FUN! Oh, yes. And that is what girls just wanna have, if Cyndi Lauper is to be believed. Do you like having fun? Are you doing a face-palm movement in response to that question? Let’s have some serious play with the word. Looking up the word “fun” in the etymology dictionary, we see that fun is:

“diversion, amusement,” 1727, earlier “a cheat, trick” (c.1700), from verb fun (1680s) “to cheat, hoax,” of uncertain origin, probably a variant of Middle English fonnen “befool” (c.1400; see fond). Stigmatized by Johnson as “a low cant word.” Older sense is preserved in phrase to make fun of (1737) and funny money “counterfeit bills” (1938, though this may be more for the sake of the rhyme).

It is often rather instructive to look up the origin of a word or expression. It tells us a lot about what the word or expression means. Some of the original meaning may have been lost or modified along the way, but the word or expression always seems to somehow retain its original flavour.

Is having fun important to you? Look at the origin of the word. Would you like another word to be able to use instead of saying “having fun” all the time? How about the word “fulfillment”? “Fulfill” means:

“Old English fullfyllan “fill up, make full,” from full + fyllan (see fill, which is ultimately from the root of full). Used early of prophecy and perhaps a translation of Latin implere, adimplere. Related: Fulfilled; fulfilling.”

Have you ever had the experience of having a wild night out and feeling empty afterwards? On the other hand, have you had to tackle a particularly difficult assignment that you didn’t enjoy at all, but you felt on top of the world after you finished it, and finished it extremely well?

Which of the two would you prefer to have more of? For me, I don’t need it to be a lot of fun. But I do need it to be highly fulfilling!