Dr. Anabel Jensen, President of Six Seconds, once told me that if I would get any magazine it should be Scientific American Mind. She told me it would inform by trainings and my overall life! Little did I know at the time that she would be so right! In the February/March issue of Scientific American Mind the feature story is “The Serious Need for Play–How it Improves Your Creativity, Emotional Health—and Cuts Stress.”

As a former teacher (always a teacher!!) and administrator I had many discussions with fellow colleagues and school parents about the importance of play. I don’t mean soccer, baseball, theater practice, rollerskating, etc.although they are all great structured activities! I mean that wonderful time when our imaginations soar! I mean that time when children go out in the backyard and say to each other,”What should we play?” I submit that not enough children are getting enough time to learn how to create play out of free time. Many times they say, “I am bored. I have nothing to do.” We are providing great structured activities for them, but we are not always modeling for them how you take that amazing free time and build something of their own!

In the neighborhood in which I grew up I remember my friends and I telling each other we would get together at someone’s home and “”figure out what to do.” What followed was some playing with dolls, and much time writing stories we would share with the neighborhood, playing “Caveman” (an original game) in our basements, writing stories we would share with the neighborhood, portraying teachers, creating plays in which we would play all of the characters, and having tremendous fun. Not one time did we feel we were bored! We learned that free time provided us with an opportunity to create our own world! Now I know some of you may think I am romanticizing my childhood. I must tell you that that may very well be true, but it was just an amazing time to explore.

Back to the magazine article… In her article, Melinda Wenner reports,” in 42 years Stuart Brown, a psychiatrist, has interviewed about 6,000 people about their childhoods and his data suggests that a lack of opportunities for unstructured, imaginative play can keep children from growing into happy, well-adjusted adults. “Free play” as scientists call it is, critical for becoming socially adept coping with stress and building cognitive skills such as problem solving.”

The article continues with this very important data: “According to a paper published in 2005 in the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, children’s “free play” time dropped by a quarter between 1981 and 1997. Concerns about getting their kids into the right colleges, parents are sacrificing playtime for more structured activities. As early as preschool, youngsters’ after-school hours are now being filled with music lessons and sports—reducing time for the type of imaginative and rambunctious cavorting that fosters creativity and cooperation.”

I could go on and on with the gems in this article. I suggest you get this issue of Scientific American Mind.  You can go to http://www.sciam.com/sciammind/

As we talk about how children develop social-emotional skills, I also submit that play is important for adults, too. Let’s all find some time for that wonderful, unstructured, play time! Also, let’s model for the children how exciting that time can be!

Source of the graph: http://ceel.psc.isr.umich.edu/pubs/papers/ceel013-00.pdf

Today Dev Dhaliwal (Director of our office here in Malaysia) and I were in “The Mall” in Kuala Lumpur – one of the first big shopping malls in the city (opened in 1986).  We were near the top where big curving metal beams meet the roof, and Dev said, “I remember how when this opened we all thought this structure was so amazing…”

Meanwhile, yesterday (!) I was walking along the path below the Jumeirah Beach Hotel in Dubai with Jayne Morrison, the Director of our Middle East office.  The skyline there is dominated by “the Burj” (Jumeirah’s Burj Al Arab hotel, which opened in 1999).  We got talking about this remarkable structure, and how it’s almost breathtaking standing near it.  Jayne wondered how long it would be before these properties would seem passé, and said something to the effect of, “I’ve loved going into this hotel since I first came to Dubai.”

In the past I’ve used the phrase “the test of time” thinking of the sweep of history – of those few works that remain relevant and significant over hundreds of years.  But tonight it seems that time is speeding up, and I’m wondering about the “test of decades” or even, “the test of years.”

I look back to my years as a contractor (1980s) or as a teacher (1990s) and wonder:  Does that work still measure up?  (some yes!)  Likewise, we started Six Seconds in 1997 — what from those first years still stands relevant?  I remember our first “EQ Trainer Certification” with some chagrin compared to the solid program it’s become — but there are still elements from the very first one.  Certainly the core model and learning design have stuck… and once in a while I hear from people who, at the turn of the Millennium, said “this experience changed my life,” and who still identify it as a turning point.  In general I’m satisfied with the “decade test,” but I also see places where I now regret those cut corners.

But perhaps the real opportunity in this question is to consider it in advance… What would happen if we all practiced asking ourselves:  “Will this decision stand the test of time?”