Playing with the Dissertation

The dissertation is a serious undertaking, right? It’s work. Work that contributes to the field you are in and proves you are up to the task of representing your discipline.

Is that what you carry around in your head?

That could be a problem…

…”work that is devoid of play is either boring or a grind. We can get pretty far through sheer will-power, and some people have prodigious powers of perfectionism, self-denial, and suffering. Ultimately, though, people cannot succeed in rising to the highest levels of their field if they don’t enjoy what they are doing, if they don’t make time for play. Having a fierce

dedication to grinding out the work is often not enough. Without some sense of fun or play, people usually can’t make themselves stick to any discipline long enough to master it.”

— Stuart Brown, Play

So how does one re-learn how to play?

The Eight Play Personalities

Brown describes 8 “Play Personalities”. Let’s start by visiting these and see if you can find which of one or more of these describes your past and/or current play personalities.

1) the Joker: Just like it sounds, Jokers like “being silly” — nonsense and foolishness, practical jokes, the “clown” that like to make people laugh.

2) the Kinesthete: These are people who like to move in their play, who even “need to move in order to learn” (Sir Ken Robinson). It can include athletes, dancers, walkers, yoga…anything that has them moving their bodies purposefully. It’s not about competition — even if competition is involved it’s just an opportunity for engaging in an activity they enjoy for itself.

3) the Explorer: Exploring can be physical exploration of new places or emotional discovery of new “places” and ways of feeling and being. Or it can be mental exploration — researching something new, discovering new points of view or vicarious sharing of new experiences.

4) the Competitor: this player enjoys using the rules, keeping score, and/or the energy of others also playing to push themselves, discover new ways of doing something better. Competitors can enjoy playing against others, or their own past performance, or even watching others playing. 

5) the Director: Play for these folks is about planning and executing events. They are organizers. They enjoy getting others to play their parts and having everything organized to “come off” nicely. (Think: “all the world’s a stage…”)

6) the Collector:  A different kind of organization is the play of the Collector who aims to have the most, the best, the most distinctive, or the most complete of Something. It may be physical items that the Collector collects or it may be experiences (traveling to every country at least once, eclipses, etc.). They may enjoy collecting for the sake of the collection itself or part of the enjoyment may be connecting with others with the same interest.

7) the Artist/Creator: The play here is in making things — in any number of ways. They may show and sell their creations, they may give them as gifts, they may do it just for the joy of the creating alone — never having an audience. They may create things that are beautiful, fun, functional, repairing or inventing things.

8) the Storyteller: Imagination rules for the Storyteller. So although Storytellers include the obvious writers, dramatists, cartoonists, screenwriters, performers…they also include the people who enjoy the stories told, putting themselves into the characters’ places. Stories can be delivered through the written word, the stage, through dance, magic, lectures. Storytellers can also bring a story to almost anything they do — telling the unfolding story as they progress through the activity.

And there are the eight Play Personalities.

Where do you see yourself? I know for me I indulge in different kinds of play in different situations (room is tense? rely on me to crack a joke ;-)

How can you use them?

You can think back to your own favorite play activities and ways of being to re-discover how you played most naturally.

How could you apply that play-style to your dissertation work?

You could Play with the play personalities themselves — how can you imagine applying each of these styles to the dissertation process? Any of those sound intriguing? Worth Playing with?

What if you’re just not in a place to Play at all? Where to start?

Here are some tips for jump-starting the Play imperative:

1) Move!: Regular physical activity can increase your activity levels and make play of any type easier to engage in. For the movement to be most effective, it should either: raise your cardiac output meaningfully and promote endurance conditioning, be something you’re not so good at / that’s new to you (e.g., balancing on a wobble board), or let you move in new or different ways (dancing without a partner, moving freely to rhythms).

2) Play with experts: This means primarily children and animals — connect with these folks who know how to play un—self-consciously, just for the fun of it. If you don’t have access to either of these expert groups, borrow some on You-Tube and let yourself share their joy. (Here’s a great start - and notice how the adult filming is also having a great time!!)

3) Create your own Play History: While there are formal ways to do this, start with just taking a few minutes to sit and reminisce about your own best play experiences: what were you able to feel totally involved in? want to do time after time, again and again? what gavae you joy to just be doing? Now immerse yourself in how you felt doing those things — really feel it, visualize yourself doing them, stay with it for awhile. Next, you’ll want to start finding activities that help you recreate that same feeling in the present. Barbara Brannen (The Gift of Play: Why Adult Women Stop Playing and How to Start Again) calls this “heart play” as it is play that brings joy to your heart.

“The master in the art of living makes little distinction between his work and his play, his labor and his leisure, his mind and his body, his information and his recreation, his love and his religion. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence at whatever he does, leaving others to decide whether he is working or playing. To him, he’s always doing both.”  — James Michener, in his autobiography