You’ve Been Pwned!

We take ourselves too seriously and in doing so we become boring and no fun. Sometimes it's okay to let loose, act silly, and have a good time. It's energizing.

Given this is a short 4th of July week and I'm sure you (like me) don't want to use too many brain cells, I figure we'll keep it light and have some fun. Then again, fun is what it's all about, isn't it?

So many times we while away the days being the consummate professional. We read professional journals. We write professional messages. We hold professional meetings. We wear professional clothes. Sometimes we push the limits and read SEMI-professional blogs like this one (which is a wonderful little guilty pleasure).

Unfortunately this professionalism bleeds over into everything we do. Professionalism eventually becomes the ultimate buzzkill. And once that happens, life sucks.

Allow me to illustrate. My son's school has a huge outdoor games at the end of the year. There's a picnic, games, blow-up climbing thingies, etc. Parents are invited. Here's the first rub - it occurs during the day therefore a lot of parents don't attend due to work. For some, that's a reasonable reason to miss the event. For others who have flexibility, it was a lame excuse.

Many non-lame parents made it to the games. Then they acted lame. They stood around talking to other lame parents about lame work stuff. All around them, really cool and funny fifth graders were having a blast. They were shooting water cannons, shooting baskets and running relays. My son and his friends invited me to play four square. I was not going to be lame. I had to show these kids how to kick it old school on the playground.

I played (with vigor) for about 45 minutes. I learned the lingo by listening to the kids. One of my son's friends, Robbie taught me how to shout "line!" when the ball looked out. Ethan called me a "shoe shiner!" on multiple occasions when I hit him in the foot with the ball. And when the boys got me "out" (which happened several times) they promptly informed me I had been "pwned" (pronounced "poned" and rhymes with owned – Wikipedia has a cool definition here).

The "professional" parents looked at me like I had something wrong with me. All I know is all the participants in the four square game were fully alive in that moment. Sure I wasn't acting like the consummate professional I need to be in the office (which isn’t always necessary – read about Burger King crowns to see what I mean) but it wasn't the time nor the place to be professional. I consciously made this decision fully aware that several of the parents there were employees of my existing or prospective client organizations. My philosophy: if you either can't let down and have fun or at least appreciate when someone else is, I probably won't enjoy working with you or your organization. Uptight people give me a rash.

One of my favorite events is the annual Memorial Day Picnic at my neighbor’s house. Invariably, kids of all sizes end up playing a sprightly game of dodgeball (since the schools won’t let them play it there anymore. What’s this world coming to?). Last year, my son encouraged me to join the game since a dad had joined the other team. How could I let the sides be uneven? We had a blast. All of us. I even got pwned a couple of times by a fifteen year old with a laser rocket arm.

Of course, there were plenty of “professional” parents standing around sharing their views on how ridiculous it was for a grown man to play dodgeball with grade school kids. Clearly they had never seen Billy Madison and didn’t realize how much fun ALL OF US were having. The game at this year’s picnic was even better.

Another shared favorite lately is for the two of us to hop on AddictingGames.com and play Boxhead Zombie Wars together. Essentially you destroy waves and waves of zombies with ever-increasingly powerful weaponry including miniguns and airstrikes. If you have several hours to waste, I highly recommend it. And yes, we both look like idiots when we play and yell at each other to pwn the next zombie with the minigun and shoot the vampire with the shotgun. Yes, it's awesome (I'm proud/ashamed to admit my high score is over 3 BILLION).

As I was reflecting on the above events and preparing to write this, I asked my son "does it bother you that I act like an idiot sometimes?"

Without hesitation he replied "No! It's AWESOME!" I rest my case. I go to work so I have the resources to go play (I’m writing this after a day at the water park where I pwned him in several races on the water slides and he pwned me in a splash fight).

Remember - you go to work for a reason. Try to remember a lot of it is a means to an end - and hopefully that end is having fun. Don't let professionalism stand in the way of a good time. It has its time and place. Do your part to keep it from spreading beyond that. Go pwn someone today.

Mike is the managing director of thoughtLEADERS, LLC – a leadership development training firm. Follow thoughtLEADERS?on LinkedIn HERE to get our latest articles and special offers on our eLearning courses.

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