Play Every Day and Be Happy

Engaging in play is a sound investment anyone can make regarding their happiness. Play is directly related with pleasure, and no matter what stage we are at in the lifespan we need to engage in things pleasurable; psychological science has proven it; we all have the need to play, and play is one form of God’s will for pleasure.

Too often we have chosen to gratify the sinful desires in order to meet our pleasure needs. All along God has designed play as a direct means to satisfy the pleasure sense. Perhaps the best and most direct way of obtaining healing for our addictive propensities is to simply engage with the child within us.

Some of us, indeed very many, have had our childhoods shortcut or even damaged. Indeed, if we were to take the therapeutic viewpoint, we are all damaged, but my heart goes out to those of us who were abused or neglected in the process of our childhoods.

Notwithstanding the childhood we had, we all have the need to connect with, accept, and love our inner child. And this occurs when we engage in play, and there are so many forms of God-willed play to engage in.

Such play cannot hurt anyone; indeed, God-willed play will, if anything, will be a blessing to others, but we do it to engage with ourselves, as we engage with our Heavenly Father.

If we are to live healthy adult lives we must continue to engage in play.

The Importance of Creative Pleasure

Play is the immediate input into pleasure, but it isn’t the only way. For instance, to be recognised, to be honoured, to be valued, and to be accepted; these all, and many more positive experiences of life, engage us which the pleasure sense that God has wired us to have the need for.

This is not to say that pleasure must take precedence over consequence. Adults are responsible to engage the pleasure sense in ways that please God. They understand that pleasure is part of creativity and innovation; that there is no need to sin in order to gratify the pleasure sense.

This is a secret to the happy life: to keep things simple; to have fun, but not at others’ expense. And there is much room to create fun in ways that is generative, so generosity is the output.

© 2014 S. J. Wickham.

Acknowledgement: to David Michie, counsellor, pastoral supervisor, and trainer.

God’s Invitation Into Character Transformation

Character change is an uncomfortable prospect for every single one of us; no one willingly enters into the confronting process of character growth and transformation without some external influence that meets with their own internal motivation.

Often the external influence for growth appears forced. We knuckle down because our options to do something else more comfortable have dried up.

The journey of character transformation is replete with many opportunities to swing outside of our comfort zones, in finding, through new ways of exploration, new cohesiveness of identity. But, there is always disequilibrium, anxiety, and resistance to meet with along way. So there are many threats to effective growth, and therein lies the advantage of therapy and coaching to get us through the discomfort to the eventual incorporation of new competencies.

New cohesiveness of identity is a state of enhanced character; of higher, better self-knowledge and relationship with God.

The Cycle of Comfort

As thinking, feeling creatures, with many layers of unconscious self-protection that we have learned, we are drawn to remain in the cycle of comfort. We don’t want to be exposed to our vulnerabilities. We want to remain where life is safe and predictable and pleasurable. The cycle of comfort meets that inherent aim. Safety and security is our aim, and to reach the state of comfort is our goal. But if we are to grow in character – which is God’s will for our life – then there will be plenty of stimuli to that end, and it will be some external influence that will set us on our way.

The dissatisfaction of being in a rut will be our motivation to enter the cycle of discomfort and growth.

The diligent disciple prays to become self-aware and to courageously commit to the cycle of discomfort and growth.

The Cycle of Discomfort and Growth

Again it must be said, our flesh and self-protective instinct seeks to avoid this territory. We have a fearful hatred of challenges to our identity. As soon as we have become dissatisfied enough to seek for growth, we have achieved a state of disequilibrium, which creates anxiety, and in turn involves the temptation to resist the very growth we are after. We can so easily vacillate between two divergent poles.

The key watch point is a moment of fear or of pride that presents as resistance. Whenever we resist the inputs for growth and transformation we do well to simply rest and reflect, before we are pushed too far and resist altogether. The mode of resistance is a key point along the journey, and we should call the resistance for what it is. Resistance is fear, but it shouldn’t be judged. It should be anticipated and welcomed before it is creatively dealt with.

Once we have met the resistance head on we are likely to enter positive exploration, which has as its danger the state of deserting the plan for some ‘higher’ and more salubrious vision. We need sufficient restraint to stay focused and do what we need to do in establishing the component of the new self toward new cohesiveness of identity.

***

Character growth hurts because it involves the pain of external influence. If we can still our anxiety, understand and accept our resistance, and focus when we are distracted, new cohesion of identity is possible.

With humility to pass our tests of integrity, character growth is ours.

© 2014 S. J. Wickham.

When Bad News Becomes Brokenness

On an innocent enough Tuesday morn,

When the strangest experience makes its dawn,

“Abnormal internal structures” in our dear little life,

We learn that she or he is in the state of real strife.

As the doctor stared into our eyes that day,

The moment surreal, emotions not kept at bay,

To hear “there are issues” and to let that sink in,

To our faith in that moment was all we could cling.

Sitting there silently as he broke the news,

Shattered and shaken, no thought of a ruse,

We walked out into the world, forever it’d changed,

Somehow our lives were indelibly rearranged.

***

There is no preparation for bad news. To bad news there is the experience of being blindsided. Even during the process of a critical medical assessment procedure where nothing can be taken for granted there is still insufficient preparation for what could potentially come.

And it did come for us late that Tuesday morning, on a gloomy winter’s day, with rain filtering down from the heavens. Those doctor’s eyes and the sternness in his resolve and even the humidity in his eyes; the instant of silence spoke like a megaphone of what we were about to hear.

That pressurised burning sensation in the chest, the excruciating mindfulness of the moment, time sort of standing still while the emotions scramble to keep up; the doctor walks into his office and sits down, deliberating, pensive, very considered.

Certain words leave their mark. “Internal structures,” “compression of the lungs,” “herniated diaphragm,” and “enlarged kidneys,” all resound like a resonating gong in the hyperconscious seconds.

Leaving the ultrasound consulting rooms, having been waived of the fee, a meld of shock and watery eyes, the thing I noticed was how comparatively inconsiderate people were. But they didn’t know what we did. It wasn’t their fault. We had such special information. Suddenly we are positioned in the frustrating dilemma that the world is far behind; our friends and relatives have no idea and breaking the news brings all kinds of reactions – sadness, of course, guilt, silence, echoes of support, and even naivety.

Grief ripples into the lives of everyone affected. And we all are... connected and affected.

***

There is no preparation for grief; no answer for bad news. All we can do is meet the moment as honestly and as strongly as we can. There is integrity in that. There is inspiration for life in that. No matter what occurs, our faith in God carries us through.

© 2014 S. J. Wickham.