You need to have more fun.
There I said it.
Stop taking yourself so seriously and have some fun already. There’s been a glaring lack of fun happening lately and it’s time we did something about it.
We’ve Forgotten How To Have Fun
Table of Contents
It seems like all anyone ever talks about online these days are the same old blogging ideas:
- Start A Blog
- Create a posting schedule
- Build your brand
- Create your product
- Sell a Letter.ly subscription
- Debate if comments are good or evil
- Build your brand
- Find your voice
- Create a niche site
- Build your brand
- Build your brand
- Build your brand
Boring. If you really want to build your brand and differentiate yourself really quick, have some fun. People will start to notice because everyone else is taking themselves way too seriously.
Mark and I were talking about this the other day because it seems that everybody is so busy desperately trying to position themselves as an expert in whatever “social media” is, that people are forgetting to actually be social. We’re distilling socializing back down to the boring, sanitized, corporate-y version of social we think is “acceptable” to portray. Because of this, a lot of things are beginning to happen:
- We’re forgetting to be actually social.
- We’re forgetting that people like people, not robots.
- We’re forgetting that people like to laugh.
This isn’t an excuse to be unprofessional and I don’t think you should go into your next major client meeting with whoopee cushions in tow, but it is okay to have more fun with your blog and your life. Here’s a few ways to get started:
Laugh at yourself
There’s nothing more sad than a person who can’t laugh at his or her self. If you don’t know how to do this, please learn this skill ASAP. Life is a lot less embarrassing when you point out your own mistakes and own them rather than waiting until others point them out and you refuse to accept them. Here’s a few truths you’ll have to realize first before you get there.
- You’re human and you’re not perfect. It’s okay. Welcome to Earth. There’s 6 billion of us here. That’s Billion. With a B. Get comfortable
- You’re not as important as you’d like to think you are. You care more about yourself and your image than other people do.
- People have shorter memories than you think. Your great work will outshine your bad work. Focus on your great work. Laugh at your bad work and move on.
So go ahead. Look back at your bad work, laugh at yourself and get better.
I’ll start. Watch this video and try not to laugh –> 100 Pushup Fail. You can’t. I look [and sound] ridiculous. But I have two options: either I can try to hide that because it’s embarassing or I can laugh at it, own it, and use it as motivation as I keep on improving. I prefer option #2, so that means I have to spend a large amount of time laughing at myself and figuring out how to get better.
Have fun with others
I really like Nerd Fitness. If you don’t read the blog, you should because it’s one of the most entertaining fitness blogs around. And while the content is great, what I really enjoy about the site is how the founder, Steve Kamb, runs it. Steve doesn’t take himself too seriously and knows how to laugh at himself. On site, this leads to some pretty funny and entertaining articles. Off site, this usually leads us into making fun of each other back and forth on twitter in a sort of epic twitter hashtag war. They’re usually short and dumb arguments about how Steve is going to be #HugeInJapan after his recent Japanese radio interview or how #SteveKambIsGoingToBuyGoogle after his speaking engagement with them this summer, but it’s a lot of fun and different people chime in on either of our sides throughout the banter. So not only will having fun with other people not only serves to build a better relationship between you and them, but your audiences will absolutely love it. [Please note: make sure the other person has a sense of humor and is able to laugh at themselves. Otherwise you’re setting yourself up for a bad ending].
Steve Kamb on Twitter –> @SteveKamb [If you don’t follow Steve on twitter, you probably should, if for no other reason than to catch one of our epic twitter hashtag wars every now and then].
Have fun because you’re doing great work, not in spite of it
This doesn’t mean I want you to go dink around, go play videogames and waste your life. Doing great work that matters doesn’t mean you stop having fun and having fun doesn’t mean you stop doing great work. Rather, you start to have fun because of the great work you’re doing. Don’t think that’s possible? Well unfortunately for you, I’ve know a lot of of people proving you wrong:
Shannon and Kristin have one of the most intriguing blogs that I’ve come across in the last 6 months and they’re about to get huge [you read it here first]. Their blog is called All of Us Revolution where they’re documenting their efforts to build an ethical clothing line from scratch. The majority of the time, they’ll dive into commentary on consumerism and what they do for their actual work, but for Valentine’s Day they decided to do something different. They decided to write up a tongue-in-cheek piece titled The 8 Most Eligible Bachelors of the Blogosphere. They had fun with it, made a few jokes and found embarrassing quotes from everyone they chose, and the post absolutely blew up. What’s really cool is that they didn’t just isolate the “fun” they have to that one post. If you watch their videos, it’s clear they’re not only working on something that matters to them, but they’re having a lot of fun doing it as well.
Shannon & Kristin on Twitter –> @AllOfUsRev
I’m a big fan of the way Dan does work. He puts in crazy hours, manages a multi-national team spanning multiple time zones all over the world while simultaneously building a million-dollar business from the ground up. In between that, he somehow manages to write two blogs, record a weekly podcast with his business cohort Ian and create internship programs for people who want to live abroad, travel and get a lot of hand-on business experience. Despite all the specific things Dan does, the thing that I love about Dan though is that he loves what he does. Every time I listen to a podcast, I end up laughing because the fun he and Ian have doing business carries over to the podcast and it actually shows. Dan is doing some things that other people only talk about, but he’s having a blast doing it. He doesn’t sacrifice his work to have fun, but he’s also consciously aware that he’s working in order to create freedom and live, not just work.
Dan on Twitter –> @TropicalMBA
Not Just For Bloggers
Just because the three people I mentioned happen to have blogs, doesn’t mean that this only applies to bloggers. If you have a normal 9-5 job, you could probably stand to have more fun there too and it would actually help you work better.
The big players already know this. In fact, Zappos’s [you know, the Zappos that sold to Amazon.com for $928 Million dollars? Yes, that Zappos] third core company value is “create fun and a little weirdness.” Their website explains:
“We want just a touch of weirdness to make life more interesting and fun for everyone. We want the company to have a unique and memorable personality.”
Zappos realized that people doing really great work, tend to do it because they have fun doing it. Their site goes on to say:
One of the side effects of encouraging weirdness is that it encourages people to think outside the box and be more innovative. When you combine a little weirdness with making sure everyone is also having fun at work, it ends up being a win-win for everyone: Employees are more engaged in the work that they do, and the company as a whole becomes more innovative.
Having a better time working, actually helps you do better work. Who would have thought?
Google recognizes this too and they’ve learned to have fun and laugh at themselves. While some companies are worried about brand colors, integration, uniformity and strategy, Google constantly is changing their home page logo to be something different for special occasions. They even created a dedicated Google Doodle team just for this.Whether it’s Earth Day, Thanksgiving or Jules Verne’s 183rd birthday, they’re always coming up with something new and creative. Google literally pays someone to have fun for them as a company.
If Google needs to have more fun. You need to have more fun.
So start having more fun with life. It doesn’t have to be a huge change to start. It could be something as simple as sending Steve Kamb antagonizing hash tag messages on twitter [which I wholly endorse you doing], or something as easy as reflecting on the last six months and laughing at the things you used to do [and maybe still do] and striving to get better. The important thing is that you make some change.
Why I Do The Impossible
It’s kind of fun to do the impossible – Walt Disney
It’s weird to explain fun to people. It’s the most natural thing in the world, but at the same time, it feels so unnatural. You can feel guilty and lazy just thinking about having fun. After all, you’re supposed to work and work is not fun! But that’s not the way it’s supposed to be. Sure, not every part of work is fun, but the overall process of creating, accomplishing and having something to show for it all at the end of the day makes it worth it. So why do I do what I do?
- I do marketing because it’s enjoyable to me. I love solving problems and helping companies get better and grow.
- I have a side hustle because I enjoy working for myself and getting better on my own terms.
- I run triathlons because of the constant challenge, so I keep pushing myself.
I do the impossible because doing it is a lot more fun than just daydreaming about it. Telling a great story is almost always better than reading one and living out a great story is even better.
Live a great story. Do something impossible. Have some fun.
[Photo Credit]
I love that quote by Disney, btw.
Great post. I’ve been lucky enough to have 9-5 jobs that were a little strange and (usually) a lot of fun. I get paid to play on the computer all day now. In my blog life, I probably put in too much time messing with it; what had started as a hobby and a creative outlet for writing has become this thing where I worry about my analytics and subscribers-all about the numbers. But you’re right: if you build it, they will come. OR, better, if you do something crazy, they’ll laugh.
I like that –> If you do something crazy, they’ll laugh :).
Great post Joel! I notice a lot of the same things from following people on Twitter that comment a lot about how many followers they have or how many viewers they had to their blog today. It’s like a number chasing and analytic game – which isn’t what I want to hear about, and usually goes against the spirit of their blogs, which are all about having fun and living freely. The most interesting people are the ones that are actually doing interesting things.
– My thoughts exactly
A blog post on fun! I might actually cry tears of joy on this one. That is, if I wasn’t already having so much fun 🙂
It’s about time we start taking fun seriously. 🙂
True dat brotha! 🙂
Joel,
As I said last night during the U-stream chat, I think you’re really starting to find your voice. The last few posts I’ve read from you have been the best I’ve seen and I loved this one. I noticed your verbal sparring with Steve Kamb which was quite entertaining. But you make some really great points. There’s really no point to any of this if we’re not having fun while doing it.
Thanks Sri. It means a lot :). I think people are starting to pick up on mine & Steve’s banter and we have fun going back & forth with it. All in good fun 🙂
I’m with Srini. Really liking your approach in the blogosphere. Calling it how it is. Having fun. Connecting and writing and doing the impossible for the sake of living a more interesting and fulfilling life. Keep it up amigo.
De nada amigo 🙂
Joel awesome outlook! You know how much fun I’m into having?! I am the organizer of The Fun Stuff MeetUp group where I live! We do only things are fun and allow only fun people in the group!
There is too much negativity and pressure and beating ourselves up out there! Why do we do what we do? Ultimately because it makes us happy. And does having FUN ever not make us happy? HELL NO!
It’s been FUN reading your post Joel!
LAUR 🙂
Do you really have a meetup called the Fun Stuff Meetup? What happens if something you organize isn’t actually fun? Are you banned? 🙂
Thanks for reading Lauren!
Bang on chap!
So let’s say, while i’m sitting in my bed in the geriatrics ward, and my sponge bath is already done for the day, and i literally have nothing to do but ponder the life i’ve lived… would i be more pumped that i made a schmillion beans? or that i didn’t care how much moneys i made cause i lived this thing right, and i believe that tied into integrity, love and gratitude sits that thing called fun.
it’s all just a smoke show if you didn’t enjoy the sh*t out of it.
great post mang!
I want to sit in that geriatric ward and say, “crap look at all the awesome stuff I did, the people I met, and the amazing time I had doing it.”
This is such a refreshing post (and not just because we’re in it– thanks again for that by the way)!
We all talk about living life on our own terms and focusing on work that we’re passionate about. It’s important to remember that, for a lot of us, this is the lifestyle we’ve chosen. Not the lifestyle we’re stuck in. So, if we’re not having fun, then what are we doing?
As you can tell from our videos, Kristin and I try not to take ourselves too seriously. The little quirks, the mistakes, the off-kilter posts are what humanize us as bloggers. Thanks for reminding us all of that!
Thanks for being such a killer example to write about Shannon. I like your guys style and I’m looking to see you guys do big things in 2011 :). Good luck and (of course) have fun!
Hey Joel,
I agree 100% on the fun. I imagine a world where the focus is 100% on FUN and it would be a great place. When you are having fun and doing awesome things, there could not be anything better than that.
Keep up the great postings.
Peace.
Obviously not everything can always be 100% fun, but if we could get close….man that would be sweet.
OK, lets aim for 85% of the time for fun and 15% of the time for serious stuff!
Sounds good to me.
Yes yes yes! Do fun stuff, THEN blog about it. It seems that too many blogs are just blogs about how to blog. LOL.
Thanks Roy 🙂 That’s what I try to do.
Indeed, sometimes I find myself brainstorming “what fun thing can I do today, so I can later blog about it”. The blog become leverage 😉
It’s been a good motivator for me too.
I totally agree with the ladies that you are hot stuff, I totally agree with the point of this article, and I totally agree with your decision to link to me, as well as your decision to surround that link with laudatory evaluations. Thank you sir. Thank you.
I forgot to mention, I also love your comments. Well played sir. Well played.
Thanks for the birthday wishes! It was awesome. Snowboarding, beers, and a great show by Trombone Shorty and Los Amigos Invisibles (you MUST see them if they come to your corner).
I agree with Alan, that you call it like it is and I love your style. Perhaps my favorite tweet ever was something along the lines of, “No, I don’t live in Southeast Asia and write about making money blogging.”
BIT is refreshing.
“BIT is refreshing.” – I will take that compliment all day. Thanks Kristin 🙂
Laughing at yourself is the best medicine. I try to instill this into my kids but they may be a little young… my 6-year-old cries if we laugh at anything funny she says because she thinks we’re laughing “at” her. Laughing at yourself is a fine line, and personally I love crossing it!
You’re teaching her to have tough skin at a young age :). Haha, good for you. She’ll appreciate it when she’s older.
Wait, YOU WERE JOKING THIS WHOLE TIME?
Oh…me too.
-Steve
That’s just so everyone doesn’t think I’m a terrible person. #imtotallyserious 🙂
Your point about laughing at your failures and using them as motivation reminds me of a Mark Cuban quote: “It doesn’t matter how many times you fail. It doesn’t matter how many times you almost get it right. No one is going to know or care about your failures, and neither should you. All you have to do is learn from them and those around you because all that matters in business is that you get it right once. Then everyone can tell you how lucky you are.”
It’s amazing how quickly people forget about your failures. Don’t make a big deal of it, laugh it off and move on.
Dude, you totally read my mind. Or maybe my brainwaves hit yours or something… Either way, it’s pretty damn cool that we had the same thoughts at around the same time.
Lately I’ve been sucking the fun out of everything – I’ve been getting too serious, too stuck in ‘productivity robot’ mode where everything is a measure of my personal effectiveness. Screw that noise. I wanna have fun. I want to do things with a flourish, screw up, and laugh at myself. Hardcore efficiency is cool but being cool with everything I do is way cooler.
Anyway, check out this post I wrote 2 weeks ago – Whatever Happened to Having Fun? (I know it’s bad form to link in comments, but it’s totally relevant.
I like the way you think, man. Skype date soon?
Robots are cool, but being human is a lot more fun :). As Chris Guillibeau would say, “efficiency is overrated.” Shoot me an email and we’ll see if we can’t figure out a time that works for us. 🙂
Yes. So very yes. Between the recent lack of authenticity and the lack of people just having fun online, it can sometimes be a rough place. Which is unfortunate cause there are SO many fun and awesome people kicking around. Heck, as you noted, there are so many fun and awesome people kicking around the world in general.
Laughing at yourself, having fun with others, loving what you do – they all mix together to be great points in a pretty frickin’ cool manifesto!
As for the fun in the impossible…the Rubik’s Cube obsession didn’t just HAPPEN! People love to make the impossible possible. Not everyone likes to put in the work (and have fun!!!) to do it.
There are so many cool people running around everywhere. It’s about time we kicked back and started to enjoy it.
“Welcome to Earth. There’s 6 billion of us here. That’s Billion. With a B. Get comfortable”
JOEL. You are so goddamn funny. I hope I’m not objectifying the life out of this statement, but wonderful and important blog post topic!
Most of the time, one of the most challenging things I have is my blog and, honestly, most of the time I’m not having any fun doing it. I used to be really passionate about it but between getting frustrated at not doing well and not having the time to research like I want to, I chalk the thing up as a burden and neglect it.
Thanks for the reminder. Maybe I’ll chill the hell out. Grace and peace.
Haha, Thanks for the nice words Roe. Chill out, write what you want to write about and enjoy it. 🙂
Probably one of your best posts that I have ever written. And I would bet dollars to doughnuts that you had a blast writing it. You can tell, it comes through in your writing.
Keep killin it Runyon.
#JealousOfStevesCelebrityStatus
“one of you the best posts i have ever written” – You’re writing my posts for me? When were you going to let me know? I was wondering who kept updating my blog :).
#WishICouldBeHugeInJapanLIkeSteve
your last posts are incredible!!!
Maria
Thanks Maria 🙂
Fun will not make you money, nor will money make you fun. Love this post…FUN read.
I get that Nerd Fitness vibe–there is a “lightness to being” that follows a few risks a few hard knocks, and a few victories.
What is the true end of man, they asked me in catechism: “to delight in God, as he delights in you.” That’s a doctrine I can dig.
–m
I can dig that.
Lovely post. I recently came up with my own Fun Manifesto, extending what I’d seen on the web (including your post). I believe that it’s not only important to chill and have some fun and not take things so seriously – it’s important to take fun seriously. Fun can be us blowing off steam, or taking a break – but at the core it’s us at our best.
Take a read, let me know what you think. I’d love to hear.