Friday, May 24, 2002
That Recreating the American Way article has been explaining a lot to me - like why my DeepFUN Retreats wound up being 5 and 6 days long, and why they'll probably be other, even longer retreats.
Ever since I designed the New Games Trainings I have, despite their immense success, felt that they weren't as successful as I needed them to be. Yes, they were fun and poweful and people definitely developed competencies in leading New Games. But the part about inventing your own games, about creating your own fun, that part never really worked. New Games became a collection of really wonderful games, and people who learned how to lead them became a bunch of really wonderful leaders, but, if you happen to attend a New Games training (still offered by the stalwart few), you'll discover that it's almost identical with the trainings we gave 25 years ago. Yes, to the people who are new to New Games, the games are still, well, new. But they are packaged. They may be different, but they've been already invented.
And it's that part - the creating-your-own-fun part, the part during which you discover that you and a community of peers can not only invent really fun games, but can have far deeper fun playing games that are truly new and truly yours - that has been for me the gift, the core teaching, the big empowerment that we can give each other.
Looking back, I realize that the time wasn't really right for that message, certainly not as right as it is now. Even though New Games was born during the Viet Nam war, war was still too far away from us, our institutions changing, yes, but not that much, and not under such a penetrating threat. New Games fit well within an emerging infrastructure. The games and the event could become another product.
But today, our very ability to produce is under attack. And I'm thinking that we can no longer afford to be consumers or even producers of fun. That we all have to become inventors. We can't rely on prepackaged toys and games. We can't rely on organized sports. We have to rediscover our collective powers to reinvent fun in family and community. We have to learn how to create fun where there isn't any.
Ever since I designed the New Games Trainings I have, despite their immense success, felt that they weren't as successful as I needed them to be. Yes, they were fun and poweful and people definitely developed competencies in leading New Games. But the part about inventing your own games, about creating your own fun, that part never really worked. New Games became a collection of really wonderful games, and people who learned how to lead them became a bunch of really wonderful leaders, but, if you happen to attend a New Games training (still offered by the stalwart few), you'll discover that it's almost identical with the trainings we gave 25 years ago. Yes, to the people who are new to New Games, the games are still, well, new. But they are packaged. They may be different, but they've been already invented.
And it's that part - the creating-your-own-fun part, the part during which you discover that you and a community of peers can not only invent really fun games, but can have far deeper fun playing games that are truly new and truly yours - that has been for me the gift, the core teaching, the big empowerment that we can give each other.
Looking back, I realize that the time wasn't really right for that message, certainly not as right as it is now. Even though New Games was born during the Viet Nam war, war was still too far away from us, our institutions changing, yes, but not that much, and not under such a penetrating threat. New Games fit well within an emerging infrastructure. The games and the event could become another product.
But today, our very ability to produce is under attack. And I'm thinking that we can no longer afford to be consumers or even producers of fun. That we all have to become inventors. We can't rely on prepackaged toys and games. We can't rely on organized sports. We have to rediscover our collective powers to reinvent fun in family and community. We have to learn how to create fun where there isn't any.
Labels: theory
