Making Room for Play: Just Wanna Have FUN!
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Welcome to Cultural Coalition Beichang Nandiao. I'm Victoria. I'm Yijing. Today, we are diving deep into a topic that resonates with so many of us. Rediscovering oneself in your 30s, finding the joy of play and having fun even as adults, and learning what it's like to be too happy or have too much fun.

We're going to take you on a bit of a journey as we explore the fascinating facets of defining F-U-N fun. So buckle up. First one we're going to discuss about is how we rediscovering ourselves in our 30s. So EJ, I wonder what's one of your fondest childhood memories?

It's so funny that you ask this because I've actually been thinking about this a lot recently because it was just my cousin's birthday. My memory has to do with her. Growing up, we used to like

play a lot together because, you know, we were around the same age. And so my parents would drop us off at her house. And she always had like the coolest like Barbie sets and like the Barbie houses and things like that. And it was at the time in the 90s where like

the Spice Girls were really popular. So we would like get the Barbies and we would like create these like really intricate dance routines to the Spice Girls. So it was just her birthday a few days ago. So I actually said happy birthday and then I did spice up your life. So yeah, that's probably one of my favorite memories was doing that with her, my sister. That sounds interesting. I just recently watched the David Beckham, the

documentary he shot it and there's like the memory of him his wife and his vice girl was like oh and you mentioned that was like oh that's I can I have the image in my head yeah that's quite interesting what about you what's one of your uh fondest childhood memories

Well, like, I don't think I have a, like, very good memory. So the only thing I can think of is when I was young, like, I played with the kids from my building after school. So back then, even I lived in Beijing, but I didn't live in the Hutong. We have, like, a huge building and people live, people are quite close to each other. And I remember, like, there's a playground in front of the building and we just played.

so happy to play with with each other after school and each time by the dinner time and my mom will just like call me back to home to eat yes that's something i can think of like when i was young that's pretty fun is that phrase mama tell you we have to eat yes because like you are so happy you just like on the plate you don't want to go back to eat you know yeah exactly

Speaking of, like, the fun, the childhood memories, so have you ever been so happy you can speak? And what were some of those things for you growing up? Definitely. I would say probably the biggest thing was Christmas. I remember trying to explain, like, the magic of Christmas to someone in China who, like, maybe hadn't really experienced, like, a traditional Christmas before. And, like, I don't know. There's something about, like...

the build up and the anticipation and like you make your Christmas list and like you try to be on your best behavior, you know, for the whole year or at least the month leading up to Christmas because you want to make sure you get everything right.

But I don't know. There's just something about like going to bed and like everything being normal and waking up the next day and you have this like beautiful tree and like all these presents underneath it. And like, you know, people are cooking and it's like your favorite breakfast foods and like everyone's in a happy mood and like,

I don't know, you can't really speak. You're just so excited. I don't know. It's something like that that I feel like as an adult, we don't really celebrate Christmas that way anymore. And also, I feel like you sort of know what's going on behind the scenes as a kid or as an adult now. So it doesn't feel, you know, as exciting. But yeah, I would say that's definitely something that every year, you know, it was just like a type of an excitement that you feel like in your body.

That sounds quite exciting. The way I can think like similarly in China is how we celebrate the Chinese New Year. But I don't think like the logic behind how we celebrate is similar because only thing for children how we got excited is because the red packet. So you got that from the parents, from grandparents. But yeah, the Christmas thing sounds like could be like something you can very like expect like

something looking forward to for the next day when the Christmas day arrived. Do you feel like, you know, now that we're obviously not children anymore, do you feel like fun has ever like stopped for you or there's been a time in your life where maybe fun or play has been less of a priority? Absolutely. I think...

The part of that is we never really stop pursuing having fun, right? It's just over the time, having fun or try to have fun is lower priority right now, especially after graduating from school.

And we really step into the real world where we search for jobs, a place to live, a partner, and we try to make friends and eventually begin to build families. Right. And suddenly all of this aspect are taking priorities of our life. So like it seems having fun is not that important anymore. How do you feel?

I definitely agree in that, like, I've also observed that people, because of whatever changes in their life, they tend to deprioritize, if you will, fun. I...

feel like I don't know if I've ever really stopped prioritizing it. I think part of it is that like whether it's socially with my friends or in my communities or even at work, it's hard for me to

want to sustain something if I'm not enjoying it. I think like even things that maybe, you know, I start, let's say for a job, if they initially are fun and exciting for me, I think once they stop being fun and exciting for me, uh,

Like, my motivation changes, right? I, like, end up wanting to seek out something else that's going to give me some sense of, you know, joy or excitement. So, I don't know. I can't tell if that's a good or a bad thing. You know, sometimes it makes me think about, like, toxic positivity and, like, seeking out things just because they're good and positive. And I don't know if I'm necessarily...

at that place but I do think that sometimes like especially in in the workplace sometimes I can like

convince myself that the work itself is fun or good. But it's not. It's just that the reward that I get for doing the job is good. So I do have to, I don't know, that's something that I've been like considering a lot recently. But if I had to think of like one specific thing that I do feel like was lost for me in terms of fun was like reading.

I feel like I used to really, really love reading and being able to do that just for fun. I think school kind of took some of that out. But I think being out of school now is making its way back into my life. So I'm happy about that. That's interesting. I think when I was young in the school, I never thought reading was a fun part of the whole teenage life.

But now I quite enjoy reading because like I feel reading, it gives me a lot of me time. It just be quiet, enjoy a cup of coffee or like cup of tea. And in the afternoon, I just like stay in a cozy room and hearing like

jazz and can read books i think that's quite like fun in adulthood but like for especially in china right like when you in school you read the only thing you read is because you need to remember all the things and you need to do that for the test so i don't think that's fun for me when i was young so we're talking about like we explore the importance of playing the

How many of your childhood joys have continued into adulthood since we're talking about reading? Is there other things in your... Definitely singing. I feel like singing has been a through line in my life. It's taken like very...

various forms. You know, I used to be in choirs growing up. I actually hated choirs growing up, even though I liked singing. Um, I think I was just so shy and like afraid of being seen and like being heard. I'm like, what if I messed up? Um, but I did choirs. I got into musical theater. I did acapella, you know, being in China, karaoke was so big. And so a lot of KTV, um,

And like even being back here, right, there's a lot of karaoke, you know, at bars and things like that in the U.S. even. And I live alone and I have a pretty nice speaker. So I like do sing a lot to my dogs. So I feel like singing for me is something that has been a pretty important through line.

And then also learning languages. I've always, always, always enjoyed learning languages. Like even when I was a kid, I would just like make up languages on my own because I just always thought it was so cool. So I don't have as much of the same discipline maybe as I did in my younger years. So like sit down and study every day and like give it the commitment that it needs. But, you know, my Duolingo has probably, I don't know,

at any given time, four to seven languages on it. So I do it more so for fun now than trying to like, I don't know, become fluent. But if I could quit my job and just become a professional language learner, I probably would. Wow. So how many languages you can speak? Ooh, how many can I speak? Ooh, I would say three, but I've studied...

like five or six like formally yeah yeah just haven't practiced yeah I haven't practiced and yeah yeah yeah well that's interesting yeah I cannot think of any like the things I used to love when I was in my childhood I think maybe sports but like it doesn't limit to one like one specific type of sport I just like I I

I think my family used to raise me as a boy. So like I used to hike a lot with my dad, with my family. And I learned swimming when I was very young. And I think that like,

that gene like the the sports gene continues so like keep going all I love like all kinds of sports I love you know like yesterday I just like hiked with a couple friends to there's a place called MacRitchie in Singapore that was like 11 kilometers it's like two and a half hour and we run into the heavy rain and we're like we are soaked but that was like very quite interesting experience yeah

Interesting is one way to describe it. Yeah, it's quite like, it's really like a hiking experience. Was it raining when you were at the top? How far into the hike were you when it started raining? About a half, like 7K, and then it started raining. And we stopped for a little bit, and then the rain doesn't stop. So like, it didn't look like it's going to stop anytime soon. So we're just like, whatever, we just keep walking. Wow.

yeah sporty spice over here sporty spice yeah it is and next I think that is very interesting because we want to share some antidotes and research on the benefits of fun you want to share some like your research about like having fun

Yes. So one thing about the benefits of having fun relates to stress reduction. So think about how a good laugh with friends or an adorable hobby can relieve stress after a long day. So research says that laughter and engaging in fun activities triggers the release of endorphins, our body's natural feel-good chemicals, reducing stress and promoting a sense of relaxation.

When was the last time you had like loved have so much fun with your friend? Very recently pretty avid watcher of Drag Race so I invite friends over and we end up watching together and so I had a couple of friends over the other day and we watched and like

I laughed so hard, like I was crying, like literally tears streaming from my face. So it was great, especially because like work has been so busy and so stressful recently. So it was nice to be able to like make time for that, even in one of the busiest times of the year.

That's good, especially we know now like love can help with like stress reduction, right? You also know what like love also can improve our creativity. So many artists and inventors have had their breakthrough moments while having fun or doing the leisure activities.

So the research says studies have shown that engaging in enjoyable, non-work-related activities can boost creative thinking, provide fresh perspective and innovative ideas. How do you express your creative side? Do you have any, you know, creative hobbies? Do you paint or draw or anything of that sort? I'm not like a creative person. I totally believe this, but like,

I'm not like just I don't have a lot of like I'm just not that type of the artist that's not my thing how about you hmm but I feel like you think creatively I feel like you're very fashionable you know so I feel like do you not feel that way not really but thank you for saying that okay

I don't know. I mean, I guess if it's outside of singing, I think most recently something that I've been trying to do is, you know, decorating more. I just like decorated another room in my house over the weekend. So that was really exciting. It's a lot more challenging than I thought, but it's fun to have to like, you know, think about aesthetics and what kind of vibes do I want the room to feel like and what

What sorts of things can I put in it to achieve that? So probably that's the thing I've been doing most recently to, you know, express my creativity. That sounds like very fun. So something that we were talking about earlier is about work and how, you know, having fun or play can affect work.

And obviously, when work is more enjoyable, I find that I can be more productive. And so productivity is something that is also impacted and enhanced when we are having fun or playing. So people often find that they accomplish more when they enjoy their tasks.

rather than when they're just going through the motions. So research suggests that incorporating elements of fun and play into work can actually increase productivity, motivation, and job satisfaction. Couldn't agree more. Yeah, I think that's very important. And remember, like, I used to have a lot of fun, like, when we worked together. So, like, that was, oh my god, like, eight years ago. Yeah.

Like seven, eight years ago, it was so much fun. Like working with people are so funny and our age are similar and experience are similar. We have a lot like common topics and we drink together and we hang out together. And so that's also helped us as like, I think connect with each other. It also helped us to relieve the stress from work and then while we're having fun. I totally agree with that.

Yeah, which I feel like is really uncommon. At least I found coming back to the US. I don't know how it is in Singapore, but I feel like people typically don't want to have those types of relationships or like build those types of, you know, bonds with their co workers. So I felt like that was

really sort of special and unique for our experience. Yeah, I totally agree. I feel like in Asia culture, people don't want to be very close with people at work, especially when you are not in the same title. You know, like people think, because if we are going too close, right, how are we going to maintain a good relationship at work?

then if you make something wrong then how can i criticize you right so but back then we don't think too much about this as it is really good environment we talk to each other we respect each other yeah so the next one is is very also like very interesting is

it can create a stronger social bonds. I think just we discussed, right? So fun social interactions, build deeper connections and lasting relationships. I think that's why like EJ, you and I, and also a lot of friends from the company we work for, and we still have like, we still are very good friends. We have a deeper connection. And the research also shows that shared enjoyment in social activities, enhanced social bonding, trust, and cooperation among the individuals.

Remember we used to have like the retreat and the Shufu day. So much fun, right? I could use a Shufu day. That would be amazing. Everyone deserves a Shufu day.

Yeah. So a Shufu day is something like we used to have like when a very like the peak area, we were very busy for the spring, like for, sorry, for the autumn. And after that, we have the Shufu day and we will go to a really nice French restaurant. Like we eat together, we drink together, we laugh together. And yeah,

The other shufu day we used to have is to live in a five-star hotel with their executive lounge. So we have all the meals, all the drinks. You don't need to leave the hotel. You just like hang out with your friends, enjoy the dinner, enjoy the wine, enjoy the breakfast. They're like facilities in the hotel. That's really a shufu day. Yeah, yeah. Maybe I'll make my own shufu day on a budget here. Yeah.

In addition, having fun and play also impacts our health. So physical activities like dancing, playing sports, or even just playing with pets can be both fun and beneficial for our health. Research says that engaging in enjoyable physical activities promotes physical fitness, overall health, and well-being.

What's your, you said you are, you know, grew up in a sporty family and you have that, you know, gene. And what is your favorite physical activity or sort of sport to engage in? Just kind of like love all the activities. I think because it creates, it creates what I call it.

So you just normally generally be happy after exercise and you feel like you're released. It's not like actually having fun, but if you are engaged in an interactive sports, like dodging ball or like people running together or like doing team sports, I think that definitely help with like, with improved health. Also like loving exercise plus like, it's kind of like one plus one more than like equals more than two. Right? One plus one.

equals more than two. Yeah. We share about laughing can reduce the stress, but do you know also it can like help with the stress resilience? So people who incorporate enjoyable activities into their daily lives often report better resilience against stressors. So the research found out fun experiences can enhance emotional resilience, making it easier to bounce back from life challenges.

Do you agree? I do. I do. It's, I find this also, this comes up when like you're having a hard moment in life and, you know, sometimes you have, you know, I get that urge to,

and like stay in. And what I found is that like, it actually does help when people are like, no, come out and like, let's do this thing because it gives you an opportunity to get your mind off of it. You know, even if it's only temporarily, right, you get an opportunity to remind yourself like, oh, there's all of this good things and I have people that care about me and want to spend time with me. So that's something that I have to remind myself because sometimes I do just want to, you know,

hermit and be by myself and sulk in my feelings. Finally, we want to share how having fun and thinking about play can help in our own learning and development. So children often learn best through play, where learning is disguised as fun. And I would even argue that that is the same with adults.

or at any point in our life. So research suggests that play-based learning has proven to be highly effective in early childhood education, promoting cognitive, social, and emotional development. So for all of you out there who have kids, work with kids, thinking about having kids, don't forget, let the kids play. After sharing some like

the antidotes and research on the balance of fun, we want to go back to our real life, right? Because like we discussed in the beginning, when we are in our 30s, we realize the chasing fun is not our first priority now. So we want to discuss what prevents you from having fun. For me, I have found that I always have this question in my mind, like, is it worth it?

Right. And sometimes that I mean that like literally, like literally do I have, you know, can I afford to do the thing that maybe it's for fun? Maybe it's because it's a cost thing. Maybe it's because it impacts my work.

But it's also because I'm like, oh, sometimes I think like, I don't know if this is worth an investment of my time or energy. And, you know, I hate that I have to do that so much now. Sometimes I just used to do things because they were fun and I wasn't always overthinking it and thinking about like, what's the return on my investment in this? I,

I also find that sometimes I'll take, I want to take a passion because of like this grind culture, this sort of hustle culture. I'm like, okay, like how can I make money off of this? Oh, that's a cool idea. What, how can I market this? Or like, how can I make this thing into some sort of a product? And you know, like sometimes that's great and that's beneficial. Right. But I don't know. I think sometimes I don't know if it's necessarily a bad thing, but it definitely changes your

my relationship to this thing that, you know, could just be purely meant to bring me, you know, joy. What about you? Yeah, I totally agree. It remembers, I always like, I love travel. So I always want to travel the world and people around me, they were just like, why, why don't, why don't you just try to be a travel blogger? And then I was like,

I love travel. I enjoy traveling and I can engage with people and see different things. But if that's become my job, part of my obligation, then I think all change, right? Everything change. And I know I totally get like, we should try to make money from our like, this is where like really into the, where we're passionate at. And yeah,

But the reality is most of us, like, we know if you're really trying to get this passion into your work, and it's not going to be fun anymore. At least, like, it used to be 100%. Like, we're 100 score, like, fun from, like, 1 to 10. It's going to be 10 before. But, like, the moment we are turning to a work, maybe down to, like, 8, 6, 7, we're, like,

It changes. The momentum changes. Everything changes. So we're talking about what prevents us from having fun.

How can we to breaking free from this barriers we just mentioned? It's definitely challenging, I think, depending on your circumstances. But as I said earlier, I watch a lot of Drag Race and I was actually just watching All Stars 2 before this. And one of the contestants, Tatiana, says, you know, everyone has to make choices. And that was a choice.

And I think that, you know, we have to be able to, I think, come to terms with like, it's not possible to have it all. Right. I think, you know, a lot of times we want to have our cake and eat it too. And I think for, you know, in most circumstances, we can't have it all. So I think that's,

Maybe that shouldn't be our goal. And maybe the goal is thinking about, you know, what can I do that is enough for me? Which I think is hard for us to figure out, like, where the line is for enough versus, like, that desire to be ambitious and, like, go for more. But I think that if your plate is too full with, like, you know, going after gold and going for the next thing, then you don't leave space for fun. You don't leave space for play. So I think...

you have to, I don't know, maybe learn to say no to some things. And I think that's a really, really hard skill to build. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. For me, I think those barriers will never go away. We simply need to learn how to have fun and coexist with them.

Like I mentioned before, right, like we used to have so much fun working at the company and make really good friends and really enjoy going to work every day. For an extended period, I found joy and happiness in my work. Consider that like one third of our time are like actually is consumed by our jobs. I think if work becomes a source of suffering, finding happiness solely out of work is insufficient, at least for me.

But however, I also think acknowledging how challenging it can be to find a job you love, enjoy and have fun with. So what I've been doing is constantly reflecting on what is the most important thing in my life and what I desire. And all the while seeking passion outside of work. So like I mentioned, I love sports. I like trying to seek in the things I love.

Besides, I can just put work, just work. And after work, I'll just do my life. And I'm also thinking about taking a pause if necessary. If you can't really have fun and you don't know what you want to do and you don't know what can make your life anymore, just take a pause and have some me time and really think about it. Take a pause. I think that's so important. More pauses. We're always like,

keep trying different things in our life and we never when thinking about like taking a pause or stop we're going to like panic what are we going to do right if I take a pause what are we going to do what's my day look like because when we at work we know what we're going to do for Monday for Tuesday right we we have all full of lists we need to do but yeah

But I just highly recommend to take a pause, maybe just for myself first. So we've been talking about the necessity of taking pauses. Let's maybe get into what happens when you don't take that pause and you get into maybe overdoing it later.

Having too much fun, maybe overstretching yourself and doing too much. So maybe we can talk about, you know, is it possible to be too happy or have too much fun? What are some of your thoughts on that? Do you think it's possible to be too happy or to have too much fun? Have you been too happy before? Have you felt like you had too much fun? I never, I would never felt like I had too much fun.

if I enjoy it, right? I think that's fine. I think his point is we need to have a baseline of happiness. So like we can't always be like

on the top of a on the peak it was like keep having fun we're also we can't we we can't be at the bottom of the line where it's like feel sad all the time and then I think it's most important it's like when you really have fun just enjoy it and realize this is not not the normal situation this is not the normal days you will come to the baseline you will come to back to normal someday and just get used to it how do you feel

Yeah, I definitely agree with that. I think it's also to the point of, you know, like being mindful of, you know, getting so attached to the peaks of like feeling really happy to avoid the lows, like the valleys of feeling low is, you know, like,

you have to sort of spread out where you're deriving your happiness from, right? If you put all your eggs in one basket, well, like what happens if that thing shifts or goes away or, you know, you can't do it anymore or you become overly reliant on that one thing or that person or that activity or, so I definitely think that's like really, really important to be mindful of.

We talk about like having fun. Also, we have responsibilities, right? Do you think there's a way to take the balance between the two of them? I think that sometimes...

you know, this idea of like striking balance between things or, you know, work hard, play hard can be really misleading because like no one ever really defines for you like what it means to have a balance between like work and play or like, you know, having fun and your responsibilities.

At least not for me. I don't think in my life I've seen, you know, as many sort of explicit conversations around what it means to, you know, be responsible in those ways. I think at most, I think sometimes people say, you know, well, get the things you need to get done so you can do the things that you like want to do, right? Do the things you need to do so you can do the things you want to do.

But outside of that, I think that like, I don't know, I think it is difficult, I think, depending on your circumstances to strike that balance. Yeah. What about what about you? I think the point is don't try to think of responsibilities as burdens. It's not about choosing one over the other, but finding harmony between them.

Because sometimes really like fulfilling our responsibilities can bring a sense of accomplishment and contribute to our overall well-being. So like I think responsibility and happiness can be seen as intertwined. Not like once I have sole responsibility, I have like so much to do in life that I cannot be happy.

So achieving our responsibilities can lead to a sense of contentment and pursuing happiness can make us more productive and effective in fulfilling our responsibilities. Like we mentioned, having fun can make you more creative. Having fun can make you more productive. And then use that creativity and productivity back into your life.

and try to find the balance, right? And life is dynamic. Like we mentioned before, the balance between many needs

a periodic reassessment as the circumstances change. So flexibility and adaptability are important. So achieving a balance between is not a fixed state, but an ongoing process. So it involves allying personal values, prioritizing self-care, and recognizing the interconnectedness of those two essential aspects of life. And finally, the goal is to lead a fulfilling and meaningful life.

that acknowledges both happiness and responsibilities. Before we end the episode, we want to continue in our new tradition of giving our listeners a recommendation. So this week, we'd like to encourage everyone to make space in their schedule, in their busy weeks,

for play and to have fun, whatever that might look like for you. Maybe it's going outside on a walk without your headphones in, you know, maybe it's getting up early and doing yoga or, you know, going to that workout class that you've been meaning to do or cooking yourself a meal at home or going out dancing, whatever it might be, make space in your week for play and to have fun and let us know how it changes your week and how it improves your week.

And that's a wrap for today's episode of Culture Coalition. You've enjoyed this journey into finding happiness and fulfillment beyond societal norms. Remember, happiness is a unique and ever-evolving journey for each one of us. Embrace your path, rediscover yourself, and never underestimate the power of having a little fun. If you loved today's episode, don't forget to subscribe, rate, and review us on your favorite podcast platform, whether it's Apple Podcasts,

Spotify or Xiaoyu Zhou. And please share this episode with someone who could use a little more happiness in their life. Stay tuned for more incredible stories of cultural collisions and connections in our next episode. Until then, keep exploring, keep connecting, and keep finding your own unique path to happiness and fulfillment. Bye. Bye.