When Did We Stop Knowing How to Have Fun?

What the hell does fun actually look like in midlife?

Last month a friend told me she was bored. A few days later I heard someone say, I don’t have time for fun.

I’ve been guilty of this too, allowing my busy-ness, my adult-ness, to get in the way of having fun in my life.

When I wrote the piece about Navigating Friendships in Midlife, I said that one thing I wanted to do is have more fun with my friends. And that’s still true.

But something I came to realize is that…

I don’t actually know how to have fun.

What makes things fun? And at what point in my life did I stop knowing the answer to that question?

According to research by writer Erin Manger in Well + Good, millennials in particular struggle with this as we are the children of boomers who traditionally put a lot of focus on achievement and the value of a hard day’s work.

While that’s respectable, it doesn’t leave much room for playfulness that is not connected to an outcome or greater goal.

In addition, Manger also talks about how “society has conditioned us to believe that adulthood means ‘acting your age’ and adopting a calmer, more contained demeanor in order to fit in—even when you're enjoying yourself.”

Nothing puts a stop to fun like sensing judgment from those around you.

And then there’s the Instagram of it all. When the perception of fun becomes more important than the having of fun, we’ve got trouble.

All of this adds up to us midlife folks wanting to have more fun but feeling completely stuck on how exactly to do that.

I mean, it’s not like we can just declare something to be fun. “I will have fun picking pumpkins this weekend.” 🤨 Will you?

And honestly, play is essential, and “integrating play into adult life contributes to overall well-being, stress reduction, and the maintenance of a healthy work-life balance.”

So why aren’t we doing more of it?

One issue I see come up is that too often we associate fun with consuming alcohol and/or spending money.

It seems to be that when planning to have fun, unless one of those things is part of said plan, it’s not gonna be fun.

This bothers me.

I don’t’ want my brain to be so clouded that I can’t even remember the “fun” I had with my friends.

And I don’t want to have to spend money. I have some money-related goals in my future that I’m saving for and I don’t want that to keep me from doing fun things, from experiencing fun.

So I started pushing back on this idea that alcohol and money are required ingredients for fun and I realized that left me asking myself…

What the hell does fun actually look like in midlife?

• Do you have to be laughing for it to be considered fun?

• Does it need to feel like a novelty?

• Must you be with others?

• If you’re alone is that fun or contentment?

Are there actual answers to these questions? Turns out: yes, there are.

According to Catherine Price, Author of The Power of Fun, in this NPR interview,

Fun is a combination of three things: playfulness, connection, and flow.

In the Venn diagram of life, fun is where these three things overlap.

OK, cool.

Wait, what?

I’m still not clear. What does this mean? And why, Catherine, are you not just telling me how to have more fun in my life?

How do I get my hands on playfulness, connection, and flow all at once?

Let’s start with what they mean. Price says,

Playfulness is about having a lighthearted attitude towards life and towards yourself.

Connection is the feeling of having a special, shared experience with other people.

Flow is being active and engaged, not distracted, and ditching your self-conscious thoughts.

She goes on to give an example of an adult woman who hung a disco ball in her basement and had dance parties with her friends.

When I first read that I rolled my eyes. That’s ridiculous.

No, that’s the point.

Dance parties with disco balls are delightful and silly and you laugh and smile with the people in the room and, assuming no one takes out their phone, they put us in a state of flow.

I mean, anyone else ever wanted to be invited to the Disco Café? Or is it Café Disco?

Ok, maybe a disco dance party is not for you, fair enough. Then, what is for you?

Creative activities, maybe? According to a BBC study, creativity had as great an influence on participants' wellbeing and happiness as sociodemographic factors like age and health.

Whatever fun may look for you, I think we can all agree in this serious world, we need to prioritize it for ourselves.

So how do we do that?

In this piece from Katie Doll, she suggests asking yourself a few questions:

• What are you interested in learning?

• What’s something you used to love but stopped doing?

• What’s something you’ve always wanted to try but never felt like you could?

• What’s something you do that lights you up?

I think that’s probably a good place to start.

But while the idea of answering those questions is simple, it is certainly not easy.

Ultimately, it seems as though it’s going to take some work to get to fun.

We have to take the time to understand what is fun for us, as individuals. Price suggests looking for themes in your past fun experiences.

We also need to learn how to build some habits: combatting our distractedness, ignoring judgement of others, and hushing our inner critic.

And we need to believe the idea that we can have fun in our everyday lives rather than it needing to be an “event”. Fun can be had in micro-moments.

I don’t know about you, but I’m ready to take fun seriously. 😉

I write without a paywall, but writing does take time. If you enjoyed this post, I’d be honored if you bought me a coffee — it fuels my writing!