I agree 100% that pool should be fun. Different people find joy in different things.
Recreational players enjoy using pool as an excuse for a gathering of friends. They enjoy the boys night out, the drinking, the joking around. Sometimes pool can play a role in that with some trash talk or a choked 8 ball. This is one way to enjoy the game.
Another is that of a more hobbyist like yourself. You enjoy playing a bit, maybe learning a new shot or making a good run now and then. But it's meant to be an escape from the hardships of life, not another hardship in itself. My dad falls into this category. He has had a lot of fun playing despite not reaching a particularly high level.
Then some of us play competitively. For us the joy in the game comes from finding ways to develop ourselves into more effective players. For competitors the game goes beyond trying hard when at the table and becomes a meta strategy that combines with how we live our lives. Formulating a budget of time and energy and money to put into pool. Finding the most effective uses for that time and money. Analyzing our games. Sparring with better players. Doing drills. Watching the elite and breaking down pattern and technique. Getting coaching. Playing tournaments. Reading mental game books and journaling about our feelings during a match. And so on.
Much of this involves a sacrifice of the short term. We don't get to joke around like recreational players, and sometimes it takes discipline to put the break rak on and shoot 100 break shots when we really just want to run around and mop up easy runs. But the payoffs are sublime. There is nothing quite like finding yourself in a serious competition against players that were beyond you a year or two ago, then using the physical and mental tools you've worked hard on to hold yourself together and get a job done in a big way.
In fact, as you have more and more of those experiences they become so gratifying that they are not only worth all the hard work, they make the hard work enjoyable. I've learned that input = output. The more I put in, the more of those breakthroughs I have. I've done this enough that I actually feel the joy of the payoff while I'm doing the hard work. It's like any acquired taste where you learn to associate the payoff with the behavior. So I do have a ton of fun every time I play. Sometimes it's the intrinsic joy of preparation for competition. Sometimes it's the fun of showing up and reaping the extrinsic rewards. But it's all good.
That being said, there are a lot of competitors that are so perfectionistic and egotistical that they never enjoy themselves. They mistakenly believe that through self abuse and unrealistic standards they will motivate themselves and achieve a higher level of play. For this reason they sacrifice most of the joy in the game as part of their improvement strategy. I would argue this isn't effective either for good play or for quality of life. If you're referring to those players or if those players are the image you have of competitors I don't blame you for keeping it casual. I'd rather see hobby play than unnecessary misery.
So each to their own. Enjoy the game how you like.
