Successful Relationships Reading Corner
This week, Maude wrote that play is how to add peace within your relationships. Here are some of our previous posts on this topic.
How Being Playful and Just Being Together Affect Your Relationships “The need for play doesn’t change just because we “grow up”. We are all just bigger, older children. These basic needs, like the need to play, never diminish in importance for any of us, at any time in our lives. Similarly, play time is an essential part of peaceful, harmonious relationships. We need to recognize the importance of play in our relationships and find ways to incorporate it into our times together. It is important to recognize the value of time spent that’s not about achievement, but rather about just being and feeling and loving. Sharing experiences, laughing together and discovering how just being with each other feels, how just being feels, is an art we need to develop for a balanced happy life and balanced happy relationships.”
Why is Time for Play Important in Your Relationship? “Yet we also need to show respect for our bodies and our minds. They need time off, time out, or time in other pursuits. Individually and in our relationships we all need play time where we are not working on anything; not on progressing, not on taking care of business, and definitely not on achieving anything. We recently had a marvelous and rejuvenating few days. These were days where we stepped outside our usual patterns and day to day projects and were just together having an intimate and lovely time. We didn’t do anything big and important. We were very present with each other talking, laughing, sharing. We are not referring to date nights, trips, or other planned escapades together. Here we are referring to spontaneous, unplanned, unscheduled, open free time. It started when Maude suggested hanging out with each other with no goal other than that. We had each been so busy with our individual jobs and tasks or with mutual social events, that we hadn’t spent much time with each other just relaxing or having adventures. Those things that we enjoy doing separately can make us forget to spend time together, but time like that is important precisely because it doesn’t involve doing anything. It’s an opportunity to reconnect to ourselves and each other.”
The Powerful Value of Play in a Relationship “The late Dr. Karyn Purvis, Director of Texas Christian University’s Child Development Center stated, “scientists have recently determined that it takes approximately 400 repetitions to create a new synapse in the brain…unless it is done with play, in which case it takes between 10 and 20 repetitions.” Play is an experience where pleasure and learning are combined in a relatively stress-free environment. The benefits have been extolled by many scientists and educators. And yet, we are sorely put to create playtime within our lives and within our relationships. In modern society, priorities are fostered that emphasize responsibility, care-taking, accomplishment – taking care of business. We fill our time with earning a living, paying the bills, cleaning the house, shopping, taking the kids to school, picking up the grandkids. All important to our very existence. Playing has become an element that has all but disappeared from many people’s lives. Yes, people have taken up activities like regular exercise, sports, dinner dates with friends, gaming, travel. But are these the same as free-form spontaneous play?”