Maybe some people find work fun — I’m not one of them.
As a technical architect director, I’m responsible for designing complex software solutions to transform an organization’s way of doing business. I get projects completed, value delivered, and clients satisfied. It’s solid work that pays well and keeps my brain sharp.
But fun? Not even close.
For fun, I’m not reading up on new trends in architecture models or studying the latest advancements in development operations. I’m at Disneyland, waiting in line for Thunder Mountain with a churro in each hand, letting the magic sweep me back to age seven. It’s the happiest place on earth for me, and that’s no exaggeration.
My work and my fun live in separate universes. That’s how it’s supposed to be.
The “dream job” up close
My girlfriend Celia has a so-called dream job, spending her days as a professional singer. She does what she loves — on a stage, with an audience, singing her heart out for a living.
It’s work that sounds too good to be true. She’s the embodiment of “follow your passion,” the slogan people print on coffee mugs, plaster on posters, and generally act as if it’s a recipe for eternal happiness.
But passion isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Celia’s job might look glamorous, but it comes with endless hours of rehearsal, late nights, and a notoriously unstable industry.
For every dazzling performance, there’s a mountain of stress — working to be heard, staying relevant, maintaining her voice. She’s not spending her days just singing to herself, lost in a musical reverie. She’s grinding, just like anyone else who takes their job seriously.
And just like me, she finds fun outside of work. Every spare moment she has, she’s on the water, zipping across the surface in her kayak, searching for dolphins in her favorite spot just beyond the break.
That’s her escape, her way of having fun when the passion turns into pressure.
The absurdity of fun at work
The fun myth has become its own corporate monster. Companies are obsessed with it, almost as if they’re desperate to prove that we’re thrilled to be there. Cue the ping-pong tables, the “fun” Slack channels where we celebrate minor victories with confetti emojis, the cookie-cutter team-building exercises where they try to turn colleagues into best friends.
I’m convinced these are some HR brainchild to distract us from the fact that the work itself isn’t “fun” and never will be.
But these expectations don’t stop at “fun.” They extend into something even bigger: “passion.” I see the Gen Z folks coming in, eyes wide with expectation, looking for something that’s actually engaging.
I get it — they were raised to expect a job that’s not just a paycheck but a passion. They’re looking for the elusive position that fulfills them, amuses them, maybe even pampers them a little.
It’s interesting to watch, but it’s also like watching someone look for the pot of gold at the end of a rainbow. The first time a twenty-something coworker tells me they’re “bored” with their job, I feel a pang of sympathy, but it doesn’t last.
I just shrug and tell them, “Boredom means you’re working. Welcome to the real world.”
The pressure of being passionate
There’s this idea that to be a success, we should all be deeply, overwhelmingly passionate about our work. And if we’re not, we must be in the wrong job.
Our society-wide obsession with work has evolved to the point that not only should we work, but we’re also supposed to love every minute of it. Not only love it, but be thrilled by it. As if the whole point of living was to find a job that makes us giddy to open the laptop on a Monday morning.
But the reality? Most of us want something more low-key than that. We want stability, sure. Maybe a bit of flexibility, a role that doesn’t make us question our sanity every other week. But passionate, all-consuming love? Not necessary.
Passion is great for hobbies. For life outside of work. But for my nine-to-five? No, thank you.
In that way, I feel for Celia. She’s got the kind of job most people would consider a passion, and she does love what she does, but even she has to shut it off sometimes. Her work may sound glamorous, but for her, “passion” is hard work, and she needs something else to make that work sustainable.
Fun and work use two different parts of my brain
There’s a reason work and fun don’t mix for me — they’re two different mental worlds. Science backs this up. According to a study from The National Institutes of Health, different brain regions activate when we’re doing structured, goal-oriented tasks versus engaging in play.
When I’m working, it’s my prefrontal cortex doing the heavy lifting, focused on planning, problem-solving, and executing complex tasks. This is the part of my brain that helps me nail down software architecture, organize team goals, and keep a client’s digital infrastructure from imploding.
Fun is a different story. When I’m at Disneyland, lost in the thrill of a roller coaster or oohing and aahing at fireworks, my brain shifts to a more relaxed, creative state. Play activates the ventral tegmental regions of the brain associated with imagination, pleasure, and emotional release.
Trying to force those areas of the brain into a work context feels unnatural, maybe even a bit pointless. Fun just doesn’t work that way, and I’d rather not try to make it. Work and play each have their own space in the brain, and they’re not meant to overlap.
By keeping my work focused and my fun separate, I’m doing both my productivity and my happiness a favor.
Where my fun lives
As for me, my fun is decidedly not in tech. Fun lives in those Disneyland days, where Slack messages vanish, and all that’s left is the joy of moving from ride to ride like a kid with no responsibilities.
If I could get paid to wander Adventureland with a Dole Whip float, I would. But for now, that place is my oasis, not my office.
I’m a firm believer that fun shouldn’t have a paycheck attached. Fun is meant to be indulgent, messy, and even a bit impractical. It’s the place I go to shrug off the roles I play at work, to do things for no reason other than my own enjoyment.
Fun is about freedom. Trying to pin it to a job — or, worse, letting a job try to manufacture it — is the fastest way to ruin it.
Fun for its own sake
In a lot of ways, Disneyland is the ultimate rebellion against the work myth. The place is all about pure, unadulterated enjoyment. There’s no “purpose” to Disneyland beyond the joy it brings.
I think that’s why I love it. It’s almost therapeutic, the freedom to go somewhere where fun isn’t trying to be productive or goal-oriented.
Some people can’t help but laugh when I tell them I’d rather spend a day in a theme park than, say, work on personal development or check off something from a “bucket list.”
But to me, there’s nothing more worthwhile. At Disneyland, I don’t need a reason to be there. I’m there just to enjoy myself, no strings attached.
That’s where my fun lives: somewhere work can never touch.
