Play as healing- thoughts?
This issue has come up in a recent training and in some of my recent social networking, so I thought in might be a nice first blog post.
Look at this video of polar bears playing with dogs, natural predators, but when they are playing they seem to have intimacy, fun , and are “rough housing” seemingly, with out a threat of violence.
We know, and so do the animals, that the bears could do the dogs some harm. Why don’t they? Somatic Transformation innovator and master, Sharon Stanley, reminded us in a recent training that the beauty of play is it allows us to venture into vulnerable territory while maintaining a mutual understood relatedness.
The “joker” in school (or at home) knows it. Think of the comedians who have helped the country deal with issues of race and so many other issues that otherwise seemed intractable were it not for an opening provided by humor. When the element of play is introduced we often can tolerate emotional states that usually would seem too dangerous. Play builds a safety that might not other wise exist by allowing the players to stay in relationship.
So the play we do is often our way of staying emotionally involved with one another in spite of anxiety or nerves, it’s a way we care for ourselves and others and have fun. There is a fine line though because jokes can often be veiled cruelty but that feels very different. What happens when you remember feeling the different kinds of play,when you felt play got you through something, or a time when a joke was cruel? Notice how both of those thoughts might feel different.
Forgive the creative spelling and grammar, those were never my skills set , but I love what I do and so I want to share ideas as they come, so bare with me.
Interesting video.
Play is so important in Early Childhood.
Child’s play is so important to healthy growth and development
People often want their children to grow up so fast, stressing academics too early.
Many go from one activity to another without time to enjoy play with their families.
We are all so busy trying to make a living and provide for our families that when we can use the time to play we’re exhausted.
Play is good down time and good for stress relief.
When I see my daughter playing with her friends, I am struck by several aspects of what they appear to be doing. First of all, obviously, it is a deeply creative collaborative process in which they are able to exercise their ability to imagine, to play roles, to try on different social strategies for size, and practice new ways that they have learned to communicate, interact, and negotiate with others. I’m always both amused and intrigued by my daughter’s tendency to incorporate rules of behavior she has learned at daycare into her play scenarios: When a “bad guy” threatens to do some kind of harm to her or her friends, real or imaginary, she will say things like “That’s not nice! We don’t do that!” Of course, she’s also learned from the boys at day care the ancient practice of using violence instead of reason and negotiation (talking about “killing” bad guys, etc.) but I have noticed that she tends to prefer using magic in imaginary conflicts – in other words, persuasion and beguilement. She prefers casting a spell on someone to deadly force. Although if you’re Malificent from Sleeping Beauty and you’ve just turned into a dragon, watch out! She has recently begun to tell me with great earnestness that she feels her role in life is to “save” and “protect” people, and to help people feel better if they are sad – and a great deal of this intentionality, it seems, arises out of the kind of play she occupies herself with.
Very interesting. As one who always was (and still is to a certain extent) the class “joker”, I would offer that the ability to joke, and find humor in almost anything has always allowed me to find the one comfort zone in which I am comfortable with myself. By nature I am very shy, and have always tended towards a very low self-esteem – my jokes and playing give me an “out” of all that.
I am not sure, but I would be curious to see if any studies have been done with exploring the self esteem issue of comedians from childhood….
So then my question is (and probably a new post will be dedicated to this) , how does how well people know you influence how they can play with you? and how is this connected to emotional connectedness? what does the statement “he doesn’t know her well enough to say that ” mean to you ?
I felt so much anxiety watching that movie. I was too aware of what I think is about to happen when a polar bear puts something in his mouth. Apparently, there is some trust going on there that I can’t see.
Asher, even with someone as hilarious as John Pinette, I don’t know if I’m really allowed to laugh. Is he trying to get me to laugh at him on purpose so that I won’t laugh at him spontaneously? How much of play is testing boundaries and establishing heirarchy in order to avoid the use of outright force?
I think this is one reason it can be so therapeutic. Where does play end and acting out begin? It’s so fuzzy for me. (The polar bear hugging the husky was pretty fuzzy, too!)
Very interesting and my first thoughts where of the interaction with my 3 year old son, especially when I see him playing with his 5 year old friend. There is always a little different style of play over at my mothers house, versus playing with us at home, (The five year old is a neighbor of my mother and he plays with him while we visit). I can tell that Renato tries hard to conform a little more to the older activities of the 5 year old versus when he is home and is free play in a more relaxed mode where he watch younger shows like Mickey Mouse and old-school classic Transformer cartoons from the 1980′s. Not to say that he does not have a blast playing with the bigger boys as he never wants to leave, but I notice that then we plays with the bigger kids he comes home using words like, “Weapons, Kill bad guys, etc” I can really relate to E. Radars post. I am really happy just to see him play and especially laugh all the time. Anyone know what “Cracker Shells” are? The guy in the video refers to them a couple times?
Nice post. As you know, I am approaching these issues more from the side of “fun” and its power to make the world a better place, while your question is more about the individual and one-on-one relationships. My approach is more extroverted, more in line with my interests as a sociologist and not a psychologist. But to get to your question about how well you know someone and how that affects play, I would say that knowing someone well allows for a certain amount of trust, but “playing” with a stranger or acquaintance has its own thrill, maybe more like the polar bear/dog play in the video. The element of the unknown, the potential for danger, can be fun too. For adults, this is what “flirting” is all about, I think. I mean, I wouldn’t flirt with someone I thought was actually dangerous, but not knowing someone allows for the “spark” of discovery that makes it fun.
Also, to connect your interest and mine, I think “fun” is the motivation for engaging in the “work” of play.
Follow up: Play has really changed since my son, (Turning 4 in late May) has been playing Star Wars Legos on the Play Station…. Everything now is Han Solo this or Luke Skywalker that… He seems to be keeping the Transformers on one side of the room and Star Wars stuff on the other. I still have not figured out what the Cracker Shells are ….