Why You Need To Literally Schedule Fun Into Your Life + How To Do It
Because fun doesn't happen as spontaneously as we'd like.
I’m so glad you’re here! I’m Sarah Von Bargen, a long-time online writer, marketing consultant, and coach. Every week we’ll be exploring ideas around spending our time, money, and energy on purpose + how to build a life we love that doesn’t make us broke or exhausted.
Listen. I would like very much to be the sort of Cool Girl who’s always having some completely spontaneous adventure.
Inviting her neighbors over for a 7 pm dinner party and 6:30, jumping on a plane to Nova Scotia because she found a cheap flight, or swinging by the beach for a quick swim on her way home just because it was hot that day.
Regrettably, that’s not really how my brain works and that’s not really my current “season of life.”
I am more likely to wipe down the kitchen counter and then, three hours later, realize that I’ve just deep-cleaned the kitchen and somehow skipped lunch.
Or I “just open my laptop real quick” to read Walton Goggin’s Wikipedia page (he had a photography blog that chronicled his sabbatical in India!) … and then check my work email … and now I’ve been working for 1.5 hours.
All this to say: Fun stuff doesn’t particularly fall into my lap. For me, a day-to-day life that I truly enjoy takes planning and effort.
And the best way I’ve found to make sure I’m having enough fun is to, well, literally schedule it.
Why you might want to schedule fun
If you don’t schedule fun, it probably won’t happen
I’m sure you’ve witnessed this in your own life, right?
Somehow, it’s been six months since you saw that friend and the art exhibit you were looking forward to has been and gone. You have yet to visit the new bakery down the street you were so excited about. You waited for months to get that library book and now it’s due and you haven’t cracked it.
I know scheduling fun doesn’t feel particularly sexy. Fun should be spontaneous! Wonderful experiences should fall into your lap as though life were a musical montage in a rom com!
That would be awesome. And it might even happen sometimes! You’re a lot more likely to have fun if you make time for it and commit to making it happen.
Scheduling fun gives you something to look forward to
Did you know that 30% of the happiness you get from a given experience comes from anticipating it?
You can suck 30% more happiness from the fun stuff you’re already doing just by putting it on your calendar. When you scribble a reminder into your planner, you’ll see it every day. You’ll get a little jolt of joy thinking about how much fun you’re going to have at that dinner party, concert, beach day, or camping trip.
These scheduled bits of fun can also give you the push you need to get through that interminable meeting, big project, or long commute. It’s a lot easier to pay attention to Dana from Accounting when there’s a food truck festival in your immediate future.
When you schedule fun, you’re less likely to over-spend, over-eat, over-drink, or over-Netflix
When we feel deprived or bored, it comes out in all sorts of super cool ways!
True Story: scheduling fun was part of the curriculum of my beloved “Bank Boost” course and many people found that scheduling fun dramatically decreased their spending!
When we don’t schedule time with our friends, we might try to get our social fix via Facebook or Instagram, falling down a rabbit hole of less-than feelings and the comparison trap.
When we don’t make time to eat delicious food at restaurants we’re excited about, we might stand in front of the fridge eating leftovers and chips, every hour on the hour. And we’re not even enjoying ourselves or our food!
When we don’t make deliberate space for seeing fun movies, time in nature, trying new things, or moving our bodies, we scratch that itch with shopping, food, alcohol, binge-watching or doom scrolling.
So how do you schedule fun?
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to Yes & Yes to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.