The Importance of Play

Who likes to play? — We all like to play. Play regularly, on schedule. This is part of self-care, personally, but it’s also part of managing your people, once you have staff. If you don’t engage them in play and schedule it, guess what’s going to happen? They’re going to play anyway. They’re going to do it around the water cooler, they’re going to play on their phone at their desk.  Play is going to happen. People need it. 

Now let’s talk about why it’s so important. Our brains need that distraction and that play. So if you want to bring out the best most creative parts of your own brain, the best most creative parts of anyone that works with you, anyone you lead. Play is important. It’s not frivolous. Although there are generations and types of people that would say it IS frivolous and never do it at work, and totally separate work and play. That’s not true, creativity comes with play.

Every time you do something that’s a little bit outside your comfort zone, every time you push just a little bit, you create a new pathway in your brain. If you do the same thing over and over and over, and you never vary your routine, there’s a rut, literally a rut. A crevice in your brain, that gets deeper and deeper. It gets harder and harder to change your behavior, if you don’t occasionally mix it up.