A reflection on Heart & Power: Utilizing Play for Your Mental Health

Power without love is reckless and abusive, and love without power is sentimental and anemic. Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love.

— Martin Luther King, Jr.

200 people from 23 countries from Latin America, North America, Europe/UK, Asia and Africa participated in Global Play Brigade’s first Global Playshop of 2024, HEART and POWER: Utilizing Play for Our Mental Health, this past March. 

As is the GPB’s DNA, we are trying a new experiment (yes, we really believe in experimenting!) with our three large global playshops this year. We have chosen specific themes that highlight important play discoveries in different aspects of life. For this past March, we chose the theme of mental health. We wanted to see if we could provide an opportunity for people from around the world to come together and explore the power of play as a tool for addressing mental health challenges.

So many of our fellow human beings are experiencing emotional difficulties. A 2023 study by researchers at Harvard Medical School and the University of Queensland shows that half of the world’s population will experience a mental health disorder in their lifetime. While we don’t need an academic study to tell us that we and friends and families are experiencing emotional pain, reading about the scope of this is upsetting and alarming.  The Global Play Brigade, along with many other organizations, and thousands of creative teachers, therapists, activists, artists, and community organizers have made innovative breakthroughs for mental health by bringing strangers and friends together to play, improvise, co-create stories, art and poetry in ways that are providing incredible support with emotional challenges. Play can, and is, creating communities for social connection, thoughtful conversation, and nourishing support.

Heart & Power Playshops

The "HEART and POWER" playshops clearly resonated and impacted. 200 people from around the world came ready to share, wanting to learn, needing to connect, eager to be with people who were different from them. The diverse selection of workshops, led by a wonderful team of facilitators/Brigadiers, and co-created with all who came, ensured there was something for everyone:

• Pause-Observe-Connect led by Mana Mukaiyachi (Japan) and Sean Kwan (China/UK) 
• Creating Our Mental Health led by Jessie Fields, MD (USA) and Hugh Polk, MD (USA); 
• Happiness Unlimited led by Ishita Sanyal (India) and Kaseina Dashe (Nigeria) 
• Loving Listening led by Cathy Salit (USA) and Kahlil Bagatsing (Philippines; 
• Embodied Empathy led by Christopher Ellinger (USA) and Jacek Kukluk (Poland); 
• Yoga for Emotional Wellness led by Jennifer Bullock, LPC (USA);
• Discover Your Superpower led by Manuela Kelly Calzini (Italy), Kate Kennedy (USA), Alicia Laucirica (Argentina), and Nyree Robinson (Gibraltar);
• Playful Imagination led by Cristina Gioveni (Argentina) and Margot Escott (USA);
• Quien Canta, Sus Males Espanta led by Ruben Reyes Jirón (Nicaragua/Spain), José Carlos Barbosa (Brazil), and David Gómez (Nicaragua)

Impact on Mental Health

What was the impact of the Heart and Power sessions on people’s mental health? A sampling of comments shared by participants give us an idea. Watch this video to hear what people had to say: