THE SECRET OF HAVING FUN by Eda J. LeShan
THE SECRET OF HAVING FUN
by Eda J. LeShan
appeared in PTA Magazine (June '68)
copyright @1968 by the PTA Magazine
STUDYING FOR his doctor's degree in psychology some years ago, my husband decided that he needed relaxation, and tried to teach himself to play the recorder. He struggled grimly for several evenings with scales and "Three Blind Mice." Then he gave up. "Too much like work," he said, and went back to his books. Our four-year-old daughter discovered the instrument one morning on his study bookshelf. Holding it up expectantly, she put it to her lips and blew a high, quavering toot. Delighted, she skipped out into the sunshine, improvising a melody as she went along. My husband said to me later, "The moment she made that ridiculous sound, I knew she was playing the recorder as I had longed to-- just playing it and having fun!"
All too often we adults work so hard at our "fun" that we really don't enjoy ourselves at all. In fact, couldn't the real cause of much of our fatigue, tension and anxiety be as simple as this--we've forgotten how to play? As a psychologist and consultant on family-living problems, time and again I've heard the unhappy questions: Where did the magic go? What happened to the joy in life? How can I recapture the thrill of being alive?
And after years of studying and observing young children-- children at play--I'm convinced that they have the answers. What's the secret? Part of it is that a child doesn't ask if what he's doing is worthwhile. He plays for the sake of play, as an end in itself. Take a four-year-old to a playground, and with a leap and a bound he is hanging by his knees from the highest bar on the Jungle-gym, absolutely enthralled with the way the world looks upside down. No thoughts of muscle development or losing weight--just sheer pleasure in the playground's riches and in life itself.
When we adults want to enjoy ourselves, we almost always seek to be entertained by others--on television, at the theater, at a baseball game. Or we fall back on things that provide us with a kind of programmed play:cards, dominoes, bowling balls, golf clubs. We let places and objects tell us what to do, how we should react.
When a child plays, he is the manipulator; he makes do with whatever is at hand. His imagination transforms the commonplace into the priceless. A wooden clothespin, rescued from under the kitchen table and wrapped in a dishcloth, becomes a baby; a penny thrust under a cushion becomes a buried treasure. As we grow older and "wiser," we lose this talent. I think of this sometimes in New York City as I walk across Central Park at 72nd Street. Here, when I was a little girl, we played Tarzan. To us as children, it was an exotic place, full of thrills and adventures, home of lions and gorillas--a piece of Africa. Today, as I pass the spot, all I see is a small hill and a few low rock formations.
What can we do to regain this lost capacity for play, for make-believe? Here are some of the things that children teach us:
Be alive to the moment.
Study the absorption on a child's face as he sails a feather through the air, or rolls a potato across the floor into a dustpan. For him the moment is everything. Without conscious thought or plan, he brings to whatever he is doing spontaneous--and infectious--joy.
There is in children's play a fresh and quite lovely quality of freedom, of "letting themselves go." And we adults will find that something wonderful happens to us when we "let go" of our grown-up self-consciousness. A father of four told me recently how one night, after a frustrating day at work, he found himself becoming increasingly annoyed by the playful antics of his children's dog, who wouldn't let him alone. He tried to relax, it was hopeless. Finally he took the dog outdoors. "The air was fresh and cool, and suddenly something snapped! Before I realized what I was doing, I was playing with that dog like some kind of a nut. We chased each other around the lawn;I'd throw sticks and then we'd race to see who could pick them up first. Afterward it took me 20 minutes o catch my breath--but it was the first night in months that I didn't feel half-dead when I went to bed."
Children know instinctively that when you are being spontaneous you have the most fun. When friends of ours bought a house not long ago, they planned to have it redecorated before they moved in. The day the papers were signed, they sent out invitations to a "Paint-In," telling the guests to wear old clothes. When we arrived, the husband announced that we could draw, write or paint anything we wanted on the interior walls. What a wonderful, relaxing evening that was! Some wrote jokes and limericks, some painted enormous murals, some played ticktacktoe. It was marvelous:having fun without any thought for the demands of the future. It was the moment that was important, and our direct participation in it.
Be flexible.
Don't be rigid about what seems sensible. A child feels no compulsion to continue an activity beyond the moment when it ceases to give him pleasure. He's ready for any new adventure, anytime. We, however, grow ashamed of being spontaneous. If we are at home doing the family wash or at the office writing the monthly sales report, and suddenly a warm breeze through the window makes us dizzy with the thought of spring, what do we do? We tell ourselves that the schedule must be kept. Grimly we go on with our work--then wonder later why we have a headache or a backache. If only we had taken ten minutes off for a walk, to listen to a bird sing or watch a squirrel, to sit on a bench in the sun! Giving in to one's impulses for a few minutes does not automatically lead to lazy irresponsibility. Quite the reverse: it can lead to greater efficiency and productivity, for it refills the reservoir of self and nurtures an inner core of being that needs to be lovingly refreshed. Even dedicated scholars, in their wisdom, know when to yield to an impulse. Philosopher George Santayana was lecturing a class at Harvard one early- spring day when suddenly he broke off, saying:"Gentleen, I'm afraid that sentence will never be completed. I have an appointment with April." With that, he left the classroom.
Whenever our daughter is feeling especially exasperated with us, she reminds herself of one of the happiest evenings of our lives. About midnight of a school night my husband and I ended a discouraging discussion about money. It had had its usual effect--we were ravenous, not for anything ordinary, but for chicken supreme at Sardi's. We awakened Wendy, age 12, from a sound sleep, something we'd never done on impulse before. She wasn't a bit surprised. "I'd love it! Can I wear my velvet party dress?" So the three of us piled into a cab, drove to the restaurant and blew the last of our bankroll.
Renew your ties with nature.
Caught as many of us are in concrete boxes on concrete streets, we lose contact with our roots in nature. We need to find and invent ways to keep in touch with sky and sun and sea. Children understand the sacredness of these things. They are absolutely sure that the world is full of remarkable and exciting things to see and do, to taste, touch and feel. They respond with their senses to the miracles of the natural world. When they tug you outside by the sleeve, give in. Follow them. I know one father who insists that walking in puddles in a summer rain is one of the better things he's learned from his sons. Take them to a farm, a zoo, a botanical garden. Join them for a walk in the woods; lie down with them in an open field, look up at the sky and chew on a piece of grass. For a moment, see the world through their eyes.
A friend told me how one gray and cheerless day, when she was feeling depressed after a severe attack of flu, she got into her car and drove alone to a beach. "I wrapped myself up in an old blanket and sat on the sand and listened to the surf. I became fascinated watching sandpipers running in and out of the waves. When I finally looked at my watch, I realized that I had been sitting there for CCthree hours!DD I felt fully rereshed when I got home--it was like having been on a vacation." She had given to herself of the deeper rhythms of life around us.
Reach back for the child within you.
It is not by accident that stories of young lovers describe them going on picnics, running barefoot down a beach, visiting a zoo or eating ice cream cones on a carrousel. When we begin to fall in love, we know instinctively that somehow we find our truest selves in the playful games of childhood. Maurice Sendak, who writes children's stories, was asked how he was able to communicate so sensitively. "First," he said, "I have to reach and keep hold of the child in me." This is true not only for the creative artist but also for the rest of us, if we are to get close to what is unique in ourselves--our own personal identity.
About a year ago I happened to notice a toy horn in a music store, each note hole marked in a different color. With it came a booklet of tunes in which all the notes were written in the corresponding colors. My husband's favorite Christmas carol was in the book. Eureka! I thought. Here is an instrument that he can play without work.
It was the best present I ever gave him. Now, in the hallowed halls of a great university, one can sometimes hear the high, squeaky sounds of "Good King Wenceslas" as a psychology professor, resting from his teaching and research, fills his office with the only music he can make--on a toy horn, with colored notes. He is one of the rare and fortunate grownups who have watched a child play and learned a precious lesson about living.(#)
ARTICLE No. 1
THE BIBLE'S TIMELESS--AND TIMELY--INSIGHTS by Blanton
ARTICLE No. 2
A SIMPLE SHORTCUT TO SET YOU FREE by Davis
ARTICLE No. 3
DIARY OF A NEW MOTHER by Geissler
ARTICLE No. 4
THE REMARKABLE SELF-HEALING POWER OF THE MIND by Hunt
ARTICLE No. 5
OPEN YOUR EYES TO THE BEAUTY AROUND YOU by Rau
No. 6:WHAT IS THIS THING CALLED LOVE? by Viorst
No. 8:PIED PIPER OF SEVENTH AVENUE by Comer
No. 9:OBEY THAT IMPULSE by Marston
No. 10:THE LOVING MESSAGE IN A TOUCH by Lobsenz
And some more...
No. 11:THE WISDOM OF TEARS by Hunt
No. 12:HAVE YOU AN EDUCATED HEART? by Burgess
No. 13:THE STRANGE POWERS OF INTUITION by Lagemann
No. 14:WHY KIDS ARE 20 DEGREES COOLER by Mills
No. 15:THE RIGHT DIET FOR YOU by Stare
And still some more...
No. 16:STRAIGHT TALK ABOUT THE LIVING-TOGETHER ARRANGEMENT by Montague
No. 17:...The ABC's of It by Lakein
No. 18:The Day We Flew the Kites by Fowler
No. 19:"Touched by Something Divine" by Selzer
No. 20:How to Live 365 Days a Year by Schindler
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