Knowing How to Play

Mark Harris has graced us with a wonderful article called: "Are We Having Fun Yet? The Benefits of Play." It is difficult to figure out which parts of the article are most worthy of your attention, because Harris is a remarkably clear-thinking visionary, whose words are alive with fun.

For the record, there's one section in which he tells one of my favorite Csickszentmihalyi stories, because it's not so much about finding fun or having transcendent fun, but about creating fun. So, this is where I'll start:

"Csikszentmihalyi tells an interesting story about a sixty-year-old factory worker named Joe who lived on Chicago's South Side. This man's job entailed building railroad cars in a huge hangar. The conditions in the hangar were harsh, unprotected as it was from Chicago's extremes of weather. Joe, who had only a fourth grade education, was also on the low rung of the factory.

"Yet, as Csikszentmihalyi describes, Joe was one of the happiest people he had ever met. At work Joe was exactly where he wanted to be. He had no desire to be a foreman because he only wanted to fix the machinery. And fix the machinery he did. All of it. Better than anyone. In fact, the word around the plant was that if Joe retired, they might as well close up shop because he kept everything going.

"But Joe's passion for fixing things didn't end at work. At home he had built a rock garden with an underground watering system. The garden also included a lighting system designed to produce rainbows. Thus, Joe and his wife could sit on their porch in the evenings surrounded by rainbows. Joe had made of his life one seamless expression of a particular passion; in this case, a passion for building and fixing things. He possessed the gift of being able to completely absorb himself in his interests. In his living and in his working, Csikszentmihalyi concludes, Joe was a man who knew how to play."

But I was especially touched by what Mark said at the end of this most readable and useful piece:

"What struck me as I watched these young girls was how thoroughly engaged they were. And how I envied them. If, as it is said, children think heaven is being an adult and adults think heaven is being a child, then in that moment their world seemed like heaven to me. The way they played was so natural, so complete. So content.

"I say, let's pretend we've created a world where we all work reasonable schedules with plenty of time to laugh and play and just enjoy each other. Let's pretend we've let go of our worries about money and power or whatever we think we want that we don't have. Let's pretend we've created a less strife-torn, conflicted world, one in which we've learned to relax more and mistreat each other less.

"I say, let's pretend, rediscover what any child knows about the truth of living in the moment. And how wonderful it is to be fully human, fully alive. Who knows? If we play it for all it's worth, we might just make it happen."

Yes, and again yes, and twice more yes, yes, with poets and visionaries like Mark Harris to remind us to play, we might indeed just make it happen.