When I look back on my own childhood, I often think of shoeboxes.
I spent a lot of my free time stockpiling these staples of school summer holidays, using them to create a variety of small, rectangular worlds. From green felt-tip pens to repurposed chairs and tables from an old dollhouse, I made up gardens and cafes within the layers of cardboard: a fun pastime that was motivated by a serious eleven-year-old desire to become an interior designer. While this plan gradually faded away as it was replaced by other, similarly passionate career aspirations, I can’t help but wonder what caused me to give up this hobby almost entirely. Why do we, as adults, seem to value the presence and space created by play far less than we did as children? Is it simply due to our lack of time or focus on work, or are we socialised into the world of work from a very early age? Can work be perceived as play, or is play impossible in a capitalist society?
The link between play, fantasy and dreaming might help us understand. Imaginative play and fantasy are a response to a deep psychological need for pretending; the stage of sleep called rapid eye movement (REM), also known as dream stage sleep, is important to our cognitive development. Without this subconscious processing of events, humans experience mental deprivation in their struggle to make sense of information – we miss the ability to think straight. Fantasy media such as The Lord of the Rings and The Night Circus encourage us to use both the intuitive and analytical sides of our brain in comprehending a variety of fantastical worlds as well as analysing language and narrative. Our ability to imagine produces a sense of equilibrium and well-being across many aspects of our individual lives and thus becomes a mechanism for survival.
The improvisation required in play also helps prepare us for the unexpected. Perhaps the reason why play is so child-oriented is that, at a young age, everything is new. If my own shoebox interiors were ‘playing’ at being an interior designer, it stands to reason that other forms of child’s play exist as a form of training for adulthood. But as human beings we are constantly in training, be it for a marathon, an interview, or any kind of newness. I like to think that play might reform itself as we grow up, shifting like an ever-changing Pinterest board of interior inspiration. What may have started with shoeboxes evolved into drawings, then paintings on a canvas, and years later into handmade graphic props. It is with this outlook that we can infer that play doesn’t truly disappear but presents itself with more purpose in adulthood.
However, in many parts of the world, hard work dominates life, and value is given to activities concerned with progress and achievement. This is seen across education systems that measure success through quantifiable means. But in an environment under these conditions, play cannot flourish. Many interventions which increase the incentive to be creative end up reducing our creativity. The education system tries to stifle childish creativity through a grading system that places value on exam pass rate and academic success. Through a recent self-initiated design project, I battled with this notion, aiming to read more books in the time post graduation by using the system of goals and rewards I had been socialised into since childhood. While this system ultimately helped me structure my time and achieve the initial goal, I didn’t feel particularly creative because I was so fixated on the rewards I had set up for myself, rather than thinking about the reason why I was engaging with my reading project in the first place.
The emphasis on achievement can lead to a lack of presence due to the constant pressure in the ‘hustle culture’ that encourages us to quickly move on to the next thing. The alternative is to try to use our imagination to be more present. My post-graduation project formed a submission for a creative awards opportunity, which, while offering me the hard deadlines I was lacking after leaving university, also stifled my ability to be present in the work as I strained towards the end goal.
Engagement in telic activities (activities valued by their endpoint) is exhausting because the fulfilment lies in the future or past, suggesting that being socialised into this work ethic is the reason life becomes so stressful in adulthood. As adults, we seek to spend our lives in the most productive ways, but in doing so, we often miss it.
Time in childhood is a funny thing. It often extends itself outward with no clear end or direction. I was lucky enough to have all my basic needs met as a child, which meant that my focus could be on the games I played with friends, rather than survival. As adults, many of us prioritise our immediate needs like food, housing and income, when previously it was provided by a parent or other caregiver. In this way, imagination acted as a rebellion. If we think back to the characters that formed our worldview in children’s books, an anti-corporate theme often runs through these stories, manifesting itself in characters like Mary Poppins, known for her pro-play ideology. While there are obvious benefits to engaging in play, it can be seen as radical in a society that places so much value on productivity. Many of my favourite characters to this day were formative elements of my childhood, who became an inspiration for the person I wanted to grow up to be. I didn’t know the difference between a real role model and a fictional character. Where there was no sense of immediate future, magic occurred.
Even though my imaginative play in childhood was driven by a career-oriented passion, the childlike mindset of taking life and the end goal less seriously is clearly beneficial to our creativity. Perhaps, instead of skyscrapers, we should be building sandcastles.