"It is fun to have fun, but you have to know how."
These words by Dr. Seuss flashed to my face the fact that I still don't know the real essence of fun and the right ways to have fun. With my childhood experiences and challenges growing up, I became overly serious about life and work, leaving me exhausted and anxious, putting in motion the following questions in my head: How do people relax? Why do some people seem so happy despite hardship? How do we have fun? To get the bottom of it, I perused The Power of Fun by Catherine Price. Even though I had to go through tons of anecdotes, I was still able to get the important lessons about true fun.
Like me, Price also wondered about the true meaning of fun, hence the book. She is an award-winning science journalist and speaker and the person behind ScreenLifeBalance.com which aims to provide people ways on how to lessen their screen time and increase their time with their family and friends. She also authored the book How to Break Up with Your Phone.
Here are some insights I gained from The Power of Fun:
- There are two kinds of fun: true fun and fake fun.
- True fun has three elements: playfulness, connection, and flow.
- Judgment gets in a way of having true fun.
- While technology has numerous benefits, it can be a tool of distraction especially now that we consume a lot of content from social media and other apps on our phones.
- We can have fun by making space for it.
To illustrate her message, she shared stories of people from different walks of life from the beginning of the book until the last chapter. This is what I noticed about self-help books written by entrepreneurs, advocates, and speakers. They include a lot of studies and anecdotes in addition to their own stories that expand their books to hundreds of pages. I have to push myself to read these stories because I know they could help me understand what the author is trying to say but, honestly, it was not that fun at all. Good thing, I don't give up on books for I know I could learn something from them.
The Power of Fun did change the way I look at fun. Price said that true fun is the point where playfulness, connection, and flow meet. She encourages the reader to consider if the activity has these three elements to experience genuine fun. This is the most important message for me. She also has a lot tips on how to have fun and keep at it that I find helpful.I am thankful that I didn't stop reading this book.
What do you do for fun?