Paradigm’s Inaugural Issue
Written by Sophia M. Aste
When was the last time you asked someone to play? Was it recess? A playdate? This question fades from our vocabulary as we age and for some, it disappears completely. For others, play transforms. It might look like weight lifting or cosplay or clubbing—whatever form, it’s no longer about monkey bars but the essence remains; an invitation to connect, with ourselves or with each other.
Our world is increasingly disconnected. I feel it and I trust you feel it. Technology creates a pseudo-world where reminders of our past mix with material for our future, but rarely land us in the present. We feel somehow outside of ourselves, play feeling less and less like an option. However, when we dip into the present we’re reminded that within life itself is where we experience connection.
The same is true of the social enterprise. Life Itself, co-founded by Arick Manocha and Callan Hutchison is a network whose mission is to normalize play. Born in November ‘23 in response to disgust over the exclusivity within existing subcultures of play, Life Itself was built not as an escape from reality, but as an acknowledgement to its breadth. When we seek escape, we often eclipse parts of ourselves, and this eclipse is what breeds dissolution. Hutchison says it like this:
Any subculture that offers escapism attracts people that are emotionally disintegrated, compulsive, histrionic. That’s not to say everyone that goes to play parties is like that. But it’s disproportionate because the activity is underground.
Play parties? Yeah, you heard right. Both founders have roots in nightlife, Hutchison moving fluidly through conversation and polyamory and Manocha, self-defined as romantically devotional with an inherent skill for event facilitation. However, these archetypes are as reductive as calling their events as “play parties.”
In existing play communities, play is synonymous with sex. Life Itself does not deny this—they expand upon it. The ability to have sex is an option at most of their events. It’s an option, not an unspoken requirement, which is entirely the point. Do you want to do “x” with me? is the simple, consent-driven question that enables choice—one key value their enterprise is founded on. At Life Itself play isn’t synonymous with sex, it’s synonymous with connection.
Their ecosystem of brands reflects this—each one exploring an integrated life through a different social facet, unified under the same mission:
Life Itself is the network’s flagship event, with sexual play decentered and present. It’s free to enter, there’s an open bar and flexible timing: arrive in the evening, stay through sunrise, brunch together in the morning. You decide how you play.
Playjacent hosts spaces to get curious about intimacy and where it exists in daily life. Life Itself brings play to daily life, Playjacent brings life into play.
GRIT is where Berlin-style raving meets NY-style play, honoring play’s queer and kinky origins. Performer driven.
Echelon is the high-altitude brand for high-performing individuals. It revolutionizes networking by acknowledging play as a super-connector.
Club Soda is the 18+ substance-free mirror of Life Itself. It proves that play doesn’t require intoxication—only permission.
Fourth4Space are their 24/7, maximum-use venues that merge home, work and the socialized “third space” to integrate—not isolate—how people live, work, and play, returning to the way our ancestors lived but in modern day.
PlayFinder is the service arm providing turnkey integration—everything from play insurance to consent education—for those building play spaces beyond the network.
Paradigm is the broadcasting network of Life Itself, amplifying the cultural shift toward daily integration and analyzing the broader sector of social disruption.
All of these iterations point to why calling Life Itself the host of “play parties” is limiting. Their goal is not to centralize play—it’s to normalize it, alongside every other form of connection. Sexual play being one expression among many, no longer exceptional, is what dissolves its secrecy, allowing for an expanded range of expression. Play at Life Itself looks like intimacy, voyeurism, touch, cuddling, kink, body art and adornment, hair braiding, ropes, wax, fire, electro, movement, dance, circus, fashion, gallery exhibitions, food, music, conversation…
Play seems like more of an option now, doesn’t it? Life Itself brings play back into daily life, reflected in the enterprise’s applied philosophy: Daily Life Itself—the practice of integration.
As notated through Life Itself’s point of origin, integration is the combination of freedom and autonomy.
Consent enables freedom; the option to choose. Choice, however it’s expressed, builds autonomy. Together, they form integration, the embodied wholeness that comes from aligning what you want with the space and support to receive it.
The beauty of this philosophy is that it doesn’t stop at Life Itself’s events. As put by Manocha:
The skill sets we learn from play—consent, clarity, curiosity, self-awareness, the ability to ask for what we actually want, the ability to build connection without transaction—don’t stay in the play space. They ripple outward. They change your relationships. They shift how you communicate. They alter how you experience joy, creativity, intimacy, and life itself.
Play isn’t a part of something you attend, but a way to inhabit your own life.
Life Itself is building the infrastructure to support a new category of culture—one that counters the rigid systems that reward disconnection. Consent is their method, choice their value, and integration their philosophy.
