People often say that life isn't a game. However, if we were to describe life as a collection of rules designed to challenge the creativity of its participants as they navigate the constraints of the game as well as the actions of the other players all while imparting no small measure of joy, achievement, and personal fulfillment, would that be in any way inaccurate, trivializing, or reductive? In reality, life is one of the most compelling games ever created. It is particularly compelling because no one fully understands the rules and even when we do start to feel like maybe we have a handle on things the rules up and change. As Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett describe it in the book Good Omens, “God does not play dice with the universe; He plays an ineffable game of His own devising, which might be compared, from the perspective of any of the other players [i.e. everybody], to being involved in an obscure and complex variant of poker in a pitch-dark room, with blank cards, for infinite stakes, with a Dealer who won't tell you the rules, and who smiles all the time.” It may not actually be as bad as all that, but after long strings of failures, many of us may come to view ourselves less as players and more as pieces on a game board being moved by others. We may come to the conclusion that learning and following the rules is too hard, if not impossible, and it is much better to simply not play at all, to make random or half hearted attempts, or else to cheat. It is especially dangerous to fall into such patterns of thinking when we find ourselves at the bottom of the barrel, so to speak. We've been dealt a crap hand and are down to our last few chips and we hate the people we're playing with (who, by the way, are all cheaters anyway). This game was rigged against us from the start. There is nothing we could have done. What makes this all so much more beguiling is that we get sucked into thinking that, if life is a game, and we happen to be losing this particular iteration of the game, then we are doomed to lose forever. It would be far more accurate to say not that life is a game, but rather a whole series of games, with the rules and the players changing all the time. This gets especially dangerous for those of us who are winning the current version of the game because we are just as likely to believe that our current level of success and mastery will continue on unabated from now until the end of time as we are to believe when we are on a losing streak that are bad luck will never end. And it is far more psychologically damaging when we are on the top of the leaderboards to find the ground yanked out from under us and all of our winnings at one version of the game don't always transfer when the game changes. The upshot of all of this is that when we understand that life is a game with a set of rules that we do in fact have the capacity to learn and to understand and to master, then we can start playing the game for real. As we get better at following the rules we will win more often which will place us in a better position to win more often still. And as we get better at playing one version of the game, we will come to understand that truly winning means placing ourselves in a position to keep playing the game even when the game changes. Not everyone participates in the game of life with the same spirit of fair play and good sportsmanship. Because there are people who care more about the fact that they are winning or losing in the short term, they are more likely to engage in behavior that will break the rules of the game. At first, the other players will adapt and still try to play by what rules they can even if they have to make exceptions for the ways in which the rules have been broken. Eventually, the game will buckle under the collective weight of all of these exceptions until it is no longer possible to play by all of the self-contradictory rules. Those who are at the top, whether they got there honestly or otherwise, will still try to cling to the current version of the game. But those of us who are playing the long game will start to break the rules that are themselves breaking the game. When enough people are breaking the lesser rules in favor of the greater interest of being able to sustain the game long term, then the current version of the game collapses and a new game is born. As the new game is born, those who have played enough versions of the game to understand what rules function best to keep the game going the longest will get to make the new rules. At each stage - following the rules, breaking the rules, making the rules - it requires those of us who want to play The Game to exercise humility, courage, and to take ownership of and responsibility for our actions. It takes humility to admit that we haven't been playing the game very well and that if we paid more attention we might learn how to play it better. It takes courage to break the rules and go against the grain when so many of the people we respect and admire are playing by the rules of a broken game that is slowly but surely robbing everyone of their vitality and enjoyment and agency. And it takes a great deal of responsibility to lead by example and take a hand in making the new rules of the game in a way that will encourage long term sustainability. I know sometimes we break the rules because of a sense of greed or spite, and sometimes we follow the rules blindly even when we know deep down we're hurting ourselves or others. But the longer we play the game, the better we will get at understanding when it is time to follow the rules, when it is time to break the rules, and when it is time to make the rules.
