My Draft Writings
Carving a Man Out of Stone: The Ways I Cherish the Men in My Life
My writings are about play and the vital spirit of caring play that men hold within themselves instinctually and its importance in the world. Child and adult play, when it is done with care is mother nature's way of sneakily nurturing our relationships, building our gut instincts, and our ability to adapt and innovate through profound adversity, with our morals intact.
Writing from a POV of a sister, daughter, dating partner and businesswoman, these writings explore the cherished moments I have had with the men in my life and their profound, positive impact on my development and healing. These cherished memories touch into my yearning to live in a world where embodied, moral instincts are talked about and learned about, so we can better keep each other and our families safe. My writings give me hope that our faith and trust in something bigger than us, can evolve and be strengthen. Where we, as men, women, and non-binary are able to keep our morals intact, while we play more, care more, create and evolve more; individually and together.
Through the lens of caring, embodied play, my hope is we can evolve our skill to see one another more clearly and safeguard one another from our own demons, and the world at large. Both halves recognizing that we are in the bunker together doing our imperfect best, fumbling through it one mistake and error correction at a time. Perhaps through the art and science of adult play, a new pathway for moving through relationship difficulties and adversity, especially between genders and within society can emerge.
I believe it is true that, diamonds are not a girl's best friend, it is her girlfriends are her diamonds. Yet there are some men that have also been my rock in a different way. My writings seem to be a retooling of my understanding and orientation around that. A momma's and a girlfriend's love can certainly move mountains. Under the right, caring conditions, maybe play can too. Read more...
My Draft Blog
Men and your Girl's Hurt
If there is one in three women that hold significant sexual, physical or verbal trauma, then that means there are considerable number of loving boyfriends, husbands, dads, brothers and sons that might be impact by that. That impact bring up a lot of agonizing, difficult, helpless, conflicting feelings. Feelings that could bring to your knees.
So if I am going to offer writings on the ways I Cherish the Men in My Life, I can't ignore in my writings the ways you as men may be suffering. Often you may be suffering because of the ways YOU CHERISH US, AS WOMEN.
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I'm Just a Care Bear
To mother nature, play isn't just for "fun", play is a discovery mechanism. It's intent is to loosen up ruts in the brain, build grit, to support evolution. It's like the sweet, innocent care bear that loves to explore and discover, has tricked us into evolution with its cuteness.
Play that holds the quality of discovery, disrupts default mode networks in the brain, to evoke what I consider as healthy post play growth. It's a kind of growth that can restore more of our gut instinct wits about us, our open heartedness, our morals, our capacity to love. But the post play period can throw us for a loop, into destabilization as new firing and wiring happens in our brains.
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My Doctorate Research on Adult Play
My doctorate research is in honor and dedicated to my Dad, as he is the first man that taught me to play. A man I cherish and love deeply.
For my doctorate, I researched whether mindful embodied relational play dynamics had an impact on, 1. moral reasoning, 2. gut instincts, and 3. ethical, creative emergence and innovation. My participants were engineering staff at Dupont/Dow Chemical. My research learnings were quite interesting. :)
Now that I have completed that doctorate research, I would like to do it again, augmenting and evolving this study to continue to collect more data, to bring my work out into the world. Would you like to get involved? Read more...
Cops and Robbers: Where Did All the Robbers Go?
Imagine into a young boy's imagination and what they do when they play? They like to blow things up and shoot things, and they like to be the one that stops the shootings. They like to play the cop who catches the robber, and they like to be the robber that outsmarts the cop. They like and need to play both sides of that coin. It is as important to psychological development, as breathe is to the body.
What happens to these kids when their play guns, knives, war toys, robbers' masks are taken away? They find sticks, and rulers, and Legos to be their war toys. Why is that? Not only is it instinct for the child to play, but it is also instinct to play both sides of the opposing tension: The good guy and the bad guy. Read more...
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Snowmobiling in Slushy Waters: Fun Teachings from My Step-Dad
My stepfather passed recently, and memories have been stirring in my mind ever since. I have felt stuck, sad and frustrated, unsure of how to honor him. Maybe this will be a way.
As a teenager, my stepdad did what Dads do, he played with me. He would paddle board beside me, while I swam a mile across our deep, cold lake and back. I would always be scared that a giant Megalodon fish was going to swallow me whole, if he didn't stay close by.
Dads: Don't Ever Loss Your Playful Spirits
"Play is a universal language." Donald Winnicott.
Dads often have a playful spirit about them when they are around their kids, that seems to come naturally. Yet Dads can sometimes get judged for this. The judgement kind a makes sense...the stereotypical thought is often, "while Dads are goofing off with the kids having fun, moms are often found wiping their noses and making dinner."
But I want to make a STRONG case for the extraordinary value that Dads bring to a family with their playful spirits, that should not be undermined or dismissed as frivolous and a waste of time. Play to our biology is serious business. It is as important to our survival and evolution as breathe.