I’ve been reading Catherine Price’s wonderful book The Power of Fun: How to Feel Alive Again and wanted to share a few ideas with you today. You can have more fun parenting and living, even during one of the busiest times of the year.
Each season as a parent can be a hard time to have fun because you feel frenetic. You may be shuttling your kids to activities, prepping for gatherings or celebrations, adjusting to new schedules, and balancing everything with your own work or projects. And yet, the world beckons you to go outside and just have fun, too. How do you manage hectic family schedules, juggle all the balls, and still have fun?
Let’s take a moment to have some fun together. Keep reading to “SPARK” some fun in your life.
What is “true fun”?
Here’s how one person described the feeling of “True Fun” to Price:
“It’s a visceral feeling of lightness, where your chest expands and you feel like you could lift off the ground…It’s laughter and joy and feeling like you wouldn’t want to be anywhere else in the world. (Fun is )doing something you love with other people, where you don’t care about what other people think. It’s a feeling of freedom. It’s being a bit reckless and giving your inner child a chance to come out and play.” (p.31)
When is the last time you had this feeling? Revisiting those feelings can bring them back into both your mind and body, and lift your spirits. When is the last time you had this feeling? Revisiting those feelings can bring them back into both your mind and body, and lift your spirits.
Connect with your own fun
Take a moment to close your eyes and think back to a time when you remember having fun. When have you felt playful, connected, and in flow (Price’s equation for True Fun)?
A memory of fun could be something that happened yesterday or long ago…just call that feeling to mind.
Who were you with, if anyone?
What made it so fun?
How did you feel?
Re-imagine it using all of your senses to bring it to life. Feel those feelings again and enjoy the memory. Notice what made that experience feel so fun.
Want some inspiration?
Try some of my guided meditation audios, especially the “Catalyst and Intention” meditation and the “Peak Values” meditation. These are helpful at bringing pleasurable past experiences back into your consciousness and offering inspiration.
True Fun = Connection + Playfulness + Flow
As Price researched what people of all ages and backgrounds defined as fun, she was able to see that some combination of experiences of connection, playfulness, and flow (that feeling when you lose track of time and fully are in the moment) were the key ingredients of fun. We may not experience all three of those when having fun. However, we can start noticing when those elements are present, and appreciating how they contribute to that feeling of fun.
When you are feeling good and appreciating how fun something is, pause and notice which elements are present. How much are you feeling connected – to yourself and/or another person? Are you feeling playful – joking, laughing, being a little irreverent or surprising? Did you lose track of time and feel in the moment, like things were flowing with synergy?
What you focus on grows, so pay attention to these elements of fun.
You can also notice when the key elements of fun are missing, and you are not having fun. Then you can make a conscious shift towards playfulness, connection or flow and see what happens.
Want to have more fun? Do a Fun Audit
Here’s a spin on the “Energy Diagram” I sometimes ask my parent coaching clients to do: The Fun Audit. (For more info, read Chapter 4 of Price’s book.) G
Get a piece of paper and write the following. Create a grid with Energy on the X axis and Enjoyment on the Y axis:
Add examples of things that fall in each quadrant. As you do this, notice any patterns
Pattern Example:
Top Left: High stress things that require energy and aren’t that enjoyable. Sometimes we have to do these things, but we can make an effort to limit them.
Lower Left: Things that drain your energy, waste your time, or make you fall into despair. These are things you might want to prune from your life as much as possible.
Top Right: Experiences that have potential for “True Fun” because they are energizing and enjoyable. Focus on doing more of these!
Lower Right: Activities that are more like hobbies and pleasant pastimes because they are enjoyable and don’t require as much energy. Carve out time for these instead of doing the things in the lower left quadrant when you need to relax and recharge.
Consider inviting your family members to do a fun audit as well. Or, try creating a family one together, especially if your children are young.
How to use your Fun Audit
Notice what things you are doing to have fun in your life, and what things you’d like to do more often. It’s ok if you can’t imagine how yet. Just identifying and naming these things will help your mind move you closer to making them happen. This is especially true if you write them down or find pictures that represent those ways you have fun and put them up where you’ll see them more often – like a mini vision board.
Identify your “fun magnets.” Price calls these the Activities, People, and Settings that typically generate fun for you.( p.144) Which of these helped you experience connection, playfulness, and flow? Which do you have easy access to? Which do you need to plan for more? As you get clear on what your fun magnets are, you can plan them into your daily life more consciously and increase your likelihood of having more fun.
Applying these ideas to your current life
We still have to do all of the responsibilities of life and parenting, AND we can focus on bringing in more elements of fun and spark joy.
SPARK: Catherine Price shares her recipe for Fun
Make Space
Give yourself a permission slip to do more of the things that bring you both energy and enjoyment. Take a nap, order takeout, go on an after dinner walk, forget the dishes and go play frisbee with your kids before bedtime, dance in the rain or watch the lightning.
Schedule a regular check in with any parenting partners to plan out what needs to happen, who is doing what, and how each person can get some space to do something fun that they would enjoy.
Pursue Passions
Identify your interests and passions. Often we get so busy with parenting and work that there’s no energy left for exploring our passions and we can feel like we don’t have any anymore.
Take a moment to remember things you once loved or dreamed about doing and see if you can focus on one of them again. What would you like to try? Consider something silly or odd, but that catches your fancy when you think about it. What do you feel jealous of other people doing that you might like to do, too?
Remember that sometimes these passions can fit into 15 minutes of time, like identifying plants as you walk by a garden, reading a few pages of a book, sketching, singing, doing cartwheels, or dancing. Some of them you can do on your own and some you might invite your kids or partner to do with you.
Attract Fun
Find people who are non-judgmental, kind, spontaneous, open to new ideas, and up for doing things together and spend more time with them. Be this way yourself and you will find people are attracted to being with you!
Practice a growth mindset. If something is hard, find ways to make it more fun and you will have more fun. If someone is annoying you, remove yourself from their company and go do something you enjoy and you will attract others (maybe even that person) to come have fun with you. Remember that the most satisfaction comes from struggling with something and getting through it.
Send out play signals. Watch how animals signal that they want to play. A dog will bring you a ball or a stick, wag its tail, bark, or come nuzzle your elbow. How can you initiate fun and play in your life? Sometimes just doing a funny walk or speaking in a silly way is enough to get my kids laughing and feeling cooperative. Chasing them up the stairs or plopping onto the couch and opening my arms to my kids can invite a laugh or a snuggle without a single word!
Rebel
As you think back on times when you had intense moments of fun, you might notice that some of your memories involve some rebellion – doing something unexpected, irreverent, against the rules, or a little bit naughty, and that is precisely why it was so much fun. There is a thrill to breaking out of the normal patterns of life and doing something unexpected. We get a natural jolt of adrenaline that energizes us.
We can do this in our daily life with our kids, too! Think back to your own childhood. What moments of fun stand out to you? Pancakes for dinner, playing a harmless prank, hide and go seek, skinny dipping, a spontaneous trip with a friend are just a few that come to mind for me. As parents, we can surprise our kids by doing funny little things, whether it be a silly walk, a spontaneous ice cream cone, or anything that breaks up the normal routine.
Ask your own parents or elderly friends about fun times from their pasts and you will often notice a theme of rebellion. Collecting these stories will give you inspiration to make your own life more fun.
Keep at it
Like any positive habit, we need to keep at it and build it into our lives if we want to internalize that new way of being. This takes conscious effort. Here are a few of the many ideas Price suggests in her book:
Create a fun squad of 2-6 people with whom you commit to checking in with every month or so for at least 6 months. You can agree to share about fun things you have done (if you live far apart) or to do fun things together (in person or virtually – something we got better at through the pandemic).
Plan for and embrace fun – in both micro and macro moments. Look back at your Fun Audit or memories and look for little ways you can have fun in daily life. Hop off the train before you get to your usual stop and walk on a beautiful day. If a meeting gets canceled, use that surprise time to do something delightful instead of just catching up on work. Sign up to learn something you’ve always wanted to try. Make a date with someone you enjoy – either on your own or with your family. Go on a spontaneous outing with minimal preparation and see what happens (best if your kids are older). Give yourself 15 minutes a day to practice an instrument, draw or read a book. Set an example of taking time to enjoy your life for your kids.
Keep a Fun Journal or build a Fun Toolkit.
Find a journal where you can make brief notes about your fun experiments. Make a fun toolkit that has a list of fun ideas and some of the materials that lead to fun for you and your family – props, games, silly items, questions, souvenirs from past fun for inspiration.
Fun is contagious!
When we feel happy and energized, everyone else around us benefits. Give yourself permission to put down your phone, go to bed earlier, and have more fun. You will feel happier and your kids will, too!
Want to get an instant buzz of fun? Check out a few clips from “Improv Everywhere”. They create spontaneous fun for people in New York City. Get ready to smile and feel inspired – from the “No Pants Subway Ride” to the “Magical Porta Potty.”
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