Health Guide - Play: 

The Genius of Play:

What was your favourite way to play as a kid? 

Maybe it was building things out of LEGO or blocks, climbing trees, playing with friends or cousins, or colouring or singing along with your favourite tunes. Regardless of the form, hopefully, play was central to your young life; it was a way of being in the world until you had to grow up and become more “serious” and “responsible”. Or maybe your play became more structured through sports or drama, or dance. For most of us, as our adult responsibilities grew, those playful experiences took a back seat or maybe disappeared altogether.

The problem with not allowing ourselves to play or be playful is that play is essential for our overall health and well-being. Many of us have experienced heightened stress and anxiety from uncertainty over the past few years. As a result, play may seem frivolous and something you don’t have time or energy for. The opposite is true – incorporating some play into your regular routine can do wonders for you. Playful experiences help take your mind off your stressors and worries and help you refocus your attention on what’s fun and pleasurable; they can also help remind us how much is good and worth living for in the world.

What is Play?

Play is defined as engaging in activities for enjoyment and recreation rather than a serious or practical purpose. Characteristics of play include it being intrinsically motivated - that it’s done for its own sake more than for any reward; it’s creative and imaginative and requires an alert but relatively non-stressed state of mind.

As an adult, play could simply be goofing around with friends, sharing jokes and laughs with a coworker, throwing a frisbee at the park, going on a leisurely bike ride or dancing in your kitchen. There doesn’t need to be any point to it beyond just having fun and enjoying yourself.

Engaging in play with your partner, friends, coworkers, pets, and kids helps to fuel your imagination, creativity, and problem-solving abilities and boosts your overall sense of well-being.

Some of the reasons we play:

to learn

to create 

to feel challenged

to lose ourselves in a pleasurable activity to calm and focus ourselves

to win competitively

to co-operate

for the fun and joy of it

The Benefits of Play

For children, the benefits of play include critical thinking skills, social skills and enhanced problem-solving. It’s an important part of childhood development, from physical wellness to emotional intelligence. We forget that adult play offers many of the same benefits, fostering creativity and social skills essential for healthy relationships.

Stress reduction is one of the greatest benefits of play and light-heartedness for adults. Creating moments of fun and joy is even more important when we’re feeling anxious and unhappy. Playing releases endorphins, the feel-good chemicals that help us feel happy and stable as we go about our day. Adult play allows us to deal better with our stress by infusing us with positivity. This also leads to better resilience and a greater capacity to deal with the stress we are facing.

In addition to helping us manage stress, play also boosts our creativity and imagination by inviting us to consider new possibilities, novelty and spontaneity, which helps with problem-solving.

Playing games like chess, solving riddles or doing puzzles like sudoku and crosswords challenge our brains, improve brain function, and help prevent memory problems. The social interaction of playing with friends or family members can also help ward off stress and feelings of loneliness and depression.

Sharing a laugh and having fun with others can foster trust, intimacy, compassion and empathy. Developing a playful attitude and light-hearted state of mind can help improve relationships and connections with others.

Physically, play can boost your energy, vitality and immunity. You can read this article for more about the science and health benefits behind laughter.   

In the words of George Bernard Shaw, “We don’t stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing.”

Play at Work

Success at work is often more about the quality of your work than just the time you spend doing it. And the quality of your work is often dependent on your well-being. Making the time to refresh and replenish yourself through play is one of the best things you can do to create a sustainable relationship with work and make it enjoyable.

Often when we feel stuck or stumped by a problem at work, taking a few moments away from it can help clear our minds and give us some helpful distance to look at the problem from a different angle. Having a laugh or playing can engage the creative side of your brain and help silence your “inner critic,” that wants you to censor your thoughts and ideas.

10 Easy Ways to Play More

Here are ten fun ideas to get more play into your day. This is just a starting point. The options are endless! Use your imagination.

1. Paint something – pottery, a picture, paint-by-numbers, your face etc.

2. Read fiction – get lost in the story

3. Outdoor games – like lawn bowls, croquet, bocce, tetherball, four square, horseshoes,          cornhole etc.

4. Play with a pet – or a friend’s pet, or volunteer at a shelter

5. Try a maze or escape room in your area

6. Grow a garden, pick flowers or challenge yourself to make a bouquet

7. Puzzles – jigsaw puzzles, crosswords, sudoku and more

8. Try a new activity – indoor climbing, skateboarding, roller-skating, pottery class, knitting 

9. Learn some magic tricks

10. Play a game – board games, card games, bowling, charades, hopscotch etc.

Key Message

Play is beneficial for people of all ages. Play can add joy to life, relieve stress, enhance learning, and connect you to others and the world around you. Play can also make work more productive and pleasurable. You can play on your own or with a pet, but for even greater benefits, play should involve at least one other person and get you thinking, moving or acting in new and fun ways.