Lowering the Fun Threshold

Let's consider two different funonemena*.

We'll call one "extreme" and the other "ordinary."

Extreme fun is, well, extreme. Fun that is so much fun that we are willing to risk life and limb to taste it, even if only for a second. It's the fun of sky diving, bungee jumping, rock climbing, snow boarding.

Ordinary fun is the chewing gum kind of fun, even the washing dishes kind of fun that comes with the warm water and emerging sparkle and the meditation-like expanse of timelessness that ends when the sink is empty.

The problem is that it's the extreme kinds of fun that get all the press. That's the kind of fun that soft drink commercials are made of. The other, the ordinary kind of fun goes for the most part unnoticed, barely felt.

Which is precisely why so many of us think that we aren't having fun. Which is precisely why so many of us really aren't having fun - because even when we are, we think we're not, if you know what I mean.

So all the commercial dollars that go into making it perfectly clear how this car or these shoes or those sunglasses lead inevitably to the ultimate expression of all-consumingly extreme fun - leave us, for the most part, in the shadows of despair, feeling that everything else we do is dreary, funless.

Which has the effect of raising the fun threshold to the point that hardly anything ever feels fun enough. Which is fine for the commercial powers, but not so good for us, the fun-seeking many, who buy and buy in to the belief that ordinary fun is not fun enough to be considered fun at all.

So we need to take back the fun that we are given on a daily basis: the fun of crunchy cereal, of cold milk and hot coffee, of birdsong and dog wag, of smiles and waves, of warm blankets and light reading, of bringing someone breakfast in bed, of holding someone, of being held.

We can start with making a list, an enumeration, of the things we do for no reason. The things we do for fun. The things that give us pleasure. The pleasures we give and get. The slight things that bring us moments of light. Sure, we can include the big things, the extreme ones. In fact, bringing the ordinary together with the extreme enriches our understanding of both, our embrace of all.

 

See also: minor fun

 

---

For the last few years I've been taking art classes. I love to draw
and I especially love to draw portraits. But I am truly untalented.
I'm the worst in every class I've taken.* I don't tell anyone that
I'm taking classes because they have a high performance threshold.
They immediately start asking questions to determine my motivation.
Are you thinking of selling your art? Do you hope to exhibit some
day? Do you hang them in your home? The assumption behind these
questions is that a person wouldn't take lessons and draw and paint
unless there's some external reward in it. The same thing happens to
people who love to write stories? Have you been published? Have you
submitted articles for publication? There doesn't seem to be an
understanding or an acceptance that certain activities are inherently
satisfying or that one would continue an activity unless one were
good at it.. Drawing, even poorly, is immensely satisfying to me. In
the future when work is done by the 10 people running the 10 machines
in the 4 global corporations, creating art for one's one satisfaction
will be one of the few activities that will make any sense.

* BTW being the worst most untalented person in the room has given me
new perspectives on teaching and learning. Academic subjects have
always been easy for me so being at the bottom of the class is a new
experience. And I must tell you it takes a mighty effort of will to
continue when you can see that the teacher takes no delight in your
efforts. How difficult it must be for a young person in a class who
senses a teacher's disappointment or lack of regard for his or her
work. This must be especially difficult when the notion of learning
for learning's sake is not, as a rule, highly valued in our schools
or are culture. And then when you're encouraged to compare yourself
to other students instead of comparing your self against your own
progress, it must be very discouraging.

Garry Shirts