It's the little things...

It's the little things...  This is my new insight about happiness, fun, and play.  Developing new friendships, and flirting.  Continuing an almost three-year daily email conversation with a loved one.  A piece of music that makes you stop what you're doing and daydream.  Bantering back and forth with a Scrabble partner.  The sight of your daughter dancing to pop songs and seeing what a lovely and vibrant young woman she's becoming.  Soaking in the creativity and liveliness that your son expresses.  The anticipation of good friends coming to visit.  Being in "the zone" as you try new ski techniques that a friend has taken the time to share with you.  Reconnecting with an old friend that you thought you were growing away from.  Being alone in your house for the entire weekend and you start to go a little batty and take pictures of your feet in various settings.  So many blessings.  This is what keeps me going... what makes it all not so mundane and makes life worthwhile.

Vermont is taking big steps in cultivating happiness!!

Well, to fill in a little space (since I am still slacking!) here's an old post I wrote for my work at the Center for an Agricultural Economy.  Although it's not about play, it's about happiness, which is related.  Enjoy!

Vermont is taking big steps in cultivating happiness!!

By Heather Davis, Food Systems Monitoring and Evaluation Research Associate at the Center for an Agricultural Economy

June 11^th, 2012

Happiness.  What does it really look like?  How do we achieve it?  How do we measure it?  Where does responsibility lie in achieving this state?  With us as individuals?  With the state to support policies that will enhance happiness and well-being?  Or both?  These are the questions that Vermonters are now asking themselves due to a new law passed this year, S.237, which calls for the State of Vermont to measure the well-being of its citizens.  The indicators and the associated data that are being developed for this state initiative will be a real asset in decision-making; for the state budget, for local businesses and organizations, in creating laws and policy, and for individuals in making decisions about their own lives.  This is exciting and progressive stuff!

On May 30^th, I spent the day at the University of Vermont attending the Measuring What Matters: Pathways to Sustainable Well-Being in Vermont conference, sponsored by the Gund Institute for Ecological Economics, Gross National Happiness USA, and Common Good Vermont.  I am a data geek and I love measures, so the idea of measuring our well-being in a way that is more representative and accurate than the traditional Gross Domestic Product (GDP) method really appeals to me.  Monitoring progress toward goals is the only way we can really know if we are really making our way toward those goals – and what a more worthwhile goal than happiness!  This conference was really up my alley!

After some wonderful speakers, there was some great discussion in the break-out group I attended addressing the question of measuring well-being.  Some of the words that emerged to describe happiness and well-being include “Thriving,” “Community,” “Time balance,” “Resiliency,” “Work-life balance,” “Relationships,” “Access to nature,” and “Basic needs,” and “Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs.” 

After coming up with the definition of happiness and well-being, the next step will be to develop ways to measure these things.  This can be the more difficult part of the process: it’s very important to find the right measures (indicators) – if you measure the wrong thing, you’ll get misleading results and/or the information will not be useful at all.  This problem can be seen in the over-emphasis of measuring GDP.  The U.S. and other countries have generally focused on this measure – which describes the total sum of all economic activity – and have used it to tell us how “well” a nation is doing.  This approach is very problematic for many reasons – not the least of which is that our well-being goes far beyond economics.  Yes, economics is an important part of well-being – to a point – but there are many more factors that we need to pay attention to, such as those mentioned above.  If one of these factors is languishing we need to do something to address it – both as individuals and collectively as a community, state, or nation.  This is why measuring the elements that contribute to happiness is so important – “What you measure affects what you do. If you don’t measure the right thing, you don’t do the right thing” -Nobel Prize winner, Joseph Stiglitz.

The idea of measuring well-being, beyond the traditional and problematic measure of GDP, began in Bhutan in 1972 when the new young king, Jigme Singye Wangchuck, declared that his country would be measuring the Gross National Happiness of his people, which was a more well-rounded way to measure well-being.  It has taken some time (Bhutan was way ahead of the curve here), but the idea has caught on in recent years and several other countries, states, the UN have now begun the process of measuring well-being in a more holistic way.

Now, Vermont is part of this progressive group and will be measuring the well-being of its citizens.  This conference was the first step in this process. 

How does measuring happiness and well-being relate to the work I do at the Center for an Agricultural Economy (CAE) and the general work of the organization?  The CAE’s mission is to, “bring together community resources and programs needed to develop a locally based food system that supports the desire of rural communities to rebuild their economic and ecological health.”  We, as an organization, must reflect on why we want to develop the local food system in the first place?  What are our intended outcomes of doing so?  We need to have a vision of the larger impacts of our work.  What benefits does our work have for individual citizens and the community as a whole?

There are four main outcomes of a healthy food system that have developed through my work here and are also reflected in other work that I have come across in my research, which also happen to reflect well-being, in general:

·      Healthy Communities

·      Robust & Equitable Local Economy

·      Food Security

·      Healthy Environment

A portion of my work here at the CAE has been measuring the health of the local food system and the well-being of the Hardwick-area.  My Master’s Thesis, A Framework for Monitoring Local and Regional Food Systems, which I worked on while here at the CAE, took a holistic approach to measuring the health of food systems and includes all the various elements that make up a food system (Farms, Food Waste Recycling, Processing, etc), as well as those four outcomes.  This also includes measures on well-being to reflect “Healthy Communities” as one of the intended outcomes of a healthy food system.  Some of the specific indicators relating to this that were developed include:

·      Percent of respondents who participate in bartering

·      Percent of farms who participate in bartering

·      # of Buffalo Mountain Co‐op members (total members & working members)

·      # of members of North Country Farming Network

·      Percent of registered voters who voted in most recent mid‐term election

·      Percent of respondents who indicated that they currently volunteer

·      Average score on community satisfaction index

·      Average score on the “Well‐being Index”

·      Homeownership rate

·      Crimes against property: Number of property crimes / 1000 pop.

·      Crimes against people: Number of crimes against people / 1000 pop.

The intentions of the above indicators (there are a total of 200+) are to get an accurate sense of community vitality, engagement, and well-being.  Other indicators look specifically at details relating to farming, food processing, etc.  The data for this portion of the larger framework is being collected from area organizations, state and federal data sources and via community survey.

In rural areas where farming is integral to the community - and even in more urban areas where we’re seeing the development of more urban agriculture and increased engagement in the production of food – we need to consider the health of the food system when considering our greater well-being, and vice versa.  Food is one of our basic human needs and for true well-being we need to have healthy food and a healthy food system.

The Measuring What Matters Conference and these conversations will be part of the ongoing process of creating the state-mandated well-being index for Vermont.  It really is exciting to see this coming together – another way that this small and humble state is leading the way!

Self-Sufficiency

Okay, I admit it – I’m already neglecting this project!  It’s been on my mind, for sure, but I kept putting it off.  I haven’t had my children very much in the past few weeks due to scheduling and the holidays (this year they’re with their father for Christmas) and I have been blaming it on this, but really, that’s a lame excuse.  If that’s the case, then I’m transferring responsibility for my fun and play from a man to my kids now.  I need to do this on my own.  I need to get out of my head.

I’ve been told for a long time that it is important to work on the capacity to meet your own needs; even as a child my father encouraged this.  And, I believe it – after a failed marriage, and other life experiences that have shown this to be true.  It is the basis for this whole Play project – I feel like I need to develop the capacity for spontaneous play and joy on my own and not depend upon a relationship, or even my kids, to bring this out in me.  I have also gone to see a very respected (and amazing) astrologer in the area that reinforced this to me and said that this is especially important for me on my path through life and where I’m headed.

A friend of mine posted this article by Rachael Vaughan on Facebook last weekend, which, on the surface, seems to contradict my belief in this.  Now, the article specifically talks about emotional self-sufficiency – not all of the other forms of self-sufficiency that I have been working on for so long.

“We are relational beings” she states, and yes, I 100% agree.  She says there’s no shame in feeling lonely when these needs for relationship are not being met, and there’s not.  And while this is the ideal scenario – that somebody would be there for us – at the same time, we need to meet these needs in ourselves at times.  Sometimes there’s nobody there to help make us feel better.  We need to be able to do this for ourselves and feel whole within ourselves.  This is why, I believe, it is important to develop these skill of emotional self-sufficiency and this is what my Play project is about.  And, depending upon another for something we want in our lives can be the recipe for co-dependence and unhealthy outcomes.

At the same time, I fully embrace the importance of having others in your life – I do want to find that great and healthy relationship that’s right for me; I enjoy my work most when I’m with or working with others (mostlyJ); I love my family and community; I couldn’t live without my kids.  I have really reached out to my friends and community for support during this time that I have been struggling, and they’ve reached out to me (for which I am so grateful).  I also notice that I am most satisfied when I am relating to others.

The more you give and take love, care, attention and contact with others, the happier and healthier you will be. So humans are naturally relational why has this meme [of emotional self sufficiency] taken such a hold? How did a meme based on avoidance become such a fervently held belief?

This meme is all about fear

We become avoidant because of fear. Sometimes people have been mean to us in the past and we carry the scars of that trauma—which makes us turn away from love because it has become twinned with the fear of betrayal. The far end of that avoidance response is the supreme isolation of schizoid personality disorder, or the lonely fearfulness of avoidant personality disorder. The near end is believing in the desirability of ‘meeting all of one’s own needs’. All of us have been betrayed at some point. So all of us harbor a little fear connected to the vulnerability of opening ourselves to love, and therefore this meme is seductive. But there’s another reason why it has taken hold, even though it’s one that goes against what makes us most healthy and happy.

The author seems to put all the blame for this belief system in emotional self-sufficiency on fear.  I recognize that it can come from this, but sometimes it’s also a practical need.

Fight the meme, my friends. We don’t need more self-reliance. Or more narcissistic focusing on ourselves. What we’re blocked in is our relationality: our readiness to receive and our willingness to give. We’ve become so infected with the values of the consumer society that we think we should only give if we’re going to get, and that we should try to get the most return for the least investment. God forbid we love someone more than they love us. Or give our love for free. We think we should provide for ourselves, because otherwise we’d be relying on someone else. And that means taking a risk without any guarantee. We’d rather hoard our own resources, and be all right, Jack. This is the attitude to life that has people in my office feeling both lonely as hell, and ashamed of it—they’ve been told it’s wrong to need people, and they’re scared that their normal attachment instincts are sick.

Instead of going inward and trying to meet your own needs, go outward and build yourself a robust network of relationships, a community of like-minded souls that you can laugh with, cry with, listen to, care for and love—the type of network that makes people in Roseto live longer. Then when the inevitable betrayals, bereavements and disappointments happen, you won’t be alone. You’ll have support. Because the truth is, no-one makes it alone. And no-one—unless they’re the sole survivor of a plane crash in a jungle—should even try.

Some good food for thought, for sure.  I think that it’s a balance – we can meet our own needs, but this doesn’t necessarily mean that we isolate ourselves either.  I’ve seen the results of someone isolating themselves, and it’s not a happy ending.  I think we can have a high-level of self-sufficiency, and at the same time have meaningful and satisfying relationships with others.  It’s not an either-or situation.

Meanwhile, I will be playing tomorrow – I’m going skiing!

Picking myself back up

Well... The past two days have not gone as smoothly as the previous two.  Someone said one thing, and it brought me way down - on the edge of tears if I needed to explain myself for the rest of the evening.  And then there was this low-level depression for most of today.  I really didn't have it in me to play or be spontaneous in any way.  (Well, I did spell out "Hi" with knives on the counter in the kitchen of my office and left it there yesterday for someone to discover - a bit random, but it's all I could muster :)

I'm not usually prone to depression, but every now and then it does happen - always situational.  I can see in my thinking what is contributing to it - worries that I won't be able to keep myself afloat financially after my job ends and that I will never find the man I'm looking for, as well as missing the man I was dating (which I mentioned in my first post).  The thing that turned it around for me this evening was cleaning.

I used to have a cleaning business and when I was doing it full-time - although the benefits were that it was meditative and allowed me time to process life - after a while I started to really dislike it.  That's not what I wanted to do for the rest of my life!  So, I went to graduate school, and my life transformed.  The pain of what I was experiencing motivated me to make a change, just as it is now with this whole experiment.

Anyway, back to cleaning tonight...  I think that part of what turned around my mood while doing this is the physical activity involved.  I also consciously tried to change my thinking.  I thought, "Well, there are a lot of benefits to being single" and started focusing upon those.  These include:

• Being able to go out and do what you want without answering to anyone (except, of course, when I have my kids).
• Being able to sprawl out in bed and staying up as late as I want.
• I get a lot of work done! (And right now, I really need to do that - having a full-time job, a few side jobs, maintaining my house, and job searching, as well as all of the other activities my kids and I are involved with).
• It allows me to focus more on my kids and my own self-improvement
• It's allowing me to get this project going - and thus (re)learn how to depend upon myself for my well-being and happiness.
• It's allowing me to connect more with a wider-range of friends and community that I wouldn't have otherwise and feel their love and support.

These are all pretty good things!

Beyond thinking about the benefits, I also started thinking that I just haven't found that person yet, and he will come, and I should enjoy what I have right now.  Same thing with the job situation.  When it seems that things are not falling into place, it's just that things are not right now, and something needs to change, so keep trying new things.  My play experiment seems right on target.

So, I haven't gotten back to the level of play yet, but the day is still not over!  Although I did come across this picture which inspired me :)

Success with kids!

Well, I’ll have to say (and my kids agree with me) that these first few days of my “bring more play into my life” experiment have been a good success!  I have probably laughed more in these past few days than I have in a while!  And I do have my children to thank for this.

When I first mentioned this project to them, they emphatically agreed that this was sorely needed.  They were also quite enthusiastic to participate in the experiment and to be my guides/mentors/teachers.  (I’m so lucky!)

A very good friend of mine upon reading my first post said that in my true nature I “lay it out in full seriousness.”  And I am taking it seriously – I am not trying to deny my nature or completely change who I am, but I do want to be a more relaxed, lighter – not so serious!  At the same time, I want the play side of me to be authentic – not forced.  Although, some of my approaches will be a bit forced – such as learning jokes (beware dear friends – I may try some out on you!) and doing at least one spontaneous thing each day (tonight I was outside and my kids were calling me in and then I repeatedly walked into the glass door to try to get inside – this made them laugh!).

Being true to my nature and as a researcher, I am approaching this very systematically.  My first method of primary data collection was naturalistic observation (observing the subject in its natural environment when they are unaware of your observing) and participant observation (you are observing, but also participating in the act).  I’ve got some other good data collection methods lined up for this!

First off Brook decided that I needed some formal schooling, so she set up a classroom and got to work!  After having me look up the definition of "fun" and "play" and a bit of desk time, we hoola-hooped, pogo-sticked, threw a frisbee, hit a ball, and threw a football.  There were definitely some good laughs there!  Beyond this, we have danced to Christmas music, bowled, listened and sang to Michael Jackson (something that has always brought me up!), they taught me some jokes, gave me some very creative ideas for my spontaneity exercise, and have shown me to be much more present (and get out of my head a bit!)

One unexpected benefit of this whole experiment is that it is bringing my kids and I closer.  I have never felt like I was not close to them, but I admit that I haven’t generally been closely involved with their play time since they were quite young, and my role is often telling them what and what not to do.  At the end of the first day, one of the most satisfying parts was when my daughter said, “Mom, I don’t think you’ve ever been this fun!” 

We made some great videos, which I will edit and post (hopefully sooner than later) and I must say I am grateful to have such great kids/teachers.  My only concern is how I will keep it up when they go back to their dad’s – this will be much more of a challenge.  Any suggestions on this will be greatly welcomed!

What follows is a photo-documentary of our adventures!

When I picked up the kids, this was laying in the parking lot next to the car – I thought, “How appropriate - this must be my little guide!”

The first thing we did was go pick out our Christmas tree – this is the one Oliver wanted!

Some down time – but Oliver is playing “Heads or Tails” and I join in!

Well, there are things to get done too – Oliver paints the wall where him and his friend were playing a little too hard and made many holes in the wall!  He was quite willing to make it right though!  We also threw and stacked wood.

Brook & Oliver’s school - I have great teachers!

Watch out!

Here’s Brook getting very focused on the task at hand, and then falling off the deck!  

That made us all laugh!

We ended the day at Parker Pie and the antics continued – I tried to tone it down a bit, but we (or they, really!) may have been a bit much!  One man said, "They don't get out much, do they?"  :)

Another approach – today I wore fun socks!  This outfit backfired a little bit and I had some clothing malfunctions though, which added to the humor of the day. 

This fun and play stuff is messy business!  I’m generally a bit of a neat freak, 

but working on letting this go a bit too!

The Revelation

This has been a challenging year. Between men challenges and job challenges, I can’t say that 2012 has been one of the highlights of my life. At the same time, it’s not all that bad – I do have my vibrant and beautiful children; I have a lovely home; I live in a wonderful and supportive community; I have been graced with many opportunities and blessings. But despite all that, sometimes it’s difficult not to be overwhelmed by all of the pieces of my life that are not fulfilled (i.e. the loss of work and a lack of a long-term relationship – two very big things in one’s life!).

Within the past three weeks I was informed that my job of two-and-a-half years would be ending in mid-January due to a lack of funding, and then I broke up with a man I had been dating because of the high stress level I was feeling from that, and then regretted it later. These two things have sent me into a mild depression, and with winter just starting, it does not help at all for me!

The wonderful thing about getting older is that we have more wisdom, and the one thing that I have noticed about this set of bumps in the road and my diminishing positive attitude is that I have much more awareness about it than I have ever had before during similar periods in the past. I have been picking it all apart – monitoring my attitude and feelings that seem to fluctuate wildly throughout the day and trying to assess what is causing it; having more awareness about how my body feels and its need for sleep; looking deeply inside of myself for ways to overcome all of this emotionally.

Now regarding the job challenges, I already have a plan, and a back-up plan: that’s how I work. I also have faith that things will turn out okay. But, fear does rear its head – some times more than others – and the faith melts away for some time. Regarding relationship challenges, I try to maintain the same faith, with the same results – at times feeling like I’ll never find the “right” man and at other times feeling that it will come one day and I need to be happy with where I am right now and make the most of it. I try to be at peace with everything and work on manifesting.

The other piece to all of this is the process of becoming an adult. Being an adult is no easy thing – especially when you’re a single mother, or when you’re married to a man that lets you take care of everything. Everything is on your shoulders, and this weight can become a burden and really weigh you down. After years and years of this, we can sometimes lose our sense of humor. We can forget how to play.

This is what has happened to me – to a point. I do go out with friends, go dancing, and/or have fun maybe once a week, and I’m thankful that I haven’t completely lost my sense of fun. But, what I’m finding is that it doesn’t sustain me enough; the rest of the week is so mundane and full of responsibilities and I find that when I’m with my kids I’m often a dud or a downer. I have also been losing my motivation and my sense of purpose.

One of the things that I really enjoyed about this most recent relationship was that he made me laugh. I felt this sense of lightness when I was with him and often, for a while, I forgot about all of the responsibilities that I had – and I loved that! In fact, many of the relationships that I’ve had since my divorce have been that way – they have been a source of escapism for me.

Because of this, and the good feelings this brings, I have thought to myself, “I need to be with a man that is light-hearted because I have a tendency to be so serious and I want someone to bring out that light-heartedness in me. I like that part of me and that’s what I want in my life, but I need someone else to get it.”

Now, anyone who has done any sort of therapy or self-help work would see this as a really big red flag – depending on someone else for something you want in your life rather than cultivating it on your own is not a sustainable approach to well-being. But, I didn’t see it clearly in this particular situation, until tonight. Tonight I came to the realization that I need to do this for myself – cultivate within myself a regular sense of play and joy in order to be happy and fulfilled.

So, I started Googling “Ways to bring back playfulness” and “Have fun as an adult” (You can imagine some of the search results!). And I came up with some really good ideas. I’ve kept a notebook for the last few years where I write down good ideas and quotes I come across, as well as especially significant thoughts of my own, so I dutifully wrote the most inspiring ideas for play in there. And now, I’m going to try out ways to bring more play and joy into my life on a daily basis.

This brings us to why I decided to start this blog. I wanted to try out some new ideas and practice some new thinking regarding play. While taking a bath (where I often have my most promising revelations!) I thought that blogging about my process with this experiment would serve many purposes: it would help me to stay on track and not lose sight of what I want to accomplish; it would allow me to record all of the results of my experiment; and it would allow me to share some of my experiences and maybe help others who could benefit from a similar practice.

I have decided that my practice for tomorrow will be with my kids, and when I pick them up from their grandparents, my focus will be with them. I’m going to enlist their help (Mommy needs to be taught how to play again – will you help me? ☺). We’ll see how it goes, and I’ll report back to you the wisdom of my 8 and 11 year olds!