People tend to describe me as more of a half-glass-full type of person, but even I can admit: these last few months have dragged. Long weeks of depressing news have been interrupted by short bursts of fun, but even I’m having a hard time staying positive when I don’t know how long this current reality will go on.
I’ve noticed among my friends this sort of collective sorrow. I wouldn’t describe it as depression, but it’s like the earth let out one big sigh.
And so I’ll admit it: I’m jealous of the children. For children, everything is novel and new, and the world fills them with joy. I would like to find that kind of joy. It shouldn’t be hard, actually. We all know someone who brings out the kid in us. Just watching a kid do something he/she loves can make us smile. And how many of us have had one of those experiences where we are reminded of ourselves as a kid?
Just recently, I saw that old Tootsie pop commercial on TV—the one with the owl who has to figure out how many licks it takes to get to the center of the Tootsie pop. Just thirty quick seconds brought back of flood of happy memories of me watching cartoons and eating sugary cereal in front of the TV on Saturday mornings while my parents slept.
My son plays soccer, and a few weeks ago I attended a game after a big rain. There were mud puddles everywhere, and there was this one kid wearing rain boots and just having the grandest time. I tiptoes around the mud puddles as I walked into the game, but that kid lifted his knees high and stomped right through them. He splashed and giggled like it was the most fun he had ever had in his life.
And it made me laugh, too, because I have to be honest: I would have loved to jump in that mud puddle.
But of course I was wearing my good jeans, and I didn’t want to ruin my shoes and the thought of driving home wet and muddy, not to mention how silly I would look—a grown woman playing in the mud puddle. Imagine!
You can guess what I did. I talked myself out of it.
That’s what adults do. We talk ourselves out of things—thinking of all the ways something won’t work or why it doesn’t make sense or how silly we’ll look doing it.
And then we wonder where all the joy went.
Brian Sutton-Smith, the pre-eminent voice in play theory, has a lot to say about the benefits of play. In fact, he’s quoted by a lot of other mental health pioneers, including the well-respected modern behavior scientist Brene Brown. Sutton-Smith was the first to say that the opposite of play isn’t work; it’s depression.
“The opposite of play isn’t work; it’s depression.”
If you’re feeling down in the dumps, maybe the solution is easier than you think.
Maybe you just need to jump in a mud puddle.
And also, maybe we need to shift the way we see the mud puddles in front of us.
To a kid, a mud puddle is an opportunity—something to be embraced.
To an adult, a mud puddle is a hazard—something to be avoided.
Perspective is everything. And the good thing about mud puddles is that they are neither half full nor half empty.
If a glass of water is invitation to drink, a mud puddle is simply an invitation to play.
For more information on the benefits of play, you can watch these Ted Talks:
The Decline of Play: this one explores the link between the decline of play and the rise of depression and anxiety in adolescents and young adults.
Play Helps us Grow at Any Age: This one is just 12 minutes and will demonstrate how play can help you deal with the hard stuff of life.