The NFL football season started this week. Some people are surprised to hear I love football given the rest of my outward persona. But since I was a kid, I have spent several hours basically every Sunday in the fall watching the Seahawks game. I listen to sports radio and podcasts. I have two fantasy teams. I nerd out on the NFL Draft in the spring.
I feel embarrassed admitting this. It doesn’t really cohere with a lot of other parts of my identity and interests. It’s questionable ethically for the players from a health perspective. It makes me look “bro-ey.”
I could go on defending all the reasons I prioritize it: It connects me to my dead father. It allows me to better connect with folks from different socio-economic and political backgrounds. It nurtures my masculine side.
But mostly, it’s just fun. I love it. And, really, I want that to be enough. I don’t want to hold everything or even that many things in my life that way. But it’s nice to have this. Our lives can get so full of the not fun: needing to make money, worrying about the planet and society, personal healing work, etc. It’s liberating to allow myself to have this space in my life that’s just fun and not be particularly high-minded about it. In fact, it even feels healing.
What “guilty” pleasure might you more fully allow yourself to just have fun with?
Peter Schulte
I help aspiring changemakers do good in the world and feel good in the process.