BONUS | Not Everything Has To Be Productive (with Chris Guillebeau)
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What does it mean to prioritize fun over productivity?
Welcome to the Daily Stoic Podcast, designed to help bring those four key Stoic virtues, courage, discipline, justice, and wisdom into the real world.
you have to think about how to be of service and also how to have fun and enjoy life yourself, which is also something that I, I don't historically do a good job of like, I want to have fun. I'm going to do, you know, like I actually wrote about it. And it's like, like, how do I practice having fun? Right. It's a whole chapter about this. And I like, I have the story of this guy in the Netherlands named Jan who for like 30 years, every Wednesday, he would go to Amsterdam Schiphol Airport and book a flight somewhere within Europe, wherever was cheapest. He'd fly to Stockholm or Barcelona or somewhere and he would just kind of hang out and he would like walk around the terminal and he'd fly back.
Never leave the airport?
Never leave the airport. Okay. It's so interesting. This is what he liked to do. He just like he found it really peaceful, enjoyable, relaxing and so on.
How can small, enjoyable activities enhance our lives?
So it's it's so easy to criticize that, you know, be like, well, he never he traveled so much and never traveled at all. Right. But it's a small thing that made him happy.
Yeah.
You know, and I think, you know, if we can all find like small things that make us happy, even if they seem weird to other people or strange or like, why would you do that? then our lives are going to be better. And I was thinking about his story one day when I went for a walk, I found this restaurant I wanted to go to that was like 17 miles from my house. I thought about it for maybe like a few days in advance, but not, not too long. And I was like, I should walk there. You know, I was like, I should walk to this, you know? And so one day I was like, okay, what do I have this afternoon? Not that much, nothing that I can't do later. And so, so I did, I got like right after lunch, I left and I walked like six or seven hours and
And it's funny because I thought, well, I'm going to try to get some stuff done on the walk, you know, like make some phone calls or whatever. But then your phone battery dies, you know, because you're on GPS the whole time, like tracking.
What unique story illustrates the joy of unconventional experiences?
And I was like, oh, this is not going to actually be a very productive experience. But of course, it was actually very meditative and kind of fun and, you know, also silly. But like, it's like, this is a thing I'm just doing for myself. And I'm not even going to like blog about this. I'm not like, hey, everybody, I'm out on a walk for six hours. You know, I'm just doing this thing. So I went to the restaurant and then, like, went home. And then, like, for days afterwards, I'm like, what a cool thing. You know, what a fun thing that I did. It's a weird core memory.
I bet you felt very alive.
Yes, exactly. Exactly. And so there are things you can do to feel more alive. Yeah. And I have been trying to lean into that myself, and I hope that other people will as well.
Yeah, instead of going, hey, I got to cross these 15 restaurants off a list. I got to do this. I'm sure you're not just, you probably felt alive because you were present. You were only doing that thing, however silly and inexplicable that thing was.
That was the attraction, right?
That was the thing. Did you walk back?
No, I took an Uber back and then the whole way.
15 minutes. Exactly.
That's what's funny. I was like, this is fun. But I'm passing all the way, all the places that I walked, you know, and I was like, oh, that's just fun.
And probably when you pass by those places now, you can tap into that feeling for even just a fleeting second.
How does a long walk lead to unexpected insights?
Yeah, and this is two years ago, and I still remember this weird memory, and it wasn't that hard of a choice to make. And it's not like I was like, every Wednesday from now on, I'm going to walk 17 miles. I don't have to do that. I can just be like, what are things like that that I can respond to and say yes to?
How was the food?
The food was really good. It was really delicious. Cornbread. There's a cornbread appetizer that's usually shared among people, and I ate the whole thing myself.
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