I feel like so many people discount play, but I find it to be incredibly important in life. \u00a0Just look at what these people have to say about the importance of play<\/a>…<\/p>\n \u201cYou can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation.\u201d Plato<\/p><\/blockquote>\n \u201cPlay is the only way the highest intelligence of humankind can unfold.\u201d Joseph Chilton Pearce<\/p><\/blockquote>\n \u201cPlay has been man\u2019s most useful preoccupation.\u201d Frank Caplan<\/p><\/blockquote>\n \u201cIt is paradoxical that many educators and parents still differentiate between a time for learning and a time for play without seeing the vital connection between them.\u201d Leo F. Buscaglia<\/p><\/blockquote>\n \u201cIf animals play, this is because play is useful in the struggle for survival; because play practices and so perfects the skills needed in adult life.\u201d Susanna Miller<\/p><\/blockquote>\n \u201cPlay is a uniquely adaptive act, not subordinate to some other adaptive act, but with a special function of its own in human experience.\u201d Johan Huizinga<\/p><\/blockquote>\n \u201cPlay is the exultation of the possible.\u201d Martin Buber\u201c<\/p><\/blockquote>\n \u201cWork consists of whatever a body is obliged to do. Play consists of whatever a body is not obliged to do.\u201d Mark Twain<\/p><\/blockquote>\n \u201cWe don\u2019t stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing.\u201d George Bernard Shaw<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Yes and yes. \u00a0See, play is not just some trivial thing we do every once in a while to escape life for a while; play is vital<\/em>\u00a0to our daily<\/em> life and to our overall physical and mental health. \u00a0Did you know that Google employees are encouraged to play during their work day? \u00a0This is apparently done to stimulate creativity and maintain a healthy mental state for the employees.<\/p>\n Big kids can play too.<\/p><\/div>\n Many people that work in the outdoors like myself often make comments like, “I can’t believe I’m getting paid to do this right now,” with “this” being things like leading backpacking expeditions, facilitating rock climbing trips, kayaking, etc. \u00a0It is like we are so surprised sometimes that our work can also feel like play.<\/p>\n Let’s challenge ourselves, shall we? \u00a0Let’s consider accepting that it is<\/em> okay to believe that play is important and needed in our daily lives. \u00a0How do you or would you like to incorporate play into your life?<\/p>\n Here is one idea for a play-date for couples:\u00a0http:\/\/www.lifeadventurecenter.org\/documents\/CozyinourCanoeFlyer.pdf<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" “Play keeps us vital and alive. \u00a0It gives us an enthusiasm for life that is irreplaceable. \u00a0Without it, life just doesn’t taste good.” – Lucia Capocchione I agree Lucia! \u00a0Play does make life more\u00a0tasty. \u00a0Play does to life what salt does to food: it brings out the flavor. \u00a0When you sprinkle play in your life, you feel life’s taste buds Read more…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":1031,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[103,104],"coauthors":[19],"class_list":["post-1026","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-miscellaneous","tag-mental-health","tag-play"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/06\/9933_699985286882_444512_n.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1026","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1026"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1026\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1046,"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1026\/revisions\/1046"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1031"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1026"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1026"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1026"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcoauthors&post=1026"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/06\/9933_699985286882_444512_n-225x300.jpg\")
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