Work/Play

[River]

I was hanging out with my partner and one of our best friends the other day and the subject of work vs play came up in our conversation. At some point I said that it's a damn shame we don't have an English word (to my knowledge) that means both work and play, because the rigid segregation of these concepts into wildly separate domains seems to create all sorts of problems for us. ("Us" being people in our culture, whatever the hell that means.)

Of course, this being the polyamory forum, I'm thinking particularly about how we "work on our relationships" and "work on ourselves" in relation to ... well, relationships.

Work implies a kind of heaviness, seriousness..., an occasion for discipline and yoking ... and sort of lording it over ourselves to be sure that we don't be to lax and comfortable and lighthearted.

But some of the best "inner work" and "relationship work" is also done in an atmosphere of lighthearted playfulness, even joy and ease. Too serious and heavy an attitude can insure that good work doesn't get done. Right?

I'm hoping someone here will know a word from some language, somewhere, ... French? Japanese, Swahili?" ... that means both work and play. If there is no such word we can borrow into English, perhaps we poly folk should invent one. We're going to be needing it.

[NeonKaos]

Plork.

[River]

LOL! ... Perfect!



Hi-ho, hi-ho, it's off to plork we go....

[neegoola]

rob brezsny speaks about Pronoia (the anthidote to paranoia), maybe it's a plork' relative, but it's wildly and playfully serious!

http://freewillastrology.com/
Evil is boring. Cynicism is idiotic. Fear is a bad habit. Despair is lazy. Joy is fascinating. Love is an act of heroic genius. Pleasure is your birthright. Receptivity is a superpower.

[River]

Originally Posted by neegoola

Evil is boring. Cynicism is idiotic. Fear is a bad habit. Despair is lazy. Joy is fascinating. Love is an act of heroic genius. Pleasure is your birthright. Receptivity is a superpower.

All so true!

[AnotherConfused]

The Montessori teaching philosophy refers to what kids do as "work," to acknowledge the developmental function of children's play. I've always thought of it as backwards. I'd rather call my work play.

[nycindie]

From The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran, my favorite perspective on work:

Work

Then a plowman said, “Speak to us of
Work.”
And he answered, saying:
You work that you may keep pace with
the earth and the soul of the earth.

For to be idle is to become a stranger
unto the seasons, and to step out of life's
procession, that marches in majesty and
proud submission towards the infinite.

When you work you are a flute through
whose heart the whispering of the hours
turns to music.

Which of you would be a reed, dumb and
silent, when all else sings together in unison?

Always you have been told that work is
a curse and a labor, a misfortune.
But I say to you that when you work
you fulfil a part of earth's furthest dream,
assigned to you when that dream was born,
And in keeping yourself with labor you
are in truth loving life,
And to love life through labor is to be
intimate with life's inmost secret.

But if you in your pain call birth an
affliction and the support of the flesh a curse
written upon your brow, then I answer
that naught but the sweat of your brow
shall wash away that which is written.

You have been told also life is darkness,
and in your weariness you echo what
was said by the weary.

And I say that life is indeed darkness
save when there is urge,
And all urge is blind save when there is
knowledge,
And all knowledge is vain save when
there is work,
And all work is empty save when there
is love;
And when you work with love you bind
yourself to yourself, and to one another,
and to God.

And what is it to work with love?

It is to weave the cloth with threads
drawn from your heart, even as if your
beloved were to wear that cloth.
It is to build a house with affection, even
as if your beloved were to dwell in that
house.

It is to sow seeds with tenderness and reap
the harvest with joy, even as if your beloved
were to eat the fruit.
It is to charge all things you fashion with
a breath of your own spirit,
And to know that all the blessed dead
are standing about you and watching.

Often have I heard you say, as if speaking
in sleep, “he who works in marble, and
finds the shape of his own soul in the stone,
is a nobler than he who ploughs the soil.
And he who seizes the rainbow to lay it
on a cloth in the likeness of man, is more
than he who makes the sandals for our feet.”

But I say, not in sleep but in the over-
wakefulness of noontide, that the wind
speaks not more sweetly to the giant oaks
than to the least of all the blades of grass;
And he alone is great who turns the voice
of the wind into a song made sweeter by
his own loving.

Work is love made visible.
And if you cannot work with love but only
with distaste, it is better that you should
leave your work and sit at the gate of the
temple and take alms of those who work
with joy.

For if you bake bread with indifference,
you bake a bitter bread that feeds but half
man's hunger.
And if you grudge the crushing of the
grapes, your grudge distils a poison in the
wine.
And if you sing though as angels, and
love not the singing, you muffle man's ears
to the voices of the day and the voices of
the night.

[Satisfiction]

The English lanauage certainly sucks with descriptive words. We also only have one word for love, when there are many different kinds of love. The greek language has 100+ words for love. Go figure.

In response to your question, I try and phrase relationship "work" around the words "growth" and "understanding"

[booklady78]

Love Gibran quote, one of my favourites!
I also dig the term "plork"!

[Hardison]

Originally Posted by AnotherConfused

The Montessori teaching philosophy refers to what kids do as "work," to acknowledge the developmental function of children's play. I've always thought of it as backwards. I'd rather call my work play.

I agree. but then the kind of work I do I considered play before it ever became work for me. (computer stuff)

When I was a pre-teen figuring out how the Commodore and it's Basic language worked was play.
Today learning other new skills of the same sort is "work". (AKA play I get paid for)