speaker 3: about writing is the isolation. And I think that was
Speaker 3: a useful takeaway from this book, is like social connection
Speaker 3: is really important for everybody, and I actually really want
Speaker 3: more of it in my own personal life and my
Speaker 3: professional life. And that actually really has led to me
Speaker 3: try to find more collaborations in more ways to you know,
Speaker 3: not just be sitting alone with my words.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Same, What about the best about being an author
Speaker 1: who got to do a deep dive in fun?
Speaker 3: I was gonna say it's led to some like interestingly
Speaker 3: justifiable tax write offs, but besides, it was for fun.
Speaker 3: And look, I wrote a book about fun. No. I
Speaker 3: think it's that it's like it is cool to be
Speaker 3: like the fun lady. You know, it's like I get
Speaker 3: to think about this and I don't. I remember being
Speaker 3: at a party once with a friend and I was like,
Speaker 3: I'm getting a lot more interesting opportunities as a result
Speaker 3: of this project than I would have said i'd written
Speaker 3: a book about war. And then I looked at his
Speaker 3: face and I was like, oh God, the reason I
Speaker 3: thought about a book about war is that he wrote
Speaker 3: a book about Wooh, I am so awkward. But anyway,
Speaker 3: I think that that is It's opened my own mind.
Speaker 3: It's made me think about these things for myself. It's
Speaker 3: made me change the way I parent, it's made me
Speaker 3: change the way I live my own life. And like,
Speaker 3: that's I think, a really cool and wonderful result from
Speaker 3: a professional project. So yeah, and it's led to things
Speaker 3: like this, like this is fun, Like this conversation with
Speaker 3: you is fun. This is a fun moment of my
Speaker 3: day and that's really cool. So I'm really grateful for it.
Speaker 1: Oh I love this.
Speaker 3: Oh, thank you, thanks so much. This truly was fun.
Speaker 3: I really really appreciated.
Speaker 2: Yay, we had fun.
Speaker 1: So yes, ask funny people fun questions. We are all
Speaker 1: here to learn. Now if you're intrigued about breaking up
Speaker 1: with your phone, or if you're intrigued about having more fun.
Speaker 1: There's a link to Catherine's website in the show notes,
Speaker 1: and her book on fun again is titled The Power
Speaker 1: of Fun, How to Feel Alive Again. There are also
Speaker 1: links to her social media on X and Instagram, as
Speaker 1: well as a link to our newsletter, and we have
Speaker 1: more links, including to the studies we mentioned and tour ted.
Speaker 1: Talk all up at aliward dot com, slash Ologies, slash Funology,
Speaker 1: and we are at Ologies on X and Instagram. I'm
Speaker 1: at ali Ward on both. If you ever need classroom
Speaker 1: friendly versions of ologies great news. Smologies is now its
Speaker 1: own show, available on its own feed. Find that wherever
Speaker 1: you get podcasts. You'll notice the new sage, green color
Speaker 1: and some colorful new illustrations, and that is also linked
Speaker 1: in the show notes for you, as is ologiesmerch dot com,
Speaker 1: and of course so is a link to the Patreon
Speaker 1: page at patreon dot com slash Ologies, which you can
Speaker 1: join for just a dollar a month. Aaron Talbert admins
Speaker 1: Theologies podcast Facebook group. Aveleen Malick makes the transcripts. Kelly
Speaker 1: ar Dwyer Woman's the website Noel Dilworth is our scheduling producer.
Speaker 1: Susan Hale is our all powerful managing director. Jake Chafey
Speaker 1: and Mercedes Maitland are our audio editors, and stepping in
Speaker 1: this week as lead editor. As the wonderful Mercedes was
Speaker 1: under the weather, we hope she feels better is Jared
Speaker 1: Sleeper of Mindjam Media, who is also married to me
Speaker 1: and kind enough to stay at the office a little
Speaker 1: late finishing this. He's also the funnest person I've ever meat,
Speaker 1: which is why I made our bond legally binding. Nick
Speaker 1: Thorburn wrote the theme music, And if you stick around
Speaker 1: till the end of the episode, I share with you
Speaker 1: a secret, And for that, I'm going to play you
Speaker 1: a little footage taken at that electric car charging spot,
Speaker 1: because I did leave you on a cliffhanger, and I
Speaker 1: feel like you need to know, Hey, did you.
Speaker 2: Guys drop fifty viagra?
Speaker 1: Where did you find?
Speaker 5: Them?
Speaker 1: Are all over here?
Speaker 2: Because there was a black tesla and an old man
Speaker 2: you drop something?
Speaker 1: So yeah, I did ask strangers who informed me that
Speaker 1: the older gentleman in a black tesla may.
Speaker 2: Have dropped it.
Speaker 1: If that was you, if you dropped your generic viagra
Speaker 1: and chuchilla. You definitely have my condolences. Thank you for
Speaker 1: making my night. How beautiful would it be if that
Speaker 1: person were listening? Life would just be sparkles and rainbows
Speaker 1: and dark matter cosmic connections. One can hope, one can hope.
Speaker 1: I blow you kisses. Okay, kiddos, this is your dad speaking,
Speaker 1: urging you to please go have some fun, get weird,
Speaker 1: be yourself, share a moment, even with a stranger or
Speaker 1: a lama, lose yourself.
Speaker 2: In the process. I shall go do the same orbye.
Speaker 1: Pacadermatologymology, rypdo zoology, lithology, zechnology, meteorology, of ptology, menthology, seriology, selinology.
Speaker 1: I was fun.
Speaker 5: There was fun.