Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

Has anyone watched a child learning to tie their own shoelaces, or build a sandcastle, or catch a butterfly? Are they working....or playing? How do you know?

Neurologists tell us that the child`s brain as at least 30% more synapses or neurons (I`m not quoting here for researchers)---a boatload!---than an adult mind. How come? The increasing evidence seems to indicate that the child`s mind must be far more adaptable than the adult`s, as they have no idea what`s going on at all around them. So...when kids go out and play, are they playing....or working? How do you know?

What exactly is work? And what exactly is play? They`re both associated with actions, but why have two entirely different words? What`s the unique characteristic of each word? We won`t define "recreation" at the moment, but the difference between a hobby and a business is that the business pays money...the hobby is for "fun."

Young animals play all the time, and biologists and anthropologists tell us that such play is actually learning how to fight, hunt, and survive as adult animals. Ergo, although animals have more instincts and inherant knowledge than human beings are born with, they still must work at learning how to be adults.....or is it play?

Craig,

For what its worth I would define work more as something I have to do.  So for example chasing a butterfly would be an action I could take but by no means am I required to get up every morning, drink my morning coffee, and make my commute to the butterfly field where I have to catch 10 butterflies each day to pay the rent.  For the child I would say its play because if it wasn`t they just wouldn`t choose to do it.

The fun factor. When work is fun it isn`t a chore, but the joy of playing the game that matters most. When a child is forced into working toward a higher goal, having to do things for the greater cause, produces an adult maturity of tying simple expressions of joy together into something mom and dad and the community can be proud of. We are told to choose a business based on what we love to do and I believe that play should be inextricably tied to our life`s work. Freedom of expression, albeit with dicipline, can be the difference between struggling at a job pleasing others, and the playful exhileration of discovering that the re-creation of old ideas into new in self employment, keeps us forever in youthful synchronicity with nature`s call for adaptation. Adapting our sense of play to strong work ethics by utilizing lessons from fun activities, keep us focused on the needed thing of creating a work environment that is rich with high achievement and self worth.

Alright, so we`ve got "fun" and "force." I think there`s a connection between "fun" and "play," but it`s the same question in different form. What`s the difference between work and fun.

"Force" and "have to" begins to really introduce a unique, isolating, necessary characteristic (attribute). LOL! I like the analogy of having to get up, have some coffee, take a shower, jump in the car, go to the butterfly field, and reach a quota of capturing 10 per day! :-D Most Excellent!

What about "obligation," and personal versus someone else`s schedule? Could we factor in those concepts and come up with an objective definition of play?

How about, of responsible citizenship we can say, work = the obligation of responsibility, play = enjoyment within that responsibility. Both are definites of the best meaning of life and both adapt to the recognized authority of society where society obtains to a higher authority. The burden of work calls for commitment. The joy of play calls for seeing the lighter side of things. Both must have the same responsibility component to be considered of value. Yes, train a child to play responsibly and allow them free expression to dream the impossible, that they will show the work ethics needed to make them come true.

Great topic Craig!  

I`m reminded of a recent conversation with my brother about his career change.  He had just sold his business and was looking for a new job.   My mind immediately went into brainstorming mode and I threw out several career ideas to him around what he likes to do.  Without even giving my ideas a second thought, he said, "Works not supposed to be fun, it`s just something you have to do!"  He has very black and white ideas separating what he considers fun and what he considers work.

As for me, there is more of a blur between work and fun.   While there are definitely responsibilities and mundane chores that go along with most "work",   there can be fun in many of our duties.  Of course,  I could be stretching this description to where fun really doesn`t mean PLAY anymore, but rather is WORK that gives a sense of well-being and pleasure.

I also like the Butterfly Analogy.  Since I would consider this a pleasurable activity, I might not think of it as WORK as much as just part of my lifestyle.  I catch butterflies.  It`s what I do!  However, if on the other side of this same world, I had to work in the sewer, I`d definitely not have same way of thinking. 

Very thought provoking topic, and I don`t have the answer for it.  No matter what the defining meaning between Work and Play is, I find it interesting that people (especially people in the same family) have so many varying ideas on what is work and what is play.

OK, breaks over!  Now where did I set that butterfly net?

CG

We all see and relate to the world through our own experiences and point of view, what is fun for one is not necessarily fun for the next person. We should first define what is fun for us as individuals. For instance I enjoy strenuous physical activity i/e cycling alone 40 miles at 17mph is fun, pushing those 40 miles at 20mph is a lot of work if alone, however it can be enjoyable if it is done in a ‘pack’ although the pack is designed to work to everyone’s advantage there is an element of competition that makes it enjoyable. As a teen growing up in a farm I had to do certain chores before I could borrow the truck and head over to the beach and play with my friends, these ‘chores’ were work because I was doing them alone. However, after we came back from the beach I along with a bunch of friends would go to Gustav’s farm and do the exact same thing that I had to do before I could leave to play. What at home was work at my friends farm had turn into ‘play’, my guess is that it was because we were all doing this as a group joking/having fun. So, in my opinion the difference is not whether you must do what you ought to do what defines the activity as work or play, but whether you enjoy what you are doing. If you can convert a task into a social experience work becomes play.

GHAAACK!! Hey...! Don`t you know that exercise will KILL you?!
LOL!!

Alright; first I`d like to argue that when anyone tries to define something for themselves, they`re basically going to run into trouble with the word "define." A definition is an objective assignment of a specific value to a word, where the entire language-speaking society agrees.

On the other hand, to get started making a dictionary definition, it`s almost always helpful to begin with personal experience, listing the various attributes of the word. What does it mean to "me personally."

After developing a list, we then begin to compare our experience with others. If there`s a contradiction, then the definition still needs work.

Frndchps brings forward the association between "responsibility" and "obligation," then "society" and a somewhat vague reference to something larger or greater or higher than society. Let`s agree that "society" is a group of people who live by a particular morality.

A responsibility is that which we take on ourselves, arising from our own morality---the rules by which we live. An obligation is taken on from an external source. So we would be responsible for meeting an obligation to someone else. But we would also be responsible for avoiding poison ivy regardless of if anyone else existed on the planet.

Now consider too a child building a sandcastle. And stipulate the child is having fun and playing, just for the sake of argument. Even the child would likely agree that the "chore" of filling the bucket repeatedly with sand is drudgery. It`s a functional part of making the castle, can`t be avoided, and isn`t "as much" fun as watching the castle take shape.

That being said, the child would look back at the end of the day and group the entire set of all actions into "fun," and "playing," including the supposed drudge work. So the attribute of repetitiveness isn`t "unique" to work or to fun. It appears in both words.

Both responsibility and obligation do, however, include a time frame--a deadline of some sort. Does work always include a deadline, but play never include a deadline?