Play: A Path to Authenticity

I want to have a conversation about PLAY and JOY. 

When I think of these words I think of moments that are filled with pleasure, moments that build intimacy, moments of being human.

What’s interesting though, is as I was writing this, I went to look up synonyms for the word “play.” And you know what some of the words I found were? 

Distraction. Diversion. 

Now when I think of distraction and diversion, I think of being taken away from something important. Removing something from its intended course, or removing my full attention from one thing to something else. I think of something that could be agitating. 

I believe that these words come up because we live in a culture that has taught us to fear joy. 

We go so far as to feel itfor brief all-encompassing moments, and then push it as far away as possible in order to make ourselves and the people around us more comfortable.

(Because adulthood is all about taking life seriously, right?)

We do this because allowing ourselves to feel joy is an extremely vulnerable thing to do. 

How many of us have had moments of complete and utter bliss, and then found ourselves sabotaging that feeling moments later? Waiting for shit to hit the fan, or finding something to be upset about to bring ourselves back down to earth?

We’ve all done it. I’ve done it for most of my life. 

Speaking from my own experience, I was taught to live in a state of neutrality. Not through words, but through observation. By watching family, teachers, peers, and mentors - I was taught to live in a state that always required me to manage expectations both for myself and for the people around me. 

But WHY was I taught this?

The rationale behind this was that by managing expectations, I could prepare for the worst case scenario, while still making room for the best case scenario. 

This is what I learned was the safest. This is where there was the least amount of risk: in relationships, in pursuing passion projects, and in my personal life. 

There was less risk because managing expectations meant that I could never be disappointed, or disappoint others. That I would never be too vulnerable in case things didn't work out the way I secretly hoped for them to. 

You see - to live in complete joy and optimism, and with high expectations, would mean taking the risk that I would end up hurt, rejected, or end up failing.  

And that was more terrifying than anything. 

Or so I was taught.

So I became an expert at preparing for the worst.

Never did I, or the people around me, prepare for the best. And every space I've worked in my life has perpetuated this way of living and thinking.

I remember a colleague once telling me that another colleague needed to mature because they saw the optimism in every scenario. It was not because they showed a lack of maturity in how they presented themselves to others, but because they were overly optimistic in the face of difficult situations. Because they were playful and joyful at work, where others wouldn’t dare to be. And this was somehow seen as a hinderance to their work.

But what my colleague saw as a negative, I saw as a positive. 

You see, I saw this for what it was: he lived the opposite of what they were living. He lived with a mindset of opportunity, while my other colleague lived with a mindset of limitation and fear. 

And to watch someone live in state of opportunity when you are living in state of fear, is extremely uncomfortable.

But that way of thinking is more common than it should be.

It is so rare to see people embrace play, joy, and other “childlike” qualities, that we often associate those that do with the inability to fulfill certain obligations or roles. We associate this with immaturity, and we sometimes even associate it with mental illness. 

As if we can't both be childlike and run businesses, or we can't both be playful and be successful parents.

Being in touch with this part of ourselves is so rare because we live in a society that fears and frowns upon vulnerability. 

Western society has taught us that in order to be successful, we must separate ourselves from joy and play. That in order to be capable of fulfilling all of the obligations that life throws at us, we have to remove ourselves from the core of who we are: our inner child. 

Our inner child is just that: who we were before trauma, life experiences, and expectations got in the way. 

And the separation from this part of ourselves is where I believe we go wrong.

We lose sense of who we truly are, our authentic selves, when we disconnect from who we were as children.

We lost a sense of who we were when we walked away from who we were were and what we loved before life TOLD us what to love and who to be.

We lost sense of who we were when we stopped allowing ourselves to feel joy, pleasure, and playfulness.

And I believe that this is why so many of us separate ourselves from our passions and gifts.

Whether it be dancing, pottery, singing, painting, or martial arts - we convince ourselves that we must leave the pleasures of life behind in order to fulfill more adult pursuits.

And while we may be successful in our careers and in achieving dreams of riches and material success, I am keenly aware of the void of joy in so many of our lives. A void that so many of us try to fill with the great rat race.

But the void remains.

Whether it be those of us with endless amounts of money, or those of us just trying to get by…what sort of life is one without play or joy? Is that a life that, when we look back on it, we really view as a success?

This is certainly not the kind of life I’d like to live.

It is when we let go of the need to be “adult” - a word synonymous with rigidity, perfection, and being buttoned up - that we really experience life. 

It is the moments of joy and play that we'll remember when we look back on our lives in our final days. 

Those are the moments when we live life unfiltered and true to who we really are. Those are the moments when we are our most authentic, and when we are the most free. 

It is in those moments that we come home to ourselves. 

Food for thought: Could you benefit from more play, joy, childlike enthusiasm or exuberance in your own life?