According to Elisha Goldstein, there’s a simple but important tool we often forget when it comes to happiness: play.
I have been researching for years what helps create more resilience and happiness within us. I have looked at my own life, the lives of my clients and students, and research in psychology and neuroscience. What I have discovered is that within each of us there is a core set of natural antidepressants. Deliberately harnessing these resources alters brain activity in ways that help shape an antidepressant brain. One of the natural antidepressants that can help break bad moods and create positive neural activity is Play!
In Discovering Happiness: Overcoming Depression with Mindfulness and Self-Compassion, I describe play as “a flexible state of mind in which you are currently engaged in freely chosen, potentially aimless activities that you find interesting, enjoyable, and satisfying.”
A great video showcasing adult play and its consequences. Take a look and see what you notice.
When placed in enriching environments where adults elicited play, they became more active, open, and most seemed to genuinely enjoy themselves.
Research by Marion Diamond at the University of California, Berkeley shows that the cerebral cortex of rats that were exposed to richer environments with toys and playmates grew. This is the part of the brain involved in cognitive processing, and these rats actually ran the maze faster than other rats in less rich environments. This type of study has been repeated many times with similar results. (Note: Rats whose environment was depleted of toys and playmates had decreased cerebral cortical thickness.)
In fact, engaging play reduces stress, promotes creativity, productivity, openness, and revitalizes the sense of being alive. It is literally a natural antidepressant.
The question for us is: How can we create a richer environment?
One answer lies in understanding how our brains respond to cues. Most of the time, our brains make decisions automatically and unconsciously, and environmental cues influence those decisions. If you are often alone and your environment lacks or lacks nutritious things and people, you are more likely to lead to depression and anxiety. On the other hand, if the environment is more attractive and people have access to more playmates, they will be more resilient. So we have to think: Does the environment we currently live in, whether it’s at home or at work, foster play?
If so, it’s good practice to be aware of those cues. If not, how can we create more cues in the environment that elicit more playful neural responses?
Encourage play at home and work
Many companies are starting to create a richer environment. Because research shows that it leads to happier employees, less stress, increased loyalty and productivity. If your workplace doesn’t, you can take a mini-break to create a joke board on your own, consciously watch a short video like the one above, or hang out with nourishing people as a source of connection.
Why not think about what play means to you at home? This is usually something you thought about doing, but decided in your heart that it wasn’t important. Maybe you want to pick up your camera more, reconnect with an old friend, read a fun book, go on a weekly two-hour date, or take something out of your routine to refuel. That’s how I started.
This is considered a luxury because our culture values working over playing and we often say to ourselves, “Playing is not productive.” This is one of the biggest lies our brains tell us. Research shows that people who incorporate play into their lives are more likely to run mazes faster and more efficiently.
There are other tips for finding a more playful life and playmates, but the first step is to pay attention to your own cues and start creating a richer, more playful environment. And even in the face of the voices in your head that say, “I don’t deserve this” or “There are more important things to do,” you need to be proactive and create them for yourself. In Uncovering Happiness, we call these “negative unconscious thoughts” or NUTs. This is because they often make you feel weird when they are nearby.
The message here is:
Consciously incorporating play into your life can act as a natural antidepressant, creating positive neural changes and, with practice and repetition, contributing to an anti-depressant brain.
Please take a moment to share. What does play mean to you? How do you incorporate it into your life? Your interactions generate living wisdom that we all benefit from.
Created based on mindfulness and psychotherapy
