The Space Between: My Rediscovery of Play as an Adult Through Clowning

Abstract

In considering the embodiment of adult play I find it necessary to consider what play is and research my own relationship to its embodiment in myself. My relationship to my body and its slow journey back to play, including both movement and perspective, as well as the charging and discharging emotions, is my own evidence in support of the importance of this process. This changing relationship with self has helped me to live more creatively through increasing the possibilities I am able to choose from in any given situation. I am able to begin to play with who I am as opposed to being played by who I am. Further framing and bringing discourse to this discovery is the work and study I have done in clowning for the past eight years. This work has brought my attention and focus to the honest relationship I am developing with my body and my emotions and my growing ability to both delight in and share the intricacies and nuances of who I am, both the lighter and darker aspects of myself, as well as my relationship with the society and the rules governing it. Growing in awareness of and changing my relationship with self I am further able to support a change in the relationship others have with themselves. This leads me to the relevance of this work for those who are involved in helping and healing professions. Rather than arrive at a conclusion through this study I believe I arrive at more questions, though they are more clearly defined and some quite different than the ones that I started with.