Play Is A Mindfulness Practice, with TJ Matton, Chief Play Officer

Self-LeadershipMental HealthMindfulness
Written By Sara Lobkovich

Want to incorporate more play into your world? You’re in the right place!

Play isn’t just for kids. It’s a biological necessity that can transform your mental well-being and even help manage mental health symptoms like hypervigilance and anxiety.

And we’re lucky to have play expert TJ Matton back for this second episode in our two-part series on play. If you haven’t already, listen to last week’s episode for fundamentals about the science of play; and here we get practically applied. How can you increase play in your life? Listen (or read on) for answers.

Episode Highlights:

  • Foundations of Play: Play is essential for learning and development, helping us build new neural pathways.

  • Play as a Mindfulness Practice: Integrating play into daily life to enhance mindfulness and personal growth.

  • Managing Hypervigilance: Practical exercises to use play as a tool for managing hypervigilance.

  • Mindfulness and Emotional Reactivity: Shifting from emotional reactivity to curiosity through play.

  • Types of Play: Exploring different play patterns and how to integrate them into everyday activities.

Common Questions:

  1. How can play help with mindfulness?

  2. What are some practical ways to integrate play into daily life?

  3. How can play be used to manage hypervigilance?

Notable Quotes:

  • “Play is how we learn new ways of thinking, being, and operating. It’s necessary for growth and evolution.”

  • “Focusing on our enjoyment is never wasted; it’s an embodiment practice.”

  • “Hypervigilance can be a play buddy. Opt into it in safe environments to transform it from a suffering experience to an impulse for growth.”

Episode Chapters:

  1. [00:00:00] Introduction: Welcome to Thinkydoers and introduction to TJ Matton.

  2. [00:01:00] Foundations of Play: Recap of the first conversation and introduction to today’s topic.

  3. [00:02:00] Play and Mindfulness: How play helps build new neural pathways and its role in mindfulness.

  4. [00:03:00] Personal Anecdotes: TJ shares her journey of incorporating more laughter into her life.

  5. [00:07:00] Managing Hypervigilance: Practical exercises for using play to manage hypervigilance.

  6. [00:10:00] Emotional Reactivity: Shifting from emotional reactivity to curiosity through play.

  7. [00:13:00] Types of Play: Exploring different play patterns and how to integrate them into daily activities.

  8. [00:17:00] Final Thoughts: TJ’s belief in the revolutionary potential of play and encouragement for listeners to engage with her work.

Guest Information:

  • TJ Matton: Founder and Chief Play Officer of the Playful Revolution. You can find more information about TJ and her work at theplayfulrevolution.com and on Instagram at @theplayfulrevolution.

Next Episode Teaser: Join us next week for a conversation with another incredible expert about stuckness and mental health. Don’t miss it!

Special Offer: Are you feeling overwhelmed by conflicting priorities? Struggling to achieve the results you need in your organization or career? It’s time to unblock your inner strategist. Join my community membership program, designed for aspiring and practicing strategic operators who think differently. Right now, membership is $100 off for the full year, just in time to help with your Q3, Q4 transition and ramp up for 2025. Visit findrc.co/ubyis to learn more.

Stay Connected: Thank you for joining and listening. I can’t wait to hear what resonated with you in this episode. Subscribe to our newsletter at findrc.co/newsletter to stay updated. You can find me, Sara Lobkovich, pretty much everywhere online. Feel free to contact me at sara@thinkydoers.com. If you have other Thinkydoers in your work world, please pass this episode along. We appreciate your referrals, mentions, shares, and reviews.

TJ’s Links and Resources

Sara's Links and Resources

FULL TRANSCRIPT:

Episode 26: Play as Mindfulness Practice with TJ Matton, Chief Play Officer

© Sara Lobkovich, Red Currant Collective LLC (2024). All Rights Reserved.

[00:00:00] Sara: Welcome to the Thinkydoers podcast. Thinkydoers are those of us drawn to deep work where thinking is working. But we don't stop there. We're compelled to move the work from insight to idea, through the messy middle, to find courage and confidence to put our thoughts into action. I'm Sara Lobkovich, and I'm a Thinkydoer. I'm here to help others find more satisfaction, less frustration, less friction, and more flow in our work. My mission is to help changemakers like you transform our workplaces and world. So, let's get started.

​

 

[00:00:41] Sara: All right, so this is part two of my conversation with TJ, who is an expert in a long list of things, but what we're talking about...

[00:00:52] TJ: Jack of all trades and master of none.

[00:00:55] Sara: No, I don't think that's true at all. Listen to our first episode, and then we can talk [00:01:00] about mastery.

 

[00:01:00] TJ: My background is as a social worker, and I think that's part of what drives me to this work is that my work is all started in social justice, and humanistic philosophy, and feministic psychology. So, I am a social worker, and I work as a trauma therapist and a coach.

[00:01:14] Sara: In our first conversation, we talked about kind of foundations of play, why my listeners shouldn't turn this episode off when they hear the word "play." And next, we're going to say "mindfulness." Again, don't turn it off.

[00:01:25] TJ: Don't turn it off. We're reclaiming it.

[00:01:28] Sara: True! So, we talked about modes of play, and then what we're going to do today is talk about how to put this into practice—specifically, play as a mindfulness practice. Which mindfulness can be challenging for some of us, especially folks listening to this podcast. So, let's get nitty-gritty. Where can we start with reintegrating play into our lives?

[00:01:53] TJ: So, the first thing that I think is important to pull forward from the first conversation is that [00:02:00] play is how we learn new ways of thinking, being, operating. It is how we build new neural pathways. It is what is necessary in order for us to grow, expand, or evolve as a person. We can't help but grow, expand, and evolve as a person, and so play is this way of participating in our growth process, right? And play starts with choice, and so when we talk about combining play and mindfulness, it starts with the question: What do you want to play for? What matters to you? And again, play starts from this embodied sense of choice—what do you care about and what matters to you? And one of the things that I think is important is that like play is not hierarchical, right? So, I had a play challenge for myself like two years ago where I just really wanted more laughter in my life. So I went on a hunt for laughter. for laughers in my life. And I called them slutty laughers. It was the year of slutty laughers I wanted to make friends [00:03:00] because I didn't grow up in a house with a ton of laughter. I'm a trauma therapist. So like I don't spend a ton of time laughing. I have like my own personal trauma stories and histories like of being in that kind of body.

So like laughter was just not something that came super naturally to me and I want more laughter So like I was just on the hunt for like frivolous laughers who kept that part of themselves. And so that was a mindfulness practice for me is whose laughs do I love? What does it look like for people laugh at? What do people even laugh about? Like I did not conceptually understand it. So it became a practice for me. And it was a time of really embodying more frivolous play for somebody who like is a little bit of a deeper, more meaningful player, but it didn't, wasn't meaningless. Right.every time I laughed, was this practice of you can do it, TJ. laughter belongs in your body, right? you can do this. and oh my god, the way that laughter comes so much more easily to me now. laughing at myself, laughing at everybody I love, laughing at, even the people who [00:04:00] hurt me. like when I'm just like, oh my God, that was so ridiculous what they just said. Can you believe it?And I'm not hyper focused. I'm not spiraling about it. I'm just like, laughing it and moving on. But that was so based on just spending time. Like studying frivolousness, that felt unfamiliar to me, right? And so really building a mindfulness play practice, and again, I define play as being engaged with something with your enjoyment as the central focus. And so when we focus on enjoyment, our enjoyment is never wasted, right? That focusing on our enjoyment is like, is an embodiment practice, is how can I stay as embodied and co creating moment to moment, like. A sensation and an experience that works for me, that works with other people, where I'm not shifting into people pleasing, I'm not shifting into power, controlling the dynamic, right? But like, how do I stay in that co creative process with my enjoyment, [00:05:00] right? And so play really starts with, what do you care about? what matters to you? What do you, what kind of evolution do you want to opt into? And this is where play becomes a mindfulness practice. It's like, focusing on your enjoyment. And then how do you enjoy yourself in the co creative growth process? what neural pathways do you want to create? And some people are just really gifted at frivolous play. And this is really important because frivolous play, doesn't, helps us turn that hyper vigilance down in our body. It helps us, stop defending, ourselves. Right? Like, I was happy. why did you do it? Cause I liked it. why else? Do I need another reason? so frivolous play and studying frivolous play is like super important in helping turn hypervigilance down. And similarly, serious play, right? Helps build a lot of intentionality, a lot of focus, a lot of [00:06:00] meaningfulness in our life. And I find that adults when you're relearning play or when you're practicing play as a mindfulness practice, like having that intentionality around it, whether that intention is frivolous or serious, helps set the container, right? It's builds that quest feel, right? Like, where are we going with this? Particularly because for many people, we live in a play deprived culture. So learning, relearning play, right? You talked last time about that sub threshold to right? It's vulnerable and it's a little bit scary. And so the only way that we're going to be able to, stay in that edge of vulnerability is knowing that this vulnerability matters to us. That it's part of our bigger game, like that this move matters to the bigger game. And so we think about it as this is part of what I love about like the combination of the way neurodivergents need to be practicing play as a mindfulness assist. We love side quests, right? So each little practice is like a side quest that is for an infinite, a [00:07:00] more infinite sense of game.

[00:07:01] Sara: again, you're blowing my mind as I'm not to make this about me, but 15 or so years into therapy, and I've never had a satisfactory anything to try around hyper vigilancein terms of what I struggle with. and it's just a phenomenon that I, yet, and I'm a good therapy participant,

[00:07:23] TJ: We're working hard.. You're doing good. You got A+.

[00:07:26] Sara: Yeah. But it, uh, probably B plus,

[00:07:30] TJ: but no one needs an A plus in therapy.

[00:07:32] Sara: nobody needs an A plus, but that phenomenon from a, patient standpoint. There's not a lot that, that a lot of therapy has to offer there. So the idea that play is a practice that can help with hypervigilance is just revolutionary to

[00:07:51] TJ: So one of the things that I would say is a play practice around hypervigilance is like spending time opting into it. so go to a park [00:08:00] or somewhere you feel safe, like a coffee shop, somewhere that feels familiar, and write down, either write down or study every single detail for the purpose of your enjoyment, like what is every single thing that intrigues me? Every single one. Every single one. And because you're going to start to feel like this is what it means to opt in to hypervigilance. when feels good to be in that intellectual intensity, because again, if you're a top down intellectual learner, sometimes we hold on to symptoms like hypervigilance because we don't know what to do with the excitement and the aliveness that gets buried within that symptom. That is actually play being like, I want to study the shit out of life, right? Like that's part of what hypervigilance is. It's I want to know every single fucking thing that's in and in me and around me. And so go do it, but opt into it, right? opt into it. that's a way to begin to play with this symptom as like a play buddy, right? Like how can I be a play [00:09:00] buddy to this symptom? where the body starts to detangle being on the other end of it as a suffering experience and instead embraces that as as an impulse. what if the hypervigilance was a play buddy? And this is why it's important to do this in a place that feels,safe enough. and this that part that feels safe enough, where, the body has that intellectual and embodiment consent, yeah, I go to this coffee shop regularly. Or I go to this library regularly. Or I go, I sit in the carpool line regularly. Like, where is there enough of that safe enough for you to then step into the hypervigilance as own play buddy?

[00:09:41] Sara: Yeah, it's choosing it again, This makes me think of in my own mindfulness practice by my young adulthood, I would describe myself as very emotionally reactive. And part of living to coexist with that, or shifting it because it just didn't feel good, was [00:10:00] learning that curiosity is an awesome play buddy for me. So I can either be, anxious or reactive, or I can get curious and that's the play buddy that I want to spend more time with. hmm. And so I'm hearing the same thing here, it's like this is another, another next step of that shift to say, Alright, Be mindful. what am I feeling? Is it something I want to feel? Is it something I don't want to feel? And if listeners can do that, high fives! Like, that's huge progress.

[00:10:30] TJ: know, and it's like in the reality is like, you know, we might not care about figuring out our hypervigilance in like the carpool line or in the coffee shop, right? Where we often care about our hypervigilance is in you know,family dinners. or, new social settings, back to school, like we're in the fall right now, so back to school nights where we like want to be building community, right? And so like when we learn to opt in to hypervigilance, when we start to feel activated again in that like parasympathetic way, we can [00:11:00] be like, Oh, do I need to have that on?is this a place that is truly feeling unsafe for me? And if I so let's get out of here, right?

Like, ain't my place to play, right?and if not, if this is safe enough for me to play, what's the play here? So maybe you start studying, who has similar clothes on? who's got the same pattern of shirts? who looks like they would be, who's probably related in a secret DNA test?

Or you start making up stories about people, who looks like they could fix my plumbing in my house? And you start to turn that story maker on, because again, this is a big part of hypervigilance. It's it's a story framework, right? And over time, this allows us to interact and begin to look for safe social experiences that our hypervigilance is like looking to do, but doesn't actually know how to do that because it's trained to look for danger.And so our system has two paths, which is to look for social connection and safety, Or to look for danger, right? And so play is this [00:12:00] practice of Are we safe enough to play? And then what are we playing for? And so hypervigilance might be a play of like, how do I play with more belonging, right? how do I play for comfort, right? how do I play for ease, right? And so again, this is part of I think embracing play as a mindfulness practice is it's literally just saying What am I playing for? And I think this matters because as we begin to study play, it's vulnerable. It's shaky. We want to retract and retreat to patterns we know. And so the, what do we care about? What, what are you playing for holds us in this place. That's you can do this. I believe in you to take this path. you can play for a better future.a better experience, because again, play has that fight. what are we fighting for? Right?and that's part, that's what we mean by mindfulness, is what are you playing for? that is the anchor, because again, play is a choice that, [00:13:00] and that's what it means for, to embrace play as a mindfulness practice, is that it doesn't force you to be calm. It asks you, to be alive, to co create within the moment.

[00:13:10] Sara: That is so powerful for those of us who've been told that mindfulness is sitting down and being quiet being still. But it also, it also so firmly centers the question of what are you playing for? do you care about? And that's, again, in my coaching, that's a question people are not always spending the time To ask, that right there, that question of what might you want to play for could be a revolutionary question for some people. So when we think about that kind of getting started, and what's the first step that someone could take, where would you steer them?

[00:13:48] TJ: Yeah, so one of the first things I work with people to initially begin to explore is we all have play patterns, right? And so I often think about helping people, what do you imagine your play patterns might be? [00:14:00] And again, sometimes it helps people to think back to childhood, what did I like to do? And again, remembering that play is not an action, but an experience, right? I really like to play Legos. Was it that you liked to accomplish the finishing of the Lego? Was it that you liked to put pieces together? And begin to pull on those strings, but find them in your everyday life, right? And again, some of us being top down players, some of us being more bottom up players, where we create within the moment, and some of us love, more instructional learning. Some of us being more intellectual players, some of us being, more storytellers, and some of us being more body players. And so I think about, like, are you a close, like, a top down, more closed loop player? Are you a bottom up, more open loop player? And then are you an intellectual player? Where, like, you might benefit from, like, a life, as a lifelong learner, right? And intellectually invigorous, right? Are you somebody who loves, like, the heart centered, connected [00:15:00] play? Or are you somebody who, like, really needs to kinetically engage in something? And then just start practicing that, right? kinetically engage in your brushing of your teeth, right? find, again, we think about play as novelty and repetition. So I often start people with something that they do every single day. But do it differently. how many steps does it take you to get to the, to the mailbox? That's an intellectual, that could be an intellectual play or that could be a body play, right? what do my feet feel like when they hit the ground, right? How many of my bones can I count? When they hit the ground, right? And so even I think it's really helpful for people to take something that they know they're going to do every day and do it differently and see, do I want to engage in this thing from a thinky way, from a feelie way, or from a body way, right? And is there a goal that I have in mind, right? I'm going to practice brushing my teeth for two minutes as weirdly as I can, right? Or, [00:16:00] do I, am I more of that,non linear explorer play? Where like, I'm going to like, see if my hips can brush my teeth, right? And like, and I, because again, play is about unleashing the enjoyment. The seeking and the co creating of the experience of enjoyment. And understanding it's going to feel weird. It's going to feel weird, it's going to feel vulnerable, especially for people who have had their play shamed, so we begin exploring in this way, and over time, some people I think, it's very clear for them, what their mindfulness play is, what are they playing for, while others may need to explore play first, to be like, I want more of that, right? Again, people who are more top down learners seem to know more easily what they're playing for. Bottom up players or will start playing and then all of a sudden be like I think I want to play for this But they may not know that from the start and that's okay the goal is just start exploring and see what it is. Your body longs for more

[00:16:59] Sara: [00:17:00] the three options that you shared, I'm all about what's our default mode and what are our non default modes, what's our default behavior and our non default behavior. I just think those, even Making people aware of those three options of, thinking or top down and feeling or body and bottoms up, that right there gives us things to play with that we might not even thought of. TJ, I just I'm goose bumpy at how cool your work is. I am so grateful that you were able to take the time. Is there anything you would like to share or anything I didn't ask you that you'd like to share before I let you go for the day?

[00:17:41] TJ: Whew! The My work is called the Playful Revolution. 'Cause I believe that re embracing play is a revolutionary experience within our own bodies, and has the capacity to revolutionize our culture. I do believe that play is this path to re embodying our bodies [00:18:00] and creating a more equitable society and culture. One where we can co create together in a more meaningful and successful way. And so I do really deeply believe in play and both for, because people's joy matters and the co creating and meaningful experience matters. And, and I love to play. So if anybody out here has questions and there's free intro calls on my website, I love to answer questions. I love to clarify my work for people. I love to help people. Enter the work. So don't feel hesitant if you're listening to this to just reach out and be like, I don't get it. Because you're not alone, right? Play is something that is so deprived and We don't have a lot of language around this So if you don't get it, just come back, just keep coming back because you will Get it eventually and let me help you get it in your being.

[00:18:51] Sara: Amazing. So that's T. J. Matton, founder and chief play officer of the Playful Revolution. T. J., I'll put your contact information in the show [00:19:00] notes so people can find you. And then I just can't thank you. This has been so much fun.

[00:19:05] TJ: Please write me back in a little bit and tell me what shifts for you, right? Tell me what shifts for you after this conversation. I love when like it starts to click for people and then people get to start thinking and experiencing like. They're being differently. I'm going to stalk you down in a month or so and be like, what's , happened?

 I think one thing that comes through, is I kept thinking of the words, don't yuck someone else's yum. your take on play style reminds us that no one's play style is bad unless it's hurting someone and that's to be managed. but we can also look at how we all play and just know we're all different and that's okay. Okay.

And that there's a bridge between all of us. We may not all, we may not be able to connect easily with everyone, but there are people that like can be bridges between the world.

[00:19:52] Sara: ​

All right, friends. I want to give a huge thank you to TJ for doing these episodes with me. This was [00:20:00] so much fun and I learned a ton. I hope you did as well. So TJ, thank you. We can't wait to see you back here on Thinkydoers.

You can find more information about TJ and her work at theplayfulrevolution.com.

And TJ is

@theplayfulrevolution

on Instagram,And we'll put all those links in the show notes.

And we're going to have a conversation next week with another incredible expert about stuckness and mental health. So be sure to come back next week for a continuation of our focus on mental well being.

and then, speaking of fun and healthy play buddies.

[00:20:34] Sara: are you feeling overwhelmed by conflicting priorities? Are you struggling to achieve the results that you need to in your. Organization or in your career? If so it's time to unblock your inner strategist, And join my community membership program, designed for aspiring and practicing strategic operators who think differently.

Right now membership is a hundred dollars off for the [00:21:00] full year, just in time for you to get help with your Q3, Q4 transition and ramp up for your 2025. And with that, you get access to my comprehensive and popular Creating No-BS OKRs course, which alone is valued at $495.

 on top of that, you get a full year of community support and live group sessions with me. In this program, you will learn and practice externalizing, clarifying and celebrating your strategic goals. Your strategic wins. And your strategic learnings.

have the chance to focus on transforming your work and your career to be truly purpose focused.

Whether you are a solopreneur, a new leader. An entrepreneur.

Or, a key contributing strategic operator in an organization. This program will help you move from frustration to focus. [00:22:00] And from busy work to meaningful measurable outcomes.

discount in place and we've got a payment plan option to make it easier for you to get the help you need with your Q3 Q4 reset.

visit findrc.co/ubyis and I can’t wait to meet your inner strategist.

​Sara: Thank you for joining and listening. I really can't wait to hear from you about what in this episode resonated, so I would love to hear your feedback. Also, don't forget to subscribe to our newsletter at findrc.co/newsletter, so you can hear about everything happening all at once before the general public.

If there's anything I said today that you have questions about, you can find

me at Sara Lobkovich pretty much everywhere. I'm pretty sure I'm the only one. You're always invited to contact me by email. The easiest one to [00:32:00] spell is sara, S A R A at Thinkydoers.com. If you have other Thinkydoers in your work world, please pass this episode along. We really appreciate your referrals, your mentions, your shares, and your reviews.

Thank you for tuning in today. And I look forward to hearing the questions this prompts for you.

On the left, Sara (host) sits near a window, smiling subtly at the camera. On the right, is a collage of guest TJ Matton playing: swinging on a swing, playing in the dirt smiling, and dancing outdoors. TJ has a beautiful smile.
Sara Lobkovich
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The Science of Play with TJ Matton