My sister once told me to “Challenge Your Mind, Exercise and Play,” it is as simple as it is profound. We all challenge our minds, far  fewer exercise, and even fewer take time to play. But what is play? Have we lost the art of play due to our work philosophy of career-focused hard work with little time off?

What is play?  It’s simply to engage in activity for enjoyment or recreation. Don’t underestimate the need to play, nor consider playing a waste of time—to the contrary, there’s a whole host of benefits that playing provides beyond just the physical—there’s the mental, emotional, spiritual health aspects of play, and unquestionably, playing is a great reliever of chronic stress.

Play is one of the greatest joys in life—we should all take advantage of playing before we lose this most beautiful part of our life to work, stress and obligations that pull us further in the other direction. We don’t need experts to tell us the benefits of play—we already know the freedom of play and the pure exhilaration we get from it. When we embrace play, we are rewarded with a better quality of life. Remember what George Bernard Shaw once said, “We don’t stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing.” He was right… So, let’s rekindle our childlike sense of wonder and get out there and start having some fun, if you haven’t already!