Got Play?
By: Jenny Ward
GOT PLAY?
Passion Love Action You! Playing with your own divinity, sprit, heart, and spreading it around you. YES! When I share with people that I'm a play activist, most people look perplexed. Totally cool, I get that. What thirty year old says "I LOVE TO PLAY" while doing kart-wheels endlessly? It's not common, yet it's getting there.
Most of us are looking at our lives and sensing something shifting. Maybe we are noticing that we crave more quiet time, or we are watching kids and feeling the urge to just BE without the rules or requirements we have set upon ourselves.
What are these rules? Who wrote them and why are we following them really?
So, we can't color outside the lines anymore? Run around naked on the beach with a shovel to dig in the sand? Drool, mess up, speak out, say no, fall down and cry and then have it be over with. EXPRESS and then release. Stick our tongues out when something is boo- boo stinky. Say yes without hesitation or time limits.
BE playful.
The relationship we have to playing is very important to remaining true to ourselves. Play is the very essence of our spirit. We all want to explore, let loose, and not be "perfect" for at least one moment. What does play mean to you?
Maybe play means to skip down the street. Wear glitter underneath your suit.
Buy outrageous big flowers and place them all over your house. Walk down the game aisle at any store and give yourself permission to BE there and explore. Blow bubbles out of your car window. Paint rocks and decorate your driveway with hearts all over it with chalk. Say hello to a stranger and mean it. Call a friend for a play date. Have slumber parties. Watch your children, learn from them, and play with them, for they are play masters. Draw in the sand, climb mountains, sniff flowers, roll around in your grass, buy a slurpie, explore what it means to just giggle.
(I love that word giggle. How can you not giggle when you say it?)
Write giggle 50 times in your notebook and look at it when you wake up.
Learn something new. Put stickers on your bills. Get in touch with sharing play with others, and make this number one on your "to play" list. In what ways can you invite someone else to play with you?
I know that it is hard to find the "time." I get the time thing. As a planet we have created such limitations on our freedom. So much to do, so many places to be, and so many roles to sustain. All choices.Playing is a choice that can lighten the load. It can remind you that you are a magnificent being of love, instantaneously.
About The Author:
Owner/President of PLAYWARD. Playwards mission is to celebrate the magnificence of being alive. Jenny received her MFA from NYU. She's performed on numerous Television shows and Broadway shows in NYC. Jenny is a certified coach, and loves to SPEAK ABOUT PLAY!