"I am an adult. What do you mean by play?"

When we have a spare moment, so many of us reach for our phone to mindlessly scroll. Often scrolling activates our Fight/Flight system below our conscious awareness. But what if instead we explored our physical space with childlike wonder. We may slide in our socks on our hardwood floor just to have our kids see our fun and giddily follow along. Or we might start humming one of our favorite songs while waiting in line at the grocery store. The person behind us may smile and say, “That’s a great one.” We may or may not put colored pencils on paper when we have some downtime at the office. Without the focus being on the outcome, our pencil to paper may look like scribbles and doddles. After we finish, we may feel ready to focus on our work or present at a meeting with a presence we haven’t experienced before while working. We learn that just like many children we do not have to wait to be inspired to make art. After returning home our child may find our art in our briefcase and say “Daddy, can we put this on the refrigerator?” It may be the first time a family member put something we made on the refrigerator.

Working with a Chi for Two® Embodiment Coach can help us integrate more movement expressions into our movement vocabulary. Having more access to more movements can allow us to feel safe (present) with more people and in more situations. As a result, in moments of distress or downtime we can express how we are feeling through creative movement acts such as drawing, drumming or dancing instead of reaching to “doom scroll” on our phone. Ultimately, we can spend more time in our Social Engagement state of Play/Dance instead of reaching for a “never enough” dopamine hit that perpetuates the vicious cycle of Fight/Flight activation followed by Shut-down.