p.5 For us, play lies at the core of creativity and innovation.

  Of all animal species, humans are the biggest players of all. We are built to play and built through play. When we play, we are engaged in the purest expression of our humanity, the truest expression of our individuality.

p.6 The ability to play is critical... to... being a creative, innovative person.

p.7 The truth is that in most cases, play is a catalyst. The beneficial effects of getting just a little true play can spread through our lives, actually making us more productive and happier in everything we do.

[JLJ - Implications for game theory. If we can write script that can play with the relationships on the game board, what emerges can guide our future actions.]

p.11 It's paradoxical that a little bit of "nonproductive" activity can make one enormously more productive and invigorated in other aspects of life.

p.11-12 Once people understand what play does for them, they can learn to... make work an extension of their play lives, and engage fully with their world... Play... is the basis of all art, games, books, sports, movies, fashion, fun, and wonder... Play is the vital essence of life. It is what makes life lively.

p.12 When people know their core truths and live in accord with what I call their "play personality," the result is always a life of incredible power and grace.

p.13 Ultimately, this book is about understanding the role of play and using it to find and express our own core truths. It is about learning to harness a force that has been built into us through millions of years of evolution, a force that allows us to both discover our most essential selves and enlarge our world. We are designed to find fulfillment and creative growth through play.

p.15 at its most basic level, play is a very primal activity... In us, play can also happen without a conscious decision... play in its most basic form proceeds without a complex intellectual framework.

p.18 Another hallmark of play is that it has improvisational potential... You never really know what's going to happen when you play.

p.32 Play lets animals learn about their environment and the rules of engagement with friend and foe. Playful interaction allows a penalty-free rehearsal of the normal give-and-take necessary in social groups.

p.33 Animals that play a lot quickly learn how to navigate their world and adapt to it. In short, they are smarter.

p.36 Play's process of capturing a pretend narrative and combining it with the reality of one's experience in a playful setting is, at least in childhood, how we develop our major personal understanding of how the world works. We do so by imagining possibilities - simulating what might be, and then testing this against what actually is.

p.37 The genius of play is that, in playing, we create imaginative new cognitive combinations. And in creating those novel combinations, we find what works.

p.42 studies show that if they are well fed, safe, and rested, all mammals will play spontaneously.

p.44 When we are not up against life or death, trial and error brings out new stuff.

p.49 The great benefits of play, as I've said, are the ability to become smarter, to learn more about the world... , to adapt to a changing world.

p.58-59 Of all animals, humans are the biggest players of all... How do adults play? The answer is not as obvious as it might seem... what to many people might seem like work may really be built on a foundation of play.

p.63 What about work, which is supposed to be the opposite of play? Is there play in something as serious as biochemical research? After taking play histories of Nobel laureate scientist Roger Guillemin and polio researcher Jonas Salk, I realized that what they were doing every day in the laboratory was playing. When Roger took me through his laboratory he was like a kid as he described his experiments.

p.65-70 As we grow older, we start to have strong preferences for certain types of play over others... I've observed that people have a dominant mode of play that falls into one of eight types. I call these play personalities... The eight personality types are: The Joker... The Kinesthete [Kinesthetes are people who like to move]... The Explorer... The Competitor... The Director... The Collector... The Artist/Creator... The Storyteller

p.84 Movement is primal and accompanies all the elements of play we are examining, even word or image movement in imaginative play.  If you don't understand and appreciate human movement, you won't really understand yourself or play... Through movement play, we think in motion. Movement structures our knowledge of the world, space, time, and our relationship to others. We've internalized movement, space, and time so completely that we need to take a step back (a movement metaphor) to realize how much we think in these terms... Movement play lights up the brain and fosters learning, innovation, flexibility, adaptability, and resilience.

p.85 Curiosity about and manipulation of "objects" is a pervasive, innately fun pattern of play, and represents its own "state" (intrinsic pattern) of playfulness... We find pleasure in the physical part of object play.

p.86-87 Imagination is perhaps the most powerful human ability. It allows us to create simulated realities that we can explore without giving up access to the real world...Throughout life, imagination remains a key to emotional resilience and creativity.

p.100 Learning itself is enhanced by play, as many teachers know

p.110 How is it possible to remain playful when so much must be done?

p.111 long-term life skills and a rewarding sense of fulfillment - and yes, performance - are more the by-product of play-related activities than forced performance.

p.115 As with any play activity, people need to be open to improvisation and serendipity.

p.115 Sports provide a ready peer group, united in a common goal. Sports teach how to struggle against adversity, even when the odds seem insurmountable.

p.126 the opposite of play is not work - the opposite of play is depression... Over the long haul, when these spice-of-life elements are missing, what is left is a dulled soul.

p.126-127 Far from standing in opposition to each other, play and work are mutually supportive... what I have found is that neither one can thrive without the other... The quality that work and play have in common is creativity... At their best, play and work, when integrated, make sense of our world and ourselves.

p.134-135 By far the biggest reason that companies want to talk to me about play is its role in creativity and innovation.... Play is the mother of invention.

p.141 There is a great deal of evidence that the road to mastery of any subject is guided by play.

p.145-146 In addition to being pulled away from play, we are pushed from play, shamed into rejecting it by a culture that doesn't understand the human need for it and doesn't respect it... play is seen as something that children do, so playing is seen as a childish activity not done in the adult world... Sometimes I am taken aback by how strongly people block play, by the outright hostility to play.

p.154-155 Remember the feeling of true play, and let that be your guiding star... If you make the emotion of play your North Star, you will find a true and successful course through life, one in which work and play are bound together.

p.158 play is at the foundation of all personal relationships

[JLJ - I think it would be fair to say that the shared predicament faced by the members of a personal relationship requires a playful attitude towards the challenges and opportunities and stresses of daily life. But play as a foundation? It could be a starting point, and a returning point, and a point of refuge, but I would think that shared goals and achieving a work-play balance would/could be the foundation.]

p.161 If we lived in a world without play, all public adult interactions would model those of subway sitters and elevator riders. It would be a pretty grim world to live in.

p.166 Play... is like oxygen: pervasive and mostly unnoticed, but essential to intimacy.

p.170 Play keeps everything in balance, providing resilience and flexibility in a relationship

p.178 My feeling is that play, by its nature, has been molded by evolution to create a more optimistic, exploratory view of the world and more harmonious social interactions.

p.178 One of the prime characteristics of play is a desire to keep the activity going.

p.184 Much of our interaction with this world is through the hands.

p.193 In normal play we may still hurt each other by going too far in bending the social rules... But when our interactions are based on a foundation of caring, these hurts are corrected and avoided in the future. Bending rules and pushing through limits should happen within the realm of play. They aren't the dark side of play - they are the essence of play.

p.197 Play has always been a key to adaptation and survival, and I believe it will remain so in the future.

p.199 In a large part, play is our culture, in the form of music, drama, novels, dance, celebrations, and festivals... It is the genesis of innovation, and allows us to deal with an ever-changing world.

p.211 Probably the biggest roadblock to play for adults is the worry that they will look silly, undignified, or dumb if they allow themselves to truly play.

p.212 Play is exploration, which means that you will be going places where you haven't been before.

p.214 Motion is perhaps the most basic form of play... We are alive when we are physically moving.

p.215 The ability to play is there in all of us, and is transformative when it is rediscovered... Practice play. Understand what type of player you are and find ways to engage in your play. It won't happen automatically.

p.218 Play helps you regain the mind of the child, and better deal with the major problems and challenges we all face... Play is how we are made, how we develop and adjust to change. It can foster innovation... If your life has become barren, play brings it to life again.

[Back Cover] play: the single most significant factor in determining our success and happiness