It’s interesting, the more I lean into a self-directed way of being in relationship with my family, the more non-negotiable it’s become to only take action on things I genuinely want to do. That includes how I choose to move my body. I absolutely love Pilates, and just recently, I’ve rekindled a childhood love for long-distance running.
What I’m learning is that whenever a choice feels heavy with “have to’s” or is framed as “work,” it drains the joy from the activity. But when we connect with our authentic reasons for doing something, joy naturally follows.
I’ve even noticed this with something as mundane as tidying up after my kids. With the support of a wonderful mentor, I was able to reframe what once felt like a never-ending chore into a task that actually reflects my love for organizing spaces. This shift in meaning has brought so much peace, and even joy, to the simple act of cleaning up.
What’s becoming increasingly clear to me is how much the meaning we assign to our experiences, reflected in the language we use—shapes how we feel about them moving forward. So why not experiment with the words we choose to label our experiences, and see what changes?
As a surfer, I’ve come to really appreciate the importance of play for grown-ups. A few years ago, I was on holiday in Bali with my parents, so not really a surf trip. Every day the beach hawkers renting out surfboards would ask me, “Are you going to play today?” At first I thought it was a strange phrase, but after a while I realized—they were spot on. Surfing is how I play. I’m not doing it to compete or achieve anything. I surf because it’s fun, it helps me switch off from work, and it’s good for my health.
It’s totally pointless. And that’s exactly what makes it valuable. Unlike competitive sports or video games, surfing doesn’t revolve around winning, improving, or leveling up. It’s just play—pure, physical, joyful, and necessarily unnecessary!
Thanks for this, I agree. As a physician, I often suggest to young parents to rethink exercise. If they bring their kids to the park and run around and play with them, they may get a life giving “work out” for 45 minutes. But I always have to warn them that they can’t sit off to the side on a bench and scroll.
Today, I'm doing both. I went to work out this morning but tonight I'll be "playing out" at Karaoke. Singing and dancing...keeps you living longer for sure.
Peter, thank you for sharing your play with all of us, and your work out too. I'm genuinely impressed and truly inspired. Thank you for being a role model for those of us who might not have such an example in our families.
Living in a city, people generally walk more to and from places, which is nice. Also, swimming growing up in isolated rural communities. It depends on how happy a person is with their existence; many of us are not, which can lead to self-destruction tendencies..
I think the biggest problem for the majority of people is finding the time. This is exceptionally true in these economically uncertain times and with the expectation that "working hard and working longer hours" is a cause for celebration. Throw a kid or two in to the mix and the struggle is real.
I believe that we need to de-emphasise continuous economic growth in our societies. For as much as it will help with this problem, it will remove the stresses on our environment (which stresses humanity) and will slow down the rapid technological changes that is part of our uncertainty.
Couldn't agree more! I've joined a running club recently and really enjoying the weekly run. Anymore than that for me feels like work. I exercise in different ways that I find more enjoyable like walking and some free weights at home. I think it's good to have a 'mixed-diet' of exercise and play!
I really like lifting weights, but I do have to combat laziness to get going at it sometimes. Usually I look forward to it. My gym is an old decomissioned fire station, so we can open the east facing garage doors when the weather permits, and its like lifting weights outside. Its great.
I was extremely unathletic as a kid and I still am as a grown up. The simplicity of weights I think is part of why I like it. Learning about how muscles and joints work together has been really useful in combating some of the chronic pain I experienced from a lifestyle of video games and sleeping in. My gym routine is partly for physcial therapy reasons, but that doesn't make it any less fun. The part where I come home having gotten my ass kicked is very satisfying. Eat some good food and chill out. Sometimes with those same video games from back in the day.
In trying to combat sleep apnea, I eventually came up with a cardio method that seems to have cured my sleep apnea. I did this by playing around with the exercise and applying what I've learned about anatomy and how the body works. I had a back case of wry neck recently so then I came up with my own neck workouts and added that to my routine. My physical therapist approved of my method for neck training because what I came up with was mostly isometric based, thereby decreasing the possibility of injury.
The funnest times at the gym are when I have some new goal or some new muscle group I am trying to target. I realized my preferred sleeping positions were hard on my shoulders, so I added a shoulder exercise that seemed to be missing. Now sleeping is fine.
My favorite line about lifting weights, I like doing a lot of work for a very short amount of time and then sitting around feeling overly proud of myself.
My husband and I are avid hacky sack players! We play for hours most weeks when weather permits. It's great fun!!!
I spent years working as a personal trainer and group fitness coach and, ironically, I personally never "workout" in a gym anymore. I ride my bike, swim, go on jogs with the baby in the stroller or with my son riding his bike alongside me, and do a lot of outdoor mobility/resistance training like pushups, jumps, lunges, as well as heavy yard work, like raking, weeding and moving rocks. I relish cutting our hedge row by hand, using our manual push-mower in the summer, and shoveling in the winter! The neighbors think I'm a little weird, especially doing all of these things while pregnant :)
I wonder if in addition to the joy and playfulness factor of the tennis and badminton players, if the fact that these activities are usually played outdoors has something to do with the greater life expectancy. Our modern culture commits us to spending far more hours indoors than outdoors and this is proven to be terrible for both our mental and physical well-being.
One last note, studies show that longevity and the aging process is only 20-30% attributable to genetics, meaning our lifestyles matter!
Great advice! I love riding my bike for exercise. I literally say, "Whee!" at least once during every ride. I like to play Pickleball too, but my arthritic knee doesn't like it very much. My job also feels like play. I may or may not carry a clown nose and a rubber chicken in my purse as well. 😊 🐓
Peter, I love this article. I had open heart quadruple bypass surgery in Oct-2024 and turned 80 in Jan. My doctor said I need 30 minutes of cardio exercise daily. I did cardiac rehab at a hospital gym Jan-Apr. I am now walking 30 minutes daily in my neighborhood. I take my little dog and we are playing at meeting the neighbors on our block. It is very much fun and community building. Linda Qbq, 909-949-4930 PT
I like to approach movement in a playful yet consistent (disciplined) way. In the morning, I have a routine that wakes up my joints and muscles. During the day, I tend my home and garden and go for a long walk. In the warmer months, I bicycle, kayak and swim. For me, play is an attitude, a way of interacting with the world. When I forget, spending time with the grandchildren reminds me to be playful.
I am a huge fan of your work, Peter. This one is very inspiring, especially how you are navigating your physical activity.
I have to admit, I am struggling to find a physical activity that I can really enjoy. I had a terrible professional sports experience in my childhood (for those who are interested, I’ve added a link to my story). Since then, I’ve moved on to less terrible activities that I thought I enjoyed, but in reality, I exercised because I thought I had to. Over the past year, I have drastically reduced my exercise to almost none at all, because I feel my body is just so tired from all the unhealthy activities it was forced to do in childhood. For more than a year, I’ve been reconsidering my relationship with sports activities, and I would love to find something that actually makes me happy and not just exhausted. I’m curious if I’ll ever find a way “back” to my body exercising freely and happily, as you describe in your article.
It’s interesting, the more I lean into a self-directed way of being in relationship with my family, the more non-negotiable it’s become to only take action on things I genuinely want to do. That includes how I choose to move my body. I absolutely love Pilates, and just recently, I’ve rekindled a childhood love for long-distance running.
What I’m learning is that whenever a choice feels heavy with “have to’s” or is framed as “work,” it drains the joy from the activity. But when we connect with our authentic reasons for doing something, joy naturally follows.
I’ve even noticed this with something as mundane as tidying up after my kids. With the support of a wonderful mentor, I was able to reframe what once felt like a never-ending chore into a task that actually reflects my love for organizing spaces. This shift in meaning has brought so much peace, and even joy, to the simple act of cleaning up.
What’s becoming increasingly clear to me is how much the meaning we assign to our experiences, reflected in the language we use—shapes how we feel about them moving forward. So why not experiment with the words we choose to label our experiences, and see what changes?
Nice. The difference between work and play is not the activity but the mental attitude we have about it.
As a surfer, I’ve come to really appreciate the importance of play for grown-ups. A few years ago, I was on holiday in Bali with my parents, so not really a surf trip. Every day the beach hawkers renting out surfboards would ask me, “Are you going to play today?” At first I thought it was a strange phrase, but after a while I realized—they were spot on. Surfing is how I play. I’m not doing it to compete or achieve anything. I surf because it’s fun, it helps me switch off from work, and it’s good for my health.
It’s totally pointless. And that’s exactly what makes it valuable. Unlike competitive sports or video games, surfing doesn’t revolve around winning, improving, or leveling up. It’s just play—pure, physical, joyful, and necessarily unnecessary!
Thanks for this, I agree. As a physician, I often suggest to young parents to rethink exercise. If they bring their kids to the park and run around and play with them, they may get a life giving “work out” for 45 minutes. But I always have to warn them that they can’t sit off to the side on a bench and scroll.
Today, I'm doing both. I went to work out this morning but tonight I'll be "playing out" at Karaoke. Singing and dancing...keeps you living longer for sure.
Peter, thank you for sharing your play with all of us, and your work out too. I'm genuinely impressed and truly inspired. Thank you for being a role model for those of us who might not have such an example in our families.
Living in a city, people generally walk more to and from places, which is nice. Also, swimming growing up in isolated rural communities. It depends on how happy a person is with their existence; many of us are not, which can lead to self-destruction tendencies..
Definitely Peter, nicely said and written about.
I think the biggest problem for the majority of people is finding the time. This is exceptionally true in these economically uncertain times and with the expectation that "working hard and working longer hours" is a cause for celebration. Throw a kid or two in to the mix and the struggle is real.
I believe that we need to de-emphasise continuous economic growth in our societies. For as much as it will help with this problem, it will remove the stresses on our environment (which stresses humanity) and will slow down the rapid technological changes that is part of our uncertainty.
Couldn't agree more! I've joined a running club recently and really enjoying the weekly run. Anymore than that for me feels like work. I exercise in different ways that I find more enjoyable like walking and some free weights at home. I think it's good to have a 'mixed-diet' of exercise and play!
I really like lifting weights, but I do have to combat laziness to get going at it sometimes. Usually I look forward to it. My gym is an old decomissioned fire station, so we can open the east facing garage doors when the weather permits, and its like lifting weights outside. Its great.
I was extremely unathletic as a kid and I still am as a grown up. The simplicity of weights I think is part of why I like it. Learning about how muscles and joints work together has been really useful in combating some of the chronic pain I experienced from a lifestyle of video games and sleeping in. My gym routine is partly for physcial therapy reasons, but that doesn't make it any less fun. The part where I come home having gotten my ass kicked is very satisfying. Eat some good food and chill out. Sometimes with those same video games from back in the day.
In trying to combat sleep apnea, I eventually came up with a cardio method that seems to have cured my sleep apnea. I did this by playing around with the exercise and applying what I've learned about anatomy and how the body works. I had a back case of wry neck recently so then I came up with my own neck workouts and added that to my routine. My physical therapist approved of my method for neck training because what I came up with was mostly isometric based, thereby decreasing the possibility of injury.
The funnest times at the gym are when I have some new goal or some new muscle group I am trying to target. I realized my preferred sleeping positions were hard on my shoulders, so I added a shoulder exercise that seemed to be missing. Now sleeping is fine.
My favorite line about lifting weights, I like doing a lot of work for a very short amount of time and then sitting around feeling overly proud of myself.
My husband and I are avid hacky sack players! We play for hours most weeks when weather permits. It's great fun!!!
I spent years working as a personal trainer and group fitness coach and, ironically, I personally never "workout" in a gym anymore. I ride my bike, swim, go on jogs with the baby in the stroller or with my son riding his bike alongside me, and do a lot of outdoor mobility/resistance training like pushups, jumps, lunges, as well as heavy yard work, like raking, weeding and moving rocks. I relish cutting our hedge row by hand, using our manual push-mower in the summer, and shoveling in the winter! The neighbors think I'm a little weird, especially doing all of these things while pregnant :)
I wonder if in addition to the joy and playfulness factor of the tennis and badminton players, if the fact that these activities are usually played outdoors has something to do with the greater life expectancy. Our modern culture commits us to spending far more hours indoors than outdoors and this is proven to be terrible for both our mental and physical well-being.
One last note, studies show that longevity and the aging process is only 20-30% attributable to genetics, meaning our lifestyles matter!
Great advice! I love riding my bike for exercise. I literally say, "Whee!" at least once during every ride. I like to play Pickleball too, but my arthritic knee doesn't like it very much. My job also feels like play. I may or may not carry a clown nose and a rubber chicken in my purse as well. 😊 🐓
Peter, I love this article. I had open heart quadruple bypass surgery in Oct-2024 and turned 80 in Jan. My doctor said I need 30 minutes of cardio exercise daily. I did cardiac rehab at a hospital gym Jan-Apr. I am now walking 30 minutes daily in my neighborhood. I take my little dog and we are playing at meeting the neighbors on our block. It is very much fun and community building. Linda Qbq, 909-949-4930 PT
I like to approach movement in a playful yet consistent (disciplined) way. In the morning, I have a routine that wakes up my joints and muscles. During the day, I tend my home and garden and go for a long walk. In the warmer months, I bicycle, kayak and swim. For me, play is an attitude, a way of interacting with the world. When I forget, spending time with the grandchildren reminds me to be playful.
Walk, pickleball and garden. And good food! That’s the good life!
I am a huge fan of your work, Peter. This one is very inspiring, especially how you are navigating your physical activity.
I have to admit, I am struggling to find a physical activity that I can really enjoy. I had a terrible professional sports experience in my childhood (for those who are interested, I’ve added a link to my story). Since then, I’ve moved on to less terrible activities that I thought I enjoyed, but in reality, I exercised because I thought I had to. Over the past year, I have drastically reduced my exercise to almost none at all, because I feel my body is just so tired from all the unhealthy activities it was forced to do in childhood. For more than a year, I’ve been reconsidering my relationship with sports activities, and I would love to find something that actually makes me happy and not just exhausted. I’m curious if I’ll ever find a way “back” to my body exercising freely and happily, as you describe in your article.
https://open.substack.com/pub/morethanenoughbyselene/p/the-sport-that-broke-me?r=4ph7fq&utm_medium=ios