Play is essential for a child’s healthy development. But as we mature into adulthood, we often leave play behind. We get busy in our vocational lives, caught up in the busyness of maintaining a home and yard, family and community involvement. In the process, many of us let the joy and lightness of play slip out of our lives. Our world begins to focus on goal achievement and efficiency. We find ourselves preoccupied with judgment, criticisms, self-criticism, and (is it any wonder) fear as we strive for perfection in efficient goal achievement. That is why adults need to play just as much as children.

Adults need play to help us reconnect with ourselves and navigate the stresses of adulthood with greater freedom and happiness. Play can help us connect with ourselves and others, develop creative responses and ways of managing the stresses that naturally arise in our lives, and relieve the immediate stresses of life with moments of joyful lightness and fun. In the words of Cas Holman, author of Playful: How Play Shifts Our Thinking, Inspires Connection, and Sparks Creativity, “play is a necessary nutrient for us to survive well and not be toxic to one another.” How can you develop the habit of play in your life?

• Make a conscious choice to engage in play. This will require us to step back from societal demands for production, achievement, and constant pursuit of more to create space for the unfamiliar, for exploration, for rediscovery…for play. It will require us to get in touch with our curiosity and the pursuit of possibilities. It means choosing to set aside the pressures and demands of home and work to make time and space to play. In other words, we need to become open to the opportunities of play.
• Release judgment. Don’t worry about playing “the right way.” Enjoy the exploration. Let your play encourage creativity. Try new things. You might even choose to intentionally play “the wrong way” just to free yourself from the need to “do it right.” (My daughter complained at times that I “played” Barbies wrong because Ken could fly when I played.) Let loose and have fun.
• Releasing judgment can help us shift away from a fear of failure and instead focus on the opportunity to learn and enjoy. Play involves taking risks and then learning from the effort rather than pursuing the end goal. It values curiosity over perfection, relationship over achievement, and process over the end product. What the world views as “failure,” play views as information, sometimes even leading to a shift to something brand new and fun. For instance, a mechanical engineer working on a method to secure equipment and packages on a ship, dropped the coil of wires he was working with and, after watching it bounce across the floor, thought, “That could be a toy.” The result was the slinky. In fact, “a lot of inventors talk about keeping an open mind and maintaining playful habits.”

Release your judgments. Choose to engage in play. Learn to focus on the joy and opportunities of play, the process and connections it provides. And play. Yes, let them play…adults and children alike.