Enjoyment takes Effort

Last week I went to a church sponsored activity. It was snow tubing at a resort. The idea is they have these long trails that are groomed and then there is a pulley system that will drag you up the mountain/hill so you don't have to walk to the top.

A few years ago, I went sledding with some of my roommates and they took snow mobiles so that when we got to the bottom the snow mobiles could pull us back to the top. It was fun but it wasn't my favorite way to go sledding. I thought it was because I don't love the smell of gasoline marring the "fresh mountain air," or the sound either. It is just noisy! I do think that was some of why I didn't love it, but maybe there was something more to it because this tubing experience wasn't the best either. Granted I wasn't in the best mood to begin with so that didn't really help my outlook but it did make me wonder if sometimes in the modern world there is so much that can be done to make things easy that we forget that sometimes (always?) it is the work that makes things worth it. The only time I really exerted myself on this tubing adventure was when I ended up helping the employees put away the tubes at the end of the night... And that was completely optional.

But just to be clear the tracks were really fast and were pretty cool.

The other thing I think I miss in some of this type of experience is the idea of exploration. I tried out each of the 5 tracks, but the whole time I was wondering what was on the other side of the hill. My roommate didn't even try out the different routes, she just asked the employee at the top of the hill which track was the best and went with that.

I just felt like I was missing out on 2 of 3 of the most important elements of enjoyment (that I made up just now), effort, discovery, and a fun activity.... But then again maybe I just thought too much...