You Need a Little Fun in Your Life
Back in 2000, I was sitting in a classroom studying psychology theories. I had recently decided to change careers and was shifting from being a field archaeologist to a professional counselor. In class, we had talked about Freud of course, and we’d covered a little bit of Jung, we’d ventured into behavioral waters and talked about Skinner, and we dove a little deeper into Beck and Cognitive Theory. On this particular day, we were talking about a slightly lesser-known name (at least to me): William Glasser, M.D.
Glasser came up with Reality Therapy in the 1960s, and out of its practice, Choice Theory was born. Glasser posited that human beings were driven to meet some basic needs. He said that all behaviors, whether healthy or unhealthy were aimed at meeting needs for survival, love and belonging, power, freedom, and fun. Back when I was initially learning about Glasser, I was drawn to the importance that he awarded to choice. I was desperately seeking a way to understand my life that felt more empowered; I was tired of feeling like everything was happening to me. Choice Theory gave me a buoy in what was, at the time, a rough sea.
My love of the power of choice continues to move me today, but that’s not what I want to focus on. I want to look at one particular need that Glasser asserted as important. I have fully embraced it as a necessity, and I want to make it easier for everybody else to do that as well. Which need, you ask?
This one: Fun.
Before I go any further, I think a very short review may be required. Glasser said that fun was a human need. William Glasser, M.D. did not say that fun was a want, just something that we might have now and then, or a reward for suffering and toil. He said that fun was a NEED. Go ahead and digest that and then take a moment to consider when you last made room for fun in your life. You might also ask yourself about some less-than-healthy things you do when you feel bored or over-worked or put-upon.
Now, if you’re not convinced about the importance of fun, I understand. Most of us haven’t grown up in a culture that puts fun, play, and pleasure at the top of the list. Not really anyway. These things are what we do AFTER we do other things. They are rewards for hard work. They are chocolate cake after you finish your terrible canned spinach.
If you’re one of the folks that put fun, play, and pleasure at the bottom of your to-do list, OR if when you’re honest with yourself you can admit that you engage in some unhealthy behaviors when you haven’t had any fun, today I’d like to convince you to alter your priorities a bit.
First, let’s check out a little neuroscience. Maybe you don’t associate brain scientists with the word fun. Indeed, a neuroscientist can’t point to a spot on your head or a picture of your brain and tell you where fun resides. They don’t really talk about fun in that way; what they talk about is pleasure. Pleasure is a feeling, and it’s a by-product of fun. When people experience pleasure, a specific part of the brain, called the ventral tegmental area, lights up like one of those old Lite Brite® Boards from the 70s. When that happens, the tails of the neurons in that area reach out lovingly to touch other parts of the brain. It looks a little like a root system. It gets even better. When those neurons light up and reach out, they release dopamine, the pleasure chemical, to the other parts of the brain. It’s a pleasure bath, and here’s why it’s important. Without that dopamine bath, human beings would cease to live. We wouldn’t care about food. We wouldn’t care about sex. No food and no sex results in no babies, and that means extinction. People have learned and practiced over and over again ways to activate this pleasure pathway - some healthy and some not-so-healthy. The point is, pleasure is a need. When we try to live a pleasure-deprived (read: dopamine-deprived) life, we set ourselves up to (1) feel terrible and/or (2) act out in ways that may be less than healthy for us and the world around us.
If the dopamine bath isn’t enough to get you to go discover a new hobby or play a game of pick-up with friends, let’s talk about the role fun plays in learning new things (and thus, keeping your brain alive). It’s partially due to the pleasure pathway we talked about above. Having fun increases dopamine, but that’s not all. It also increases delicious oxygen. These chemicals make learning easier. On a less, um, organic level, finding new fun things to do, whether you’re alone or with some fun-finding friends, sets you up to learn new things. You might learn how to knit a shawl, juggle, or play soccer, and that’s neat, but neater still is what you could learn about yourself in the process not to mention the self-esteem you get to tap as your skills develop. If you’re having fun in a group, you get to learn super cool things like social cue identification, communication, and boundaries too. While some of us come from healthy homes where these things were actively taught, lots of us could really use some healing time on the playground to pick up the skills that we bypassed in our quest for survival.
If I’ve managed to convince you that fun is a basic need, I’m glad, and I also want to help you start having fun if you’re out of practice. The following is presented especially for any of you who haven’t deliberately stepped into healthy fun since, oh, say, the age of 9, but they’re useful for anyone who’s feeling a little stale in the fun department.
Fun is subjective: What someone else finds fun may not be your cup of tea, and that is absolutely, 100% okay. Find what lights up your Lite Brite® board.
Having fun may not come easily at first. This is especially true if you’ve been out of practice for a while, if you’ve been abusing chemicals in your quest for fun, or if you’re feeling depressed or anxious. First, that’s okay. While it’s great when fun comes as easy as breathing, sometimes we have to do a little searching and some practicing. Accept that fun is a need, and keep going.
Open your mind. While it’s true that fun is subjective and not everything your friend enjoys will send dopamine racing through your brain, it is also true, at least in many cases, that you won’t know until you try. If a fun-finding friend invites you to try something new, give “yes” a chance if you are able. You could discover the new, best thing.
Look for the little fun or the small pleasures. Not all fun has to blow your mind. Pay attention to your daily life, and count your smiles. Keep a log. I mean it.
Practice mindfulness. Honest to goodness, one of the best techniques I know for increasing your fun/pleasure quotient is mindfulness meditation. Take 5 or 10 minutes a day to intentionally sit and watch your breath. That part might not be fun every time, but over the weeks and months of that practice, I can almost guarantee you’ll start experiencing more fun and pleasure, in the little and big forms, in your life.
Rather than force a long closing paragraph upon you, I’ll keep it short. Fun is a need. Make it a priority rather than an extra if-I-get-time-someday-I’ll thing.
For your reading pleasure:
1 Glasser, William, (1999). Choice Theory: A New Psychology of Personal Freedom. New York: Harper Perennial.
2 Linden, David J., (2011). The Compass of Pleasure: How Our Brains Make Fatty Foods, Orgasms, Exercise, Marijuana, Generosity, Vodka, Learning, and Gambling Feel So Good. New York: Viking.
3. Shafer, L., (2018). Summertime, playtime. Usable Knowledge: Relevant Research for Today’s Educators. Harvard Graduate School of Education. Retrieved from https://www.gse.harvard.edu/news/uk/18/06/summertime-playtime#:~:text=Social%20development%3A%20Playing%20with%20others,while%20negotiating%20and%20reaching%20compromises on March 13, 2022.