Translator: Janet O'Shea Reviewer: Denise RQ
Wouldn't it be great
if there were something we could do that could teach us how to work together?
Something that could show us how to disagree with respect?
Wouldn't it be better if that thing gave us the experience of mastery
while reminding us that's it's OK to fail?
And wouldn't it be better yet if that thing were fun?
The thing I speak of is physical play
kinetic games, sports, and other activities
where interacting with each other is central to the experience.
It may sound utopian,
but I want to suggest to you that physical play can unite us,
can teach us to respect difference,
and show us how to get along even as we disagree.
How do I know that physical play can do this?
Because I've experienced it.
At a point in life I might reluctantly identify as middle age,
I launched myself into martial arts training,
kickboxing, grappling, and stick fighting with highly skilled people,
some of whom were half my age.
What I learned in that process changed my life.
I want to share that with you.
One moment in particular comes to mind.
It was a Saturday afternoon
at the Inosanto Academy of Martial Arts, where I train,
and I was in a kickboxing class.
It came time for sparring, and there I was with my partner
kicking, punching, evading, and getting hit -- a fair amount.
I stepped off the mat after a few rounds,
I took off my gloves, took out my mouth guard, and thought,
"I love these people."
I pulled myself up short realizing I barely knew these people.
And we had just been trying to kick each other in the head.
So, in addition to being a martial artist,
I'm also a Dance Studies Professor here at UCLA.
Thinking about movement
- what it can be, what it does, and what it means -
is central to my profession.
So I just couldn't let this idea alone
that competitive, in fact, combative contact between people
could yield this extraordinary sense of good will and commonality.
And then I got to thinking, "Wouldn't it be amazing
if everyone could experience what I did on the mat that Saturday?
What I've realized is everyone can,
but many of us can not.
So let me ask you a question, "How many of you, when you were kids,
played some kind of physical games?
Like kickball, soccer, even running around playing tag with your friends?
Let's see a show of hands.
OK, so how many of you do something roughly equivalent now,
like a pick-up game of basketball, riding bikes with your friends?
How many people do that on a regular basis?
OK, so if you were one of the people who had your hand up
in response to the first question
and down for the second,
you're not alone.
Only 25% of American adults play sports on a regular basis.
Of the 75% who don't participate in athletics,
most played sports as kids,
and many define themselves as sports fans.
We have outsourced physical play to experts.
We have relegated it to a specific phase of the lifespan.
So why is this?
To begin to figure this out, we can look at kids' sports,
because kids' sports have become increasingly competitive,
they've become increasingly focused on winning.
Kids are pretty clear about their motivation for playing sports.
They play in elementary school, when it's fun,
when it's about interacting with other kids,
exploring their environment and being inventive.
They tend to drop out toward middle school and high school
when it becomes more focused on winning.
And they have a point;
because the more winning matters,
the more structured our interactions tend to be,
and the less creative we get to be.
Also, too much attention to winning
undercuts the very benefits that sports are supposed to provide.
Too much attention to winning can be stressful.
It can encourage deception.
It can even promote violence.
Too much attention to winning turns sports from play into work.
This might explain why we have a participation problem.
But what do we do about it?
But to find a solution,
first we have to understand how competitive play works.
So take my example of sparring.
If you're trying to kick me, and I'm trying to punch you,
we disagree on a pretty fundamental level
as to what we want from that interaction.
But we agree as to the terms of the interaction,
and very often as to much of its content;
how hard we're sparring, how fast we're moving.
At the end, we touch gloves, we shake hands, we hug each other
and often we mean it.
We walk off the mat, and we're still friends.
In addition, sparring, unlike competition-level sport fighting,
although it's a test of skill,
no one declares a winner, no one's keeping score.
Sometimes, the only person watching is the coach.
So these two ideas:
competing without needing to win and disagreeing with respect
are not unique to martial arts.
They are common to sports and physical activities of many kinds.
They are also ideas that we can take from sport into our daily lives.
So competing without needing to win:
that's a contradiction, isn't it?
It is.
It is a functional contradiction because sports are an extension of games,
and games are about paradox.
In a game, we have a goal,
but we have rules in place that make it harder to achieve that goal.
We follow the rules to sustain the state of play
because it's the state of play that's enjoyable.
Likewise, in a game, we go up against another player or another team,
but we'll often forgo an easy victory just to keep the game going.
So in another words, we don't go all out to beat our kids at checkers,
we don't storm off when our friend wins a chess game,
and we really oughtn't to gloat when we win at cards.
Kinetic play is particularly useful
for reminding us of the importance of process as well as outcome,
because kinetic play is immersive,
it puts us resolutely in the moment;
and because of this, kinetic play can yield all sorts of important benefits.
It can make us more resilient, more inventive.
It can teach us to accept failure.
It can teach us about ourselves and give us a model for working in a team.
So what would a world look like in which we played without needing to win?
Would we communicate better?
Would we feel more connected to each other?
Would our problem solving skills improve?
Would our public debate be more respectful?
It's possible.
To get to this point, it's not enough
to change our own attitudes towards competition,
although that may help.
We also need to work together,
figuring out when to push each other and when to learn from one another.
So here's my challenge to you:
what opportunities can you create for yourselves and for others
where it's possible to compete and collaborate at the same time?
Can you bring people together around these opportunities?
Can you create the space for play?
And can you invite others in?
Thank you.
(Applause)