Are We Starved of Fun?
Are We Starved of Fun?
Ways to Squeeze More Joy Out of Every Day
In this newsletter, we provide you with notes on We Are Critically Fun Starved | Michael Rucker, Ph.D. - The Fun Habit, an episode of The 1000 Hours Outside Podcast.
Hosted by Ginny Yurich, an author, speaker, and creator of The 1000 Hours Outside Podcast. She is joined by Dr. Michael Rucker, an organizational psychologist, behavioral scientist, and author of The Fun Habit.
Read our notes below.
Topics Covered in this Summary
Happiness vs Fun
Prioritizing Fun Over Happiness
Ways to Squeeze More Joy Out of Every Day
Happiness vs Fun
Happiness is a state of mind, and fun is something that we can schedule and plan.
Many people spend a lot of time and energy in their lives trying to find happiness. They think that if they have “fun,” they’ll be happy.
Getting likes on social media is fun. But life isn't about having fun. It's about happiness and fulfillment. Get off social media and see if your life makes you happy.
Giving birth is not entirely fun, but the joy you will feel minutes after seeing your newborn baby is pure happiness.
Unlike happiness, fun isn't something that may or may not arise under perfect circumstances. Having fun is an activity anyone can take, here, now, practically anywhere, anytime.
Prioritizing Fun Over Happiness
People who think happiness is so far away end up using their free time to think about how far they are from where they want to be which leads to not utilizing time efficiently.
According to Dr. Rucker. “Once you get on that downward spiral, it becomes an exercise of confirmation bias, and you start to see things in that negative way as well”. Your time would be better spent focusing on having fun.
We view happiness as a framework of cause and effect. When we do things that we see as fun, over time, we’ll perceive ourselves as being happier.
Research shows that if you go out and have fun deliberately, you don't necessarily need to be happy, but you can keep these joyful and delightful experiences in your own way. Ultimately, happiness is going to be an amazing byproduct.
Ways to Squeeze More Joy Out of Every Day
We often mistakenly think that magical moments shouldn't require planning, but you have to commit to making space for them in your life to do so effectively.
Here are some things to think about:
Know what makes you happy. A key to steering your own happiness is reflecting on the things that make you come alive. Think back to what gave you joy in your younger years. Make a list, if it helps.
Schedule things and plan. When our kids are young, we want to be very expansive about the experiences they have. Often, we’re scrambling to figure out something to do. And if that things happen to be outside and they're weather dependent, we can't seize that moment if we don't have a list of things to pull from.
Ditch your phone. There’s mounting evidence to support the fact that excessive phone use can lead to changes in the brain and impact your mood, even revealing more serious cognitive and emotional changes in adolescents and young adults.
Invest in quality time with the people you care about. It's easy to get caught up in our responsibilities and neglect our relationships. But losing touch with friends is one of the most common end-of-life regrets. Make an effort to stay connected to the people who make your life brighter.
The real change will come when you notice how great you feel after reclaiming some time for fun. It allows you to show up as the best version of yourself. Remember, it’s not just for you, but also for everyone around you.
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Listen to the original episode