Healing Energy of Play

Tags

energy, healing, play, playfulness

I wouldn’t be surprised if the notion of “play” isn’t exactly on the forefront of most people’s minds these days. With all the challenges facing us in so many areas of our lives, it almost seems “tone deaf” to even talk about “play”. And how are we to effect spiritual healing through “play”? Let me tell you a small story. 

Last week, I talked about the new puppy that has done a “takeover” of our home. As one would imagine, her energy level is simply off the charts. It took her a mere two or three days to cajole the older dog to engage in full out play with her. He simply couldn’t resist his instinct all her invitations to play, and eventually they both were having long sessions of all out, football like scrimmages on the living room floor. The quiet, brooding, meditative seven year old came back to life. I didn’t know that he still had it in him to engage in “play” with such joy and abandon. 

Then, another thing happened. One morning, I gave her her newly discovered, favorite, dog-bone shaped, mini-biscuit. I walked away, thinking that she would be busy for a while. When I returned a few minutes later, she was sitting in the exact same spot that I had left her, in the position that is her invitation for us adults to come play with her. The treat had been set aside in the corner of her play pen, untouched. Silly me. I then realized that her favorite treat wasn’t the dog biscuit — the opportunity to play was her favorite treat!

And so, I wondered. Where do we “adults” lose our propensity to engage in “play”? Is it that words and phrases like “leadership” or “responsibility” or “accountability” or “parenting” or “setting a good example” and so on make us forget our playful nature? All of us, in our formative years after birth discovered the world around us through play, didn’t we? We would play, sleep, eat, drink, and do it all over again the next day, wouldn’t we? So, what happened somewhere along the line that we largely forgot our sense of play? Why is it that we forgot the connection of play to our well-being and health?

Or did we really forget? Maybe we simply replaced physical play with other kinds of play. What is “play” anyway? One way to define  play is its outcome – how do we feel after the experience of play? If we feel lighter, more joyous, more at peace in any or all of the three – the heart, body or mind – after engaging in any activity, then we have engaged in play. Any creative activity that engage us in a manner which heals our heart, body or mind, can indeed be a form of play. Don’t you think so?

The painter with her colors and brushes and crayons and pencils and stencils and canvases is at play. The photographer with his cameras and landscapes and portraits and lenses and perspectives is at play. The amateur cook dabbling in the kitchen with recipes and spices or baking new creations is at play. The dancer, the musician, the writer, the poet – all are at play because their heart is lighter, their mind is healed with their activity. Any action can become play, if we approach it with a light, joyful and playful attitude. And yes, even ‘spiritually focused’ activities like meditation, yoga, prayer and more, can become play. Why not?

In the Bhagavad Gita (“the song divine”), it is said that this entire world is a creation of the divine energy at play. It is further said that the deepest and highest form of love is manifested as a result of this play. If one were to believe this to be true, then we can realize that play has tremendous (healing) energy. Imagine what our life would look like, if we were to open our heart and accept the invitation to play. In loving play, we could all experience deep bliss, deeper awareness and the deepest truth in all of our being, all over again. 

Kumud

P.S. Join us on Sunday, July 19 at 9amET on twitter for our weekly community gathering in #SpiritChat. We will toss around some  questions and answers, and experience the healing energy of play. I hope you can join us. Namaste – @AjmaniK

Hydrabgea in bloom – a wonderful example of nature at play!

The Spirit of the Game

Tags

chess, coaches, equality, play, sports

Growing up in India, I was never much of a sports-playing kid in school. The emphasis was purely on academics, and any activity that distracted from “studies” was considered superfluous. It was even suggested that those who excelled in sports only did so because they were “poor” students and were probably not much interested in studying anyway!

This isn’t to say that I did not enjoy playing football (i.e. soccer), basketball, volleyball or even softball (without the gloves)  at every opportunity that I got during the daily P.T. (“physical training”) class. I even signed up to play “goalkeeper” during an inter-school tournament one year. However, my stint was short-lived because the after-school practices interfered with my “studies”. So, I decided to bide my time to play “real sports” until I got to college. 

However, all was not lost on the high-school “sports” front for me. In the ninth grade, my new brother-in-law started to teach me how to play chess. A combination of “plus points” about chess made it “acceptable” to my parents to allow me to spend untold number of hours playing the game. Firstly, I was viewed as being a good host to my brother-in-law, every time that we played when he visited us. In Indian culture, family members of the sister’s or daughter’s in-laws were always  treated with great respect and accommodation. So, this was strike one in my favor. Secondly, chess is a cerebral game, and this aligned well with the focus on “academic” activities. Thirdly, unlike football, there was no chance of getting physically hurt playing ‘chess’!

After playing diligently for a few years, studying books about chess openings, spending hours trying to solve the chess puzzles that appeared in the Sunday sports section of the newspaper, I actually started winning once in a while when I played with my “teacher”. I even started playing with my brother-in-law’s father, which was always a special occasion for me. This did land me in a bit of a dilemma as I was now finding myself in a position of asking a question. Should I be showing “disrespect” to the “in-laws” by playing “all out” and to the best of my abilities? Or should I be playing with integrity, in the “spirit of the game”, and let the pawns and rooks and knights and bishops sort it out on the board? (The dilemma sorted itself out once I graduated high-school and the opportunities to play became very rare).

Just when I thought I was getting really good at the game, an “International Master (IM)” from the USSR visited our high-school for a demonstration. He agreed to play “simultaneous chess” with thirty-two students and teachers. We all sat, sixteen apiece, in two long rows, and he moved from one board to the next, making one move at a time against each player. One by one we were defeated, and I was totally awed by the surgical precision with which he dismantled all but one student’s carefully crafted defenses. At the end of it that day, I wasn’t sure if I was awed by the IM’s thirty-one wins or the student who escaped with a draw! In those three short hours, I learnt a lot from the IM about the “spirit of the game”, and how much more I still had to learn about playing chess itself.

During my college and graduate school years, there was an unexpected hiatus of about ten years in active chess-playing for me. Fortunately, the love of the game did not die. In the mid-nineties, the advent of the internet and “international chess servers” opened up a lot more opportunities to play with players of different “ratings” (levels) from across the world. I even made a few friends with whom I would play fairly regularly – “friends” who I never even talked with, let alone meet in real life. Perhaps this experience was a precursor to what was to come a few years later on twitter in the form of #SpiritChat!

But what does chess, or sports at large, teach me about life and spirituality?

Chess taught me that the “spirit of the game” goes beyond winning and losing. It allows for the possibility of a well-contested, thoroughly enjoyable draw! I learnt that regardless of how “powerful” they were at the start of the game, every single piece was subject to being “humbled”. Any of the “lowly” pawns could not only humble the “mighty” king but also  become “all powerful” by being “queened”. All a pawn had to do was take one small step at a time until it reached the other end of the board! The bishops taught me about the discipline of “staying in our lane”, for they were only allowed to move diagonally on squares of assigned colors. The knights taught the power of flexibility in movement – the only pieces that can attack without being in line-of-sight of the pieces that they are attacking. The rooks taught me that long-range thinking, even if it is only limited to straight lines, conveys power only second to that of the all-powerful Queen.

One great lesson of playing chess perhaps came from learning that “the center” is all-important. A strong grasp of the center of the board, just like a powerful awareness of our heart, is essential to success in chess and life. Who is it that  controls the center? More often than not, the center is established by the “lowly” pawns, with their one or two small steps at the very start of the game. Similarly, it is with our small, pawn-like moves in our daily spiritual practice, that awakens awareness of our center. Our daily spiritual steps may seem small, even insignificant. Yet, with every heart-based move we make, we are setting up space for our center to prevail.

Looking back on all those years of chess-playing and all the games I must have played, one common conclusion stands out. At the end of every game, all of the pieces – whether they were black or white, winners or losers or participants in a draw,  pawns or queens or kings – all were put back in the box from which they were brought out, to await yet again for  their opportunity to take center-stage again.

The game taught me that winning and losing are often forgotten, but the spirit of those who taught us how to play with purity, fairness and dignity leaves an imprint on our heart. Remembrance of the game’s spirit is perhaps the best way to honor our coaches, and to be grateful for those who choose to be on life’s playgrounds with us! 

Kumud 

P.S. What is your favorite sport to watch or to play? What has your favorite ‘game’ taught you about life and living? If you were to play a position in your favorite game, what would it be? I invite you to share the spirit of the game with the #SpiritChat community on Sunday, Feb 2nd at 9amET on twitter. Maybe we can even play chess one of these days…  Namaste – @AjmaniK

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

By Alan Light – Own work by the original uploader, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=20299

On Making Work Play

Tags

creativity, integration, play, work

The first Sunday of September is ‘celebrated’ as the ‘Labor Day’ weekend in the USA. It was the first ‘long weekend’ that I encountered when I first here for graduate school. I was intrigued by a holiday that had the word ‘labor’ in it, and I also wondered why they did not spell it with a ‘u’. Over the years, I learnt a bit more about this classic American weekend that marks the passage from summer into autumn.

But, back to ‘labor’. The word itself seems to carry a sense of ‘heaviness’ about it for me. It conjures a vision of coolies carrying suitcases on their heads at railway stations in India, ascending and descending staircases with a seeming ease that defies their wiry frames. As a child, I was always impressed by their superhuman strength, and often felt a bit guilty about the tough negotiations we would do for hiring them. In their work, they seemed like Atlas carrying the weight of their shoulders on their back.

However, we all well know that not all ‘labor’ is manual. In this day and age of technology, our labor is often defined by our ‘finger dexterity’, ‘mental organization’, ‘oral delivery’ and ‘visual acuity’. The ‘gentler’ connotation of ‘labor’ is simply ‘work’. And the even ‘gentler’ connotation of ‘work’ is often ‘play. And some of us have mastered the niche and cultivated the art of ‘making work play’. They are perhaps the enlightened creatives.

So, what is it that defines those masters of ‘making work play’? I imagine that we would have to know what the words ‘work’ and ‘play’ mean to us at an individual level. For simplicity sake, let us assume that ‘work’ leans toward ‘labor’ and ‘play’ leans towards ‘fun and recreation’. When ‘work’ and ‘play’ tilt away from each other, like the two arms of the letter V, they tend to pull us apart. When they come together, as in the letter I, we feel a sense of integration, of wholeness, of wholesomeness.

And then, there is notion of ‘duty’. For me, the word connotes an even ‘heavier’ form of work than ‘labor’. When it first appears to do its bidding, ‘duty’ tends to invoke resistance. It is often inconvenient, and tends to be demanding of what we may be unable or unwilling to give of – which is our sense of freedom. Friction results, sparks fly, unfamiliar words and thoughts and feelings emerge. Play becomes the farthest thing from our hearts and minds when we approach the work of our duty as a burden that has befallen us.

We need not despair, though. It is time for evaluation of our (spiritual) practices. Do they feel like burdens, or like play? It is self-reflection that reminds us of our capacity to love, and it is that love which ‘greases the tracks of duty’. When approached with love, we take the first step on the path (towards doing our duty at hand) with a renewed lightness of heart. This leads to a sense of vairagya (non-attachment to the results), which leads us back to freedom, and to the joy of play!

Love of work. Freedom through love. Play through Freedom. This is our work.

The result? We find ourselves in That ocean where all of our work is a wave of divine play – Leela.

We have come full circle to the center, where ‘labor’ has become weightless. It’s time to celebrate!

Kumud @AjmaniK

P.S. Join us Sunday, September 2nd at 9amET / 630pm India for our weekly community chat on twitter. We will work on ‘Making Work Play’ in #spiritchat – bring your game-boards and game-pieces!

Nature’s (handi)Work – or is it merely Play?!

Indulging in Earth’s play

Tags

earthday, play, spirtuality

In every season, every change of season, there is the opportunity for us to indulge in, and with, nature’s playful spirit. Her propensity towards play seems to be particularly energetic in transitions to spring and autumn as the rate of change is greater than in the transition to winter and summer.

The other times that invite us to play are the daily sunrises and sunsets, when the interludes of light and shadows weave an irresistible harmony for us to dance to. The temperature changes during these transitions also create opportunities to play, to observe the effect the onset of warmth and coldness on the flora and fauna that surrounds us.

And so it goes with the Earth and her various elements that constitute external nature. But what about the play that we can indulge in, with our internal nature? What is the opportunity for play provided by our ‘inner earth’ – the playground in which we experience a deep grounding, that field of contentment which lies beyond mere happiness?

It is that “inner earth”, and her invitation to play, that has the possibility to create the lightness of heart that all play is designed to create. The energy of “inner play” creates long-term benefits for us when it inspires us towards good actions. By indulging in creative inner play, our good actions will eventually influence our minds to think better thoughts, which will lead to even better actions.

So, I invite you to accept the invitation to step onto your “inner earth’s” playground on this Earth Day. It is perhaps time to honor That friend who knocks on the heart’s door and asks – so you want to come inside and play?

Namaste,

Kumud

P.S. Like it was for many of you, she was my first play companion. Today, I will hug the earth to honor all that she taught me about the simplicity of play. It would have been her 75th birthday… Thank you, Mom!

On Play, Service, the Mind and Inner Peace

Tags

mind, peace, play, service

The month of September started with our weekly Sunday conversation on twitter discussing the nature of play, and how playfulness influences our spiritual health. The consensus of the community seemed to be that we don’t nearly play enough as adults (as compared to children), and that if we incorporated more of this sense of play into our daily lives, we would be much better of in all areas of our lives.

The role of Service was our topic of discussion on the second Sunday of September. The concept of “service before self” was explored and we examined whether this is a realizable ideal or not in today’s fast-pace world. One theme that emerged during this chat was that we have to make service to others a priority in our lives – and that the lack of doing this can stunt our spiritual growth.

The third Sunday in September was a discussion on one of my favorite topics – the nature of the Mind. The mind can be our best friend and yet, when unrestrained (like the loose reins of a chariot), it can be lead us astray in response to the inputs from our senses. Several concepts like discretion, discrimination and intellect were brought forward during this particular chat, and will be explored in future discussions.

Inner Peace was our topic for the fourth Sunday of September – perhaps a natural follow-on to the discussion on the nature of the mind. Some questions that were explored during this chat were – where does inner peace come from? what disturbs it? what techniques can we use to maintain inner peace, and so on. A theme that emerged from this chat was that inner and outer peace are deeply interconnected, and that our inner peace impacts our families and communities deeply.

This brings us to the final Sunday of September. As has become tradition, we will try and find the common thread among the topics of the past month, and look forward to the next month of October. I invite you to join the #SpiritChat community on Sunday September 30th at 9am ET / 2pm UK / 6:30 India as we continue our journey on twitter.

I hope you will join us,

Kumud

Update: Here is the html Transcript for the chat. Here is the pdf version for download. Also see the questions asked during the live chat held Sep 30th 2012 at 9am ET. Feel free to answer in the comments or tweet with hashtag #spiritchat to share your answers with the community.

Q1. Let's begin with play. What are a few, NEW playful things you did in September? #SpiritChat

Q2. Spiritual growth is serious work. Not much room for play. Agree or disagree? Why?  #SpiritChat

Q3. What is it about trying NEW, creative play that lights up our spirit? #SpiritChat 

Q4. Service before Self. Who did you observe practice this recently? Please share. #SpiritChat 

Q5. What changes occur in our minds when we engage in service to others? #SpiritChat

Q6. What are some occasions when your mind feels most at rest? During play? During Service? #SpiritChat

Q7. How does the state of your mind affect you inner peace? #SpiritChat 

Q8. What three lessons will you take from September into October? #SpiritChat