The Power of Play and Laughter
In my books , I highlight research that indicates play is good for neuroplasticity. Your brain changes through use. Play is one of the more enjoyable ways to keep that change alive. No grim self-improvement face required. Play is strange because it looks like nothing serious is happening. Kids run around making up rules no adult can understand. Someone tells a joke. A family enjoys group games after dinner. People sit around a table playing cards, laughing, arguing over the rules, and pretending the stakes matter more than they do. Alex Hutchinson, writing in Big Think , discusses recent work in a piece called " Why Play Brings Us Pleasure ." The basic idea is simple enough and yet surprisingly deep. In the article's own phrasing, play lets us "create the uncertainty that we can then resolve." We invent a game, accept its restrictions, enter its little world of rules, and suddenly the outcome is unknown. That uncertainty is the point. Play is chosen uncertai...
