Discovering oneself through play
Have you ever wondered why we love to play as children? Why children have this natural instinct to play?
Many studies show that through play, children develop physical, emotional and mental skills. We could say that playing has to do with imagination, fun, the desire to experiment and make friends, but also with creativity in finding resources and solving problems, making decisions, playing certain roles to see how it feels to be a doctor, a pregnant mother, a warrior or a supermarket owner.
What if I told you that when children play, they actually work and vice versa? And that the instinct to play has a deeper purpose than we may think?
Dr Maria Montessori, the famous Italian pedagogist, doctor, philosopher, claimed that ‘play is the child's work’.
From a very young age, children are driven by a strong desire for independence: they want to feed themselves, they want to help, they want to do what their parents do; they get excited when they can use the real tools used by adults. They imitate the world they live in and this helps them not only to adapt to their environment, develop self-confidence and independence, but also to develop their own identity and discover their role in society. The child is therefore a worker, and when allowed to follow their natural instinct, the child is ennobled in their soul - as the Italian proverb goes, ‘work ennobles man’.
In other words, through play, which means serious, engaging and interesting work, the child builds the adult of tomorrow, an adult who is fulfilled and in harmony with themselves.
However, the key for this to happen is to follow one's own interest and to do so freely (deciding how to play, when, where, etc.).
This leads me to ponder: on the one hand I think about the need to change our approach and the consideration we have of the child's ‘play’ in order to more adequately support the natural urge of the human being to fulfil their mission. So for example treating children as apprentices and making them as independent as possible from a very young age.
On the other hand, play may then be nothing more than a different approach to work, an approach to life and everything we do.
As adults, we ‘work’ to satisfy needs, but when these are dictated by our true inner self (not by money or what society thinks is best for us or most necessary), and then we do it with interest, freedom and responsibility, when we learn as children to follow this urgency and instinct of ours, then the approach to work is fun, passionate, enthusiastic; we do not lose our curiosity and desire to learn. Work becomes meaningful and fulfilling; we can do it for hours... as if we were playing!
And here I would like to make an invitation to all of us and you readers, which is to get in touch with our inner child, to be guided by what intrigues us, with enthusiasm and courage, to turn even the most mundane task, such as cooking or cleaning the room, into a game. This helps us to live life more pleasantly. But more importantly, it trains us to be more authentic, to know ourselves more and to find our passion, our true mission in this life.
I love my job and look forward to playing every day, and you?
Quote:
Maria Montessori - The Montessori Method