Play

"Want to play Wii sports?", he asked.  

"Sure!", I replied enthusiastically.
"Want to open that  bottle of wine in the fridge?", I questioned.
"Yeah!", he replied.

That simple conversation led to two bottles of wine and roughly 3 hours of fun. I know I stumbled to bed far too late for a weeknight, and I'm pretty sure I should never play the Wii Sports and Resorts boxing again, or table tennis for that matter, but I totally owned the 100 pin bowling challenge! It was an amazing night of silly fun that was worth being just a little too tired to roll out of bed on time the next morning. And that led me to think...

Why is it as adults that we forget to play? I had such an amazing night of fun and felt so much more relaxed, comfortable and happy with my play-partner afterwards. The noticeable benefits of the play session were immediate for me, and I even questioned, "Why haven't we done this sooner?". Playing helped us both forget about the stresses of the day and I'm pretty sure we both went to bed tired and happier than we were before. 

So why don't we play more often if it's so awesome? Why can't we have those easy conversations these days with other adults like, "Hey, wanna build a fort?" and we just go do it? Why does there have to be so much, "I'll check my schedule", or "No, I have X, Y, and Z to do today"? Non competitive play is important for adults, and we do far too little of it. If you were your own child, you'd be yelling at yourself to "Go out and play already!" but yet, play seems to be like a PG-13 movie in reverse, no one over the age of 13 permitted. And if you're reading this, I challenge you to change that.

Play with your kids, play with your partners, play with your friends. Just play. Go find some ridiculous Groupon activity to enjoy (I've bought plenty over the years!), or for simplicity's sake whip out a board game. This, "The Benefits of Play for Adults" article is a pretty great read and lists not only the great benefits, but even ideas of how to incorporate play in all avenues of your life. What are you waiting for - go play already!