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You're listening to Life Kit from NPR.

Hey everybody, it's Mariel.

We're going to start today's episode at the top of a hill with Emma Tempest. Back when she was a teacher

she would take her class of four and five-year-olds to the park for an end-of-year

celebration. And it was at the top of this enormous hill and every year we'd have a rolling down the hill competition and all the adults would join in because you just have you had that permission to have fun.

The other part of that celebration was a trip to a mini zoo.

You'd hear the children saying things like, oh I wonder what that fish is thinking.

Then you'd be like, what? I've never thought about that before.

That spirit of imagination and wonder you can take that with you anywhere and it costs nothing.

Emma is now a positive psychology coach who helps people get unstuck through play.

We did an episode on play, what it is, why it's good for you, and how to do more of it.

And in the process of reporting that episode,

we came up with a whole bunch of ideas for how to play for cheap.

Because you don't have to spend a lot of money to have fun.

Don't let money or time

be the thing that decides whether or not you will have fun.

You can have fun almost in spite of those things if you really put your mind to it.

...