Ep 14: The Need for Play in Your Creative Practice

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Perfectionist in Recovery

The Need for Play in Your Creative Practice

Hello and welcome to the Perfectionist in Recovery Podcast! My name is Marcy Parks and I am a perfectionist in recovery.

On today’s episode, I wanted to share with you about the need for play in your creative practice. But first, I want to take a moment to say thank you for listening and thank you for tuning back in with me after a brief break last week. I am still working on finishing up some print orders from my “There are No Bad Emotions” print release, and I so appreciated having the extra time to get caught up last week, so thank you for hanging in until I could get back to it for this episode! That being said, I am so grateful to have you here to join me for this conversation. Thank you so much for supporting the podcast! If you are enjoying the podcast and haven't already, let me know! Send me your feedback by sending me a message on instagram @MarcyparksArt or going to my website at marcyparksart.com and submitting your feedback through the contact form. As I have shared before, your feedback makes this podcast better for you to listen to! If you want to continue to support the podcast, like subscribe, follow, share and and if you haven't already, go to apple podcasts and leave a review! Reviews are the best way to support the growth of this podcast.

Now, let’s get into it!

I was inspired to talk about play in this episode after listening to a recent episode on Brene Brown’s podcast, Unlocking Us. The episode I am referring to is her “On My Mind” episode where she shares her thoughts on recent events.

In this episode, she is really just checking in and sharing what is on her mind following the passing of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and the ongoing pandemic. As she shares her thoughts, she references an article that was recently published titled “Your Surge Capacity is Depleted: It’s Why You Feel Awful”. I recommend everyone reading this article, because there is a lot in it and it can help clarify so much if you have been feeling like I have in recent weeks, but it explains that our “Surge capacity is a collection of adaptive systems — mental and physical — that humans draw on for short-term survival in acutely stressful situations, such as natural disasters.” (Haelle). The article continues to explain how, at this time, we aren’t just experiencing an acutely stressful situation, because the pandemic is ongoing and is more like a marathon, but because our surge capacity is already depleted, we can feel some combination of exhaustion, anxiety, depression, among other things.

I had also been reading about the “Six month wall” that people hit when experiencing natural disasters or living in sustained crisis. If you count March as the start of the pandemic for us here in the US, then September was our six month mark. But everything Brene was sharing in her episode was really hitting home for me because I have definitely been feeling that sense of exhaustion, listlessness, and overwhelm much more acutely lately. It feels very different from my brand of depression that I am better acquainted with. I had a day recently where I felt like I was in such a fog and I just really couldn’t even get my thoughts together. I left my house to run errands and had to turn around and go back to my house three times because I forgot x, y, or z. It was so bizarre and I didn’t even have the energy to be frustrated with myself over it. Not to mention Mars is also retrograde right now, so I am sure that isn’t helping anything lol, but I really have been struggling! So I was grateful for Brene sharing this episode because she went on to talk about a new energy resource: play.

Brene references her book “The Gifts of Imperfection” and quotes she shared from MD and Play Researcher Stuart Brown. According to Brown, “The Opposite of play is not work. The opposite of play is depression.”

I have so many thoughts about this quote. First, I definitely would have previously believed play to be the opposite of work because of sayings like “work hard, play harder” imply that playing and working do not take place at the same time, but when I think about my daughter and what play is for her, play is very much her work! It is how she learns. And when I think about my art - art is part of my work, but it is also very much my play as defined by Stuart Brown. Brown defines play as “ time spent without purpose, activities where you lose track of time, activities where you feel free to be yourself, liberated, and uninhibited.”

My second thought about this quote is how connected it is to creativity. As I have shared before, creativity is our natural state. There are no “non-creative” humans, there are just humans that use their creativity and humans that don’t. Julia Cameron describes people that don’t use their creativity as “blocked creatives”. Believing as I do that creativity is a natural state of a human being and reading Stuart Brown’s quote that “the opposite of play is depression” suggests to me that, like creativity, play is also a natural state for humans, but we lose that connection to our sense of play as we age. Brene shared another quote from Stuart Brown, saying, “Respecting our biologically programmed need for play can transform us and renew our sense of excitement in life.”

Now, my first reaction upon hearing the word play, I think of things like playing hide and seek, imagination play, all the ways in which Searsha and I play together or I see her playing, and I start feeling more exhausted! Ha! I just don’t have the energy of my three year old to play like she does! But, I think as adults and in our culture, we believe play is reserved for children with lots of energy, and when I think about how Stuart Brown defines play: as “time spent without purpose, activities where you lost track of time, and activities where you feel free to be yourself”, I realize that my previous beliefs and associations with play are just part of my programming and not actually true for me. I don’t know what happens to us as we age that we come to see play as being a “waste of time,” but I feel like it is a crime against our humanity lol.

I also started thinking about the relationship between play and creativity. Creativity requires vulnerability and play is any activity where you feel free to be yourself. I feel like the two just naturally go hand-in-hand. For example, I think about how journaling is an opportunity to be honest and uninhibited in your expression and how you can also lose track of time when journaling, so to me it would easily qualify as both play and a form of creative expression.Y’all didn’t think I was going to go a whole episode without mentioning journaling did you? I also had a revelation about swimming for me! I have shared here before that, because of my experience as a competitive swimmer, that I really don’t know how to play in a pool anymore, I only know how to swim laps, BUT, I LOVE swimming and it is something that I very easily get lost in and can lose track of time doing, so by definition, it is still play for me!

Anyway, Brene goes on to talk about creating her “play list” and she isn’t referring to music and I thought this was so creative and a fun way to think about it. She created a list of play activities she enjoys that she can start incorporating into her routine now to start to replenish and restore her energy sources. She shared about how her family even started planning their vacations around their play activities instead of sight-seeing and the usual itineraries and how they actually come home from vacations feeling refreshed instead of like they need another vacation.

I love the idea of a “play list” and think for everyone it is a beneficial creative activity to indulge in right now, especially if you are hitting that slump. Some things that I have on my playlist are:1. Painting

2. Swimming3. Journaling4. Running, exercising5. Walking or being outside with Searsha

6. Watching Schitt’s Creek

7. Watching Halloween movies (or any movie, really) with Searsha

8. Yoga

Just to name a few.

So for this week’s recommended reading:

I am recommending Brene Brown’s The Gifts of Imperfection and also some recommended listening of her podcast “Unlocking Us”.

For your Journaling Prompt today if you have a journaling practice already or don’t have one and want to get started:

Make your “play list”! List at least 10 things you like to do for play as defined by Stuart Brown. Bonus points if you create a music playlist, to accompany your creative play list.

And if you haven’t already, head over to my website and download the Free Self Discovery Journal Guide to inspire your creative and playful weekend. There is a journaling prompt in addition to affirmations and artist activities (or play activities) to ignite your creative recovery and restore your energy.

Otherwise, friends, hang in there. You are not alone! These are tough times, so be dedicated to taking care of yourself. Take time to rest, reach out to friends, and definitely get out to vote on November 3rd.

Until next time.

Ready to take the first step in your creative recovery?

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