The Secret of Success: Having Fun

I’m having a blast. It’s really fun. I don’t know why… But it’s just been a joy.

Conan O’Brien Jan. 12, 2020, “Nikki Glaser” 1:12

Why were you trying to find my extension?
I have a friend who’s opening up a new restaurant in Soho and I was hoping you’d go with me.
What?
Do you want to go out with me tonight?
Why?
Because it would be fun, and you seem cool.

30 Rock S1 E11 4:39

Let me ask you something, why do you do what you do?
I don’t know. The only time I really feel alive is when I’m singing

Jennifer Hudson’s character in ‘Sandy Wexler’ [-1:55:54].

Johnny Cash is not cast in amber, this is the guy before he was canonized, when he was just a musician, when he had runway in front of him and was less worried about getting it right than just doing it. Yup, when done right music is here and then gone, you had to be there, that’s one of the reasons live is such a big deal these days.

— Bob Lefsetz https://lefsetz.com/wordpress/2019/12/04/matchbox/

“And one does it not to be good for you, but just because you dig it. Because at last you find yourself in the center, the eternal now, in which past and future drop away, in which divisions created by words drop away.” — [YouTube Link]

Alan Watts

Something I do for like no reason besides the fact that it was just like for fun………Mmmm mmmm, I mean because making music is messing around. [Youtube Interview Link]

Billie Eilish

You’ve got to find something that you love to do in an of itself that could also become a career. I would even go a step further: the actual doing of it and navigating all of its challenges (like an adventure) actually gives you more pleasure, feeds your soul even more, or if you want to get unromantically scientific about it, releases even more dopamine, than all the other possible accoutrements it could give you (money, fame, sex, adoration).
That’s a big ask. But I think it’s the key to not only giving yourself the best shot at not only the accoutrements, but producing work that is worthy of them. In another words, work that gives more value to the audience (and keep in mind, especially in today’s world this could literally be anything: arts, business, science, etc.) than the money and attention they are giving to it. This is the key fundamental law of business: B = V + D. Business equals Value plus Distribution. But it’s an equation that can be applied to any career. And thanks to the internet, or more robustly “technology” the definition of what a career can be (“Youtube Star”) has grown at least by an order of magnitude over what it was when I graduated from college in 1989, maybe two.