Play Creates Wellbeing: The Contingency and the Creativity of Human Interaction

What is play? How do we as humans define play beyond what we know as child’s play, games, leisure, and/or a break from work? Play is both a source and a product of relationality. We are in play every day, yet we fail to see it due to its intangible emergent form. In my consultation practice with leaders, teams, and couples, I have observed that play creates well-being especially when we find ourselves in relational gridlocks. How might we play for well-being? Participants will be introduced to play as the relationally creative process of trial and error by which we co-create. I will share five resources for well-being that stems from relational play. Join us for an interactive session of play to explore the contingency and creativity of human interaction.

Speaker

• SALIHA BAVA Mercy College, Associate Professor

Saliha Bava, Ph.D. LMFT is an Associate Professor of Marriage and Family Therapy at Mercy College, Dobbs Ferry, NY. She was a Board Member of the American Family Therapy Academy (AFTA) and is an AAMFT Approved Supervisor. In her NYC-based private practice, she sees couples and coaches therapists in business and clinical practices. Her focus on performative methodologies, dialogue as socially just and hyperlinked identities is part of academic activism where she questions the dominant discourses of research methodology, social justice, and identity. She also specializes in trauma, cross-cultural relationships, digital life, teaching/learning, and leadership. For 20+ years, she has consulted, designed, and implemented performance/play-based and dialogic processes within organizational, community, family, learning, and research systems. She is currently researching how people play.