It'll Be Fun, They Said: A Worrier's Journey To Finding Joy
About this ebook
This is the question Jessica Pan asked when the long walks, Netflix binges, therapy and bowls of carbonara weren’t working. After the pandemic and on the other side of postpartum anxiety and depression, she discovered that while the panic had lifted, joy hadn’t returned. And she realised she wasn’t alone.
Here Jess chronicles the year she spent putting herself directly in joy’s path by trying new things, asking uncomfortable questions and reporting back with her trademark humor and honesty, even when she would rather stay home. We join her on adventures like:
- A pilgrimage to Finland, where she sweats through saunas, plunges into icy seas and asks what happiness looks like in other cultures.
- An experiment with Deep Talk with her parents, using research-backed questions to have the conversations we postpone until it feels too late.
- A crash course in adult hobbies that help her confront perfectionism, embarrassment and the strange grief of realizing how rarely grown-ups let themselves play.
- Falling back in love with the human race from behind the till of an bookshop in London.
- Conversations with psychologists, behavioural scientists, philosophers and other 'happiness mentors' who guide Jess on her experiments to find out what can really, truly benefit our state of mind.
It’ll Be Fun, They Said is about learning how to make room for many different types of happiness, even when life remains complicated.
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About the author
Jessica Pan is a journalist whose work has appeared in the likes of the Guardian, New York Magazine, ELLE, VICE and more.
She has a B.A. in Psychology from Brown University and a Masters in Journalism from RMIT. Jessica is also the author of Sorry I’m Late, I Didn’t Want to Come: One Introvert’s Year of Saying Yes, and the co-author of Graduates in Wonderland, an epistolary memoir about living in Beijing and Paris.
She previously worked as a TV reporter and magazine editor in Beijing and now lives in London. She writes about working at a tiny indie bookstore in her Substack newsletter It'll Be Fun, They Said. Find her @JessyPanPan on Instagram.
