You’re Not too Old For Play: How to Enrich Your Life With Creativity
Release Date: 11/26/2024
Be. Play. Love.
There are many ways we try to heal. Therapy, meditation, breathwork, movement, and mindset work - just to name a few. These paths are powerful, transformative, and often life-changing. But sometimes, despite all the tools and effort, there are places within us that remain untouched, places our intellect can’t quite reach. We’re exploring one such threshold, where healing stops being something we do and becomes something that happens to us at a cellular level. Where transformation drops from the head into the body through the quiet, mystical intelligence of mushrooms. Journeying...
info_outlineBe. Play. Love.
We all do it. When there’s silence, ambiguity, or the absence of clear feedback, we fill in the blanks with stories. But here’s the problem: our minds don’t reach for generous interpretations. They default to criticism, fear, and doubt. Whether it’s giving a talk, navigating a friendship, or reflecting on ourselves, we often assume the worst, even when reality is far more kind. Evolutionary survival instincts, societal conditioning, and inner critics keep us stuck in fear-based thinking. What if there was a powerful alternative (spoiler alert, there is!) - reconnecting to the...
info_outlineBe. Play. Love.
In our world, productivity and creativity occupy two different buckets. The former is functional, necessary, and purposeful. The latter is frivolous, chaotic, and irresponsible. It should be put on the back burner so that we can focus on “more important things.” As a result, creative expression ends up as an afterthought, something we can only do after the real work is done. The problem is: so many of us end up feeling disconnected from our creativity, cut off from a vital resource for resonance. What if instead of putting off creativity for later, we could integrate it into...
info_outlineBe. Play. Love.
Something most people underestimate about having a big vision is the process of bringing other people on board. Whether it’s an investment partner or a strategic collaborator, we’re required to communicate what we see, open ourselves up to their opinions, and invite them to join us on a journey to an uncharted territory. It’s a vulnerable place, so of course, old fears, old stories, and upper limits will come up. How do we get them to trust us and see what we see? How do we silence those old stories from past experiences? For most change-makers dealing with the...
info_outlineBe. Play. Love.
An aligned life filled with presence, playfulness, freedom and growth expresses itself in many ways. It shows up in our choices (and how we make them), our relationships, our words and how we live. In short, it’s highlighted in our ability to Be, Play, and Love. Most people miss the fact that the process of finding one's own alignment is an inner game. It has little to do with what’s happening outside of us, and rarely stems from finding the right routine, ritual, or life hack. It’s continuously dropping into our heart space, feeling into what’s right, releasing fear, and expanding our...
info_outlineBe. Play. Love.
In the name of politeness, we often sugarcoat or dilute the truth, twisting it into something softer that we think the other person would rather hear. Instead of saying what we truly mean, we go out of our way to smooth over situations in hopes they’ll land better. Here’s the issue: when we start holding back our real feelings, we disconnect from ourselves and others. We step out of alignment with our inner wisdom. Though society teaches us that maintaining peace is more important than being honest, human beings are meant to express themselves. While we may fear that speaking our...
info_outlineBe. Play. Love.
One of the biggest barriers to us getting the things we really, really want are the mixed messages we send to ourselves. We want it, then we’re not sure we do. We want it again and then we don’t think it will work out. We definitely want it, but then we can’t do it because it’s risky. When we want to go in a certain direction, we won’t reach our desired destination this way. Instead, we need to be fully committed and completely in alignment - not shaky or wishy washy. The missed messages take different forms - maybe it’s doing a push and pull, making excuses not to take...
info_outlineBe. Play. Love.
If there’s anything our culture likes to collectively ignore, resist and hide, it's aging. And yet, aging happens to every single one of us - whether it’s aging parents, aging partners or aging selves, we all have an experience with it. With age comes the opportunity for nourishment and deeper learning, but aging also comes with some unpleasant emotions and experiences. Cognitive and physical decline and even loss are all parts of the process of getting older. How do we learn to treat these things as a learning adventure? How do we deal with loved ones becoming shadows of their...
info_outlineBe. Play. Love.
In improv and in life, “yes, and..” are two words that allow us to receive what’s coming at us, integrate it and add to it in our own way. “Yes, and” has its own flipside which completely kills all play, wonder and joy, and it’s known as “yeah, but”. When people say “yeah but” when something happens, it makes them protect, contract and move away, instead of coming forward and connecting. Here’s the thing: life will always unfold in a spontaneous way and we can’t control what comes up. Adopting a “yes, and..” attitude allows us to be in harmony with life’s twists...
info_outlineBe. Play. Love.
Anytime we head into the unknown and want to break past a limit, a question arises inside of us, “is it safe for me to be this big out in the world?” That’s because if we want something bigger, our ceiling has to rise to encompass that thing and that can be scary. Sometimes we’ll expand into that bigger thing but then shrink back into our familiar shells. If we don’t make our presence bigger than our fear, this process will keep repeating itself. What if, instead of expanding and contracting - we could expand and integrate at a new level? That’s where flow comes into play - it’s...
info_outlineWhen we’re young, we’re encouraged to play, learn new things and express our creativity in endless ways. As we grow up, we find out that we can’t carry that same energy into adulthood - that society places an expiry date on learning new things. If you’re a grown up, it’s time to be responsible, serious, predictable - there’s no room for play and discovery.
Not only is that no fun at all, it also robs us of two things that make life worthwhile - curiosity and creativity.
Meeting life with an attitude of curiosity is one of the distinguishing characteristics of a successful life, but we’re often taught to block ourselves off from that.
The good news is, we can interrupt this pattern and bring unexpected curiosity into our daily lives. But first, we have to welcome creativity with both arms, and be okay with things being messy and unpredictable.
How do we make room for expression and creativity? How do we break away from feeling like we’re too old for play and discovery? In this episode, we talk about how to get back in touch with creativity, and why it leads to a more enriched life.
Things You’ll Learn In This Episode
-Continuum of choice vs. limited options
As a society, we have a tendency for polarities and limiting ourselves to either-or choices. How do we open up the possibility for so much more?
-Open your fan, express your creativity
Creativity is something we all have but we have to break out of our routines to find it. How do we find what makes life feel like a celebration, rather than a duty?
-Why creativity is scary
Many of us are uncomfortable with the messiness of creativity because it’s the opposite of the perfect persona we created for love and approval. How do we embrace the messiness from a place of safety?
About Your Hosts
Kathlyn Hendricks, Ph.D., BC-DMT*, is an evolutionary catalyst and freelance mentor who has been a pioneer in the field of body intelligence and conscious loving for over forty years. Katie has an international reputation as a presenter and seminar leader, bodifying the core skills of conscious living–authenticity, response-ability and appreciation–with conscious enthusiasts from many fields. She is the co-author of twelve books, including the best-selling Conscious Loving, At The Speed of Life and Conscious Loving Ever After: How to Create Thriving Relationship at Midlife and Beyond. Katie has been a successful entrepreneur for over forty years. She specializes in turning concepts such as commitment into felt experience and igniting new actions that emerge from the inside out. Her unique coaching and leadership programs have generated hundreds of body intelligence and relationship coaches in the U.S. and Europe. She co-founded the Spiritual Cinema Circle and the virtual Body Intelligence Summit. Katie has appeared on over 500 radio and television programs and traveled well over one million air miles as the ambassador for the work that she and her husband Gay Hendricks have developed.
Sophie Chiche is a seasoned coach and consultant who has traveled the world working with thousands of people and dozens of teams. With a passion for fully expressed living, Sophie coaches, and facilitates group sessions to help people and teams remove what gets in the way of them living their most meaningful lives.Not only does she work with clients to design the life they want, but she's also developed methods, mindsets shifts, and healing modalities to create it elegantly. Born in Paris, raised in Barcelona, and lived in LA for 30 years, Sophie now lives in the middle of nowhere Arizona, where she rides her Harley with her boo, Wall. And plays a lot of pickleball.