Natalie: Today I'm speaking with Gwen Garden who is in-charge with project called; SERIOUSLY, the Movie. It's fantastic, it talks about the impulsive play, so stay tuned.

Hi I'm Natalie Ledwell and this is the Inspiration Show. And today my special guest is Gwen Garden, hi Gwen how are you today?

Gwen: Thanks, hi!

Natalie: Now the reason I have Gwen here is that she is working on an exceptionally amazing project, and a movie called; Seriously, which all about the importance of Play. So, how did you get involved, or how did you start in this journey of creating this movie?

Gwen: Well, probably it started as a, as an ancient. When I just got the importance of play, really I mean placement of themes in my life and I had a particularly, let's say playful career. Cause I've dealing muffins when I was 19 years old. And just getting to be... I'm just really lucky I got to be in some of the world-class innovation playgrounds through-out my career and I was starting to see some of deep... I got really curious about what are the conditions that really give rise to this kind of creativity and innovation. And that's set me on a course of study, and then I really wanted to look at the deepest principles of evolution itself. What is really going on here? And when I saw it was play, that the deepest level of all these creativity, the amazing world, everything we see around us; jellyfish, you know broccoli, it's all a result of this extravagant play of the cosmos. I started this philosophy, religion, and really looked at it at the deepest level. And then when I came out of that program, I just, I was applying it, I was designing programs using the insights that I have about play and then it became clear. You know I was reading other people's projects, it was time to... I was like 10 months pregnant and I actually got an amazing invitation. I was talking to a friend and he was saying; "you know I'm tired of directing depressing films." He's a film maker and I said; you know I'm tired working on other people's projects and I was like peanut butter, chocolate. We just had this moment of let's make a movie about PLAY and within 9 hours Natalie, I was at a conference the next day and I happen to sit next to someone who had funded me on an earlier project and she said; "Gwen what's up with you?" and I said, "I think I'm making a movie about PLAY." And she said, "Well that would be the first and it's from you!" so that's how it happened. I was, like barely locked the idea out of my mouth, it was just an instant response and since then I've just felt like a flea on a media.

Natalie: Right, so a lot of that what you include in the movie is your research, do you had, have you brought other people on board, at either other people out there that understand how important PLAY is, you know adult lives.

Gwen: Well it's actually amazing you know, some kind of thing that most people think about explicitly, it's like, you know, thinking about breathing for a lot of people. But when you turn toward the topic, and you really look at what's there, what's the research and who's thinking about it and it's a big deal. And there are communities, and what's interesting is that you're not only PLAY experts, and fields of PLAY and scholarship around PLAY, and play advocacy groups and you know people are really taking place seriously, a lot of them. But an all growing member of the org because we're seeing a perfect storm, and it's causing a different play. Because we are both seeking the irrefutable evidence, you know science, and neuroscience in particular is showing us about the value of play on our developing brains, on our whole being really. It's like there isn't a thing that PLAY doesn't touch in our being. And at the same time, we're seeing policies and recess in being eliminated from half the schools, less PLAY time and after board which is great for our children, we are working harder as adults than we've ever worked at emulsifying jobs and with less vacation time, so we're playing less and seen the value of play more and it's causing people to try out! You know, not just regular people who are workaholic like you and me, but you know the American Neurotic Association has declared a PLAY crisis and you know, Michelle Obama, and the Emeril Sixty are all bringing PLAY forward as a way to counter obesity in childhood. So there's a lot going on, and you know 3 new conferences about PLAY, specifically about PLAY in the last 3 years, so I would even, peace on goal as a say that there is a PLAY movement really forming.

Natalie: You know, actually I have a new 12-Way program coming up and one of the first modules is about how we need to start from a happy foundation, and before we even think about setting goals, or thinking about the direction of our life, or anything, we have to come to this positive vibration first and you know I've listed a whole bunch of things out there of what we can do to raise our vibrations and get into that happy place, what do we call a happy place. And one of these is PLAY, because you think about it, when you act like a kid, you cannot stop it. Smile, and laugh and have a great time and you know even playing with the kids is just you know, just awesome. So we're talking about, you know raising vibration, being in a happy state, obviously combating obesity, like what are some of the other things that people, that you have discovered is really important about PLAY?

Gwen: Oh, I mean it's... I mean just what you've said about, any positive emotions are great for the whole body, the whole system, you know Natalie, good for the heart, and the respiratory system, everything but also all of those dopamine and all the endorphins that, and oxytocin's and everything that comes out, the nervous system, it's like a state of activation without fear, we are able to be fully engaged. So that's all in there, there's nothing that a positive emotion doesn't benefit. And then, but on top of that, when you see like rough and tumble play in children, no scientist and surgery fellas has an interesting research on the development of the brain, as a result of these particularly rough and tumble play, you know things that we think, "Oh no they're gonna hurt each other!" but it's so critical that the brain, the cortex actually develops executive functions that wouldn't be there without the rough and tumble, we see a better developed brain, better decision-making, better ability to navigate certain situations to understand what ambiguous signals really mean and have a sensitivity, a social intelligence really and then emotional intelligence.

Natalie: Yeah, you know it's amazing, what you just made me think of then, cause I have a puppy that I have adopted earlier in the year, and play was actually part of the socializing process, you know, it's like so you know they don't bite too hard, they know how to interact with other dogs, and I know that dogs and humans are completely different, but I'm thinking I can see similarities there, you know.

Gwen: Absolutely. Yeah I mean I'm just thinking about how really big dogs play with little dogs, not to mention inner species, you know all the great things we've seen and even animals that are natural predators, their prey relationships. Natalie there is this wonderful story of those husky and the polar bear. Polar bear normally eat the huskies right? That's like the great lunch.

Natalie: Yes.

Gwen: And that, as I say that my little, my big dog would come out and say Hi, meet Macey. (Shows the dogs)

Natalie: Oh! You've got several dogs, excellent!

Gwen: Yeah, your fans are right here. So here, the small dog, and the big dog and they play. Macey would get down so that she's of the height of Ponzi and handicap herself, she'll just play with her pal, so that the play may happen, and then if she bites too hard, she has to back and she's to back-off, so she's navigating this subtle social cues to keep the play going because play is so awesomely fun, that we're willing to cooperate so... my partner actually is palm-biologist, animal palm-biologist who did the research that revealed that PLAY is actually, probably one of the roots of morality and cooperation, like ethical behavior where we have to be emphatic, we have to understand, be kind of exquisitely attuned to the other person or animals play out special. That we know when we're causing it and we don't wanna crash it, cause if you play straight but also if they play with us cause we're really bad playmates, ostracizes from the pact, that, that's really bad for animals.

Natalie: Exactly, I know that you've got heaps of exciting things happening with this project, tell us where we can go to find out more and what's happening when we get to that website.

Gwen: So, there is an exciting kickstarter of campaign that we launched and have... it's gonna be seen, it's 5 days, 5 days! So, you'll be going to www.seriouslythemovie.com and then hitting the donate button and that will take you to the kick-starter donate page, but you don't want to miss the whole kick-starter campaign, so click the link to the campaign. We have really fun things going on, we've met our goal, we've had an extra-ordinarily successful campaign, reaching our goal within 10 days early, within 24 days and we have kick-starter staff pic, and we've also had our kick-starter of the week, for cultural weekly, you're probably on when you see this. So, that's really the full pick, we're really going for it right now, all that kick-starter. But when that ends, then we will be actually developing, since we've succeeded, we'll be developing THE PILOT. The Pilot is, if we could raise $50,000.00, we can have a 30-minute pilot that can be broadcasted. And we have great PDS producer on board, and that is really gonna prepare us to be... to create a really robust sponsorship package and raise the money for the full-feature like film, which in turn, kind of a first pilot series called Now Playing. Episodes now playing at home, now playing at work, now playing in school, now playing for life about health and wellness, now playing for change, about social transformation, and social change, and now playing for future about the creativity and innovation. So it's part of a big picture and then we'll be offering tools, and you know for the big no one's as they go inspired, we wanna provide the tools for each of those areas that will really help people make PLAY a priority in their lives.

Natalie: Yep. Awesome, so that's seriouslythemovie.com. And remember guys, if you click on the banner to the side then you'll go straight to that site as well. So thank you so much for joining me today Gwen, this is like I've said, an incredible project and we are definitely on board to help with that as well. And when you get to that website there's a really cool trailer as well. So you gotta get to there and check it out, it's really, really cool.

Gwen: And spread the word.

Natalie: And spread the word, exactly.

Gwen: You'll have 5 days to jump in and spread the word and we really wanna get to $50,000.00 so we can cover some really amazing topics.

Natalie: So guys I encourage you to share this video and the information in it by clicking the Facebook and twitter share buttons above. And if you haven't done so already, make sure that you put your email on the box above there, I would love to send you the Manifesting with Masters Video A Course, masters like Bob Proctor, Joe Vitale, John Assaraf,. It's valued in 87 dollars and I'd like to give it to you for free. So make sure you put your emails on the box above there to get that. So until next time, remember to live large, choose courageously and love without limits. We'll see you soon.