How to Be A Master in the Real Game of Life?

 

Life is actually a limitless and gigantic game. Those who understand it, play it well; and those who take life rather too seriously, often find themselves in a jam. In this real game of life, we are all players and the first priority of this game is to play our best game and enjoy the ride to its fullest. 

When we were kids, we used to play so many games. Winning or losing used to be a rather pretty big deal for us, because we didn’t differentiate the game from life. For us, losing in the game would mean losing in life. As we grew up, we began understating the real purpose of these games, which is why even if we lose to our kids we enjoy it nevertheless. But when it comes to the real game of life, we kinda deviate away. We start taking winning and losing as a rather serious matter, which points to the fact that we have knowingly or unknowingly begun behaving like kids again.

Too often, an experience of the past keeps on haunting us. Something which we did against the advice of the whole world because we thought what we were doing was right, but then ultimately we screwed up, which is not surprising. And now we are being attacked, mentally and emotionally, both from the outside world and the inside world(which is more sinister). One wrong decision in the past and it undermines our entire credibility in our own eyes for the rest of our lives. It also casts a shadow on all the other decisions we take in life which is honestly a pretty shitty situation to be in.

Whenever we try to forget about it and move on to do or start something new, the entire world is ready to remind us of our shaky past and pull us down right back to square one. Though we can fend off the outside attacks, things often get a tad tricky when our inside world is in ruins. That’s what makes it even more important to understand this real game of life. 

What to do about Ourselves?

How can we keep ourselves safe from our own selves? Doesn’t matter if we run away to the highest mountains or the deepest oceans, the inside attacks aren’t gonna stop if we don’t do something about it. We may distract ourselves for some time by diverting our focus or attention to someplace else like hanging out with friends, watching a movie, or going on a vacation; but those ghosts will come back haunting us as soon as we return home. 

That’s the whole point or essence of this blog—not to fight the outside situations but to keep calm within the inside even if your outside isn’t peaceful. Is there a way following which we can handle the attacks that keep on happening inside us at the level of the thought? If we can face this, then we can face almost anything. Because ultimately all the attacks happen inside. Even the attacks which we think happen outside(not the physical ones), ultimately are just a reflection of what’s happening on the inside.

If someone is criticizing you or belittling you, then the power of choice is in your hands—whether to be affected by it or not. We can simply say, “it’s his habit to demean people, so I don’t give a damn, it doesn’t matter.” But the problem arises when we say, “Why did he say that? How could he dehumanize me like that in front of everybody? Didn’t he remember that I was the one who used to pay his credit card bills!” and so on.

Embrace Hardships in the Game of Life

The thing to understand is that in this real game of life no one is a born genius. They grow genius. Unless you make some mistakes in the past, how can you possibly grow and how will you go to that next level? The more hardships, challenges, and mistakes you come across, the more opportunities life is actually giving you on a silver platter to grow from and become stronger than ever.

I feel pity for people who either don’t get to face any challenges in their life or keep on praying to God to magically vanish all the hardships from their lives. It’s stupid if you ask me. You don’t get to make omelets without breaking some eggs, you don’t get a pizza without baking its crust, you don’t get to use steel unless you heat it like hell first.

In a hypothetical situation, take a child who’s born in a royal family, who got whatever he desired in a snap of his fingers, who never has to do anything in his life, who never got to know how to make the important decisions in life, who doesn’t know how to sacrifice, hustle, and bust his ass to get something—it’s probably the last thing I would wish for anyone to go through.

Just imagine, he is totally dependent on his family, inside out. Such a child won’t know how the world works—he may physically grow up but he’d still remain like an innocent kid, totally naive. When the time comes where he would have to make some tough decisions on his own, he would be totally helpless as he wouldn’t have any idea or experience of the other side of the world.

Embracing your previous mistakes, accepting those outcomes, learning from them unbiasedly, and moving on seems to be like an effective strategy to adopt in this real game of life. In fact, come to think of it, the first time you make a mistake, it’s not really a mistake because you did it unknowingly. Repeating it again and again—that’s a mistake. 

 

In this Game, You are Bigger than your Failure

Failure is not a mistake, not learning from it and becoming morose about it is the real mistake. What good will being sad and gloomy about your past possibly bring? Always remember this one thing, no mistake is bigger than you. No mistake is big enough to overpower you. You are way bigger than even your biggest of mistakes or failures you made in the course of your natural-born life.

The Universe is big enough to absorb whatever it is you think is your biggest mistake. From the Universe’s standpoint, no mistake is big enough that can’t be forgiven. That’s how you develop wisdom, real wisdom. And wisdom has got nothing to do with age. It is totally dependent on your failures, hardships, and your attitude towards overcoming them.

The more you face such situations, the sharper your saw of life is likely to be. 

People tend to make mistakes only when they are outside their comfort zone and that’s your potential to grow right there. This also goes the other way too. If you did something great in the past, then don’t become complacent—grow out of it. Don’t elevate your ego by keeping on reminding the world about your past achievements.

Stay humble, stay grounded. Don’t get stuck in the past. Improve the standard, raise the bar, but don’t settle, keep moving. People either want to forget something tragic that happened with them in the past or don’t want to forget something great that they did in the past. Both of the paths aren’t really contributing to making you a great player in this real game of life. 

 

Part of the Journey is the END

Well, like the Iron Man said, all good things do come to an end. The people we love, our family, even you yourself are gonna die one fine day. It’s part of the game of life and one fine day we all have to face it. Come to think of it, when you are watching your favorite sport on the TV and you are enjoying it so much that you don’t want it to end, but inevitably it does. 

So do you lose your mind? Do you stop eating because of it? Is your inner world in ruins? 

Take another example. Say you are watching a movie where you are crying, laughing, and doing all of that on the outside but deep within it doesn’t affect your inner world because ultimately you know it’s a film.

So, is there a way wherein we can do the same in the real game of life, where we may feel a sense of loss, where we cry, scream, and do all of that on the outside, but stay peaceful on the inside? Is there a way to make us so strong internally that we can come out of the situations of life and death just like that? What to do so that we remain untouched mentally even in matters of failures and success?

Before I shed light on what I think, first ask yourselves—is it possible that you remain unaffected from the inside when you see that your loved ones, God forbid, are no more? Yes, it’s possible. Only if you understand what I am going to say, if you don’t understand it, then it won’t be possible for you.

This can help you create a balance in life which is of paramount importance. Now, by balance, some people think that you ought to be happy all the time, which is not the case. What ‘balance’ actually means is that if you cry then you cry wholeheartedly, if you laugh then you laugh like it’s your last time, if you love then you love like you have a never-ending stream of love in you.

The Game Doesn’t Affect The Real You

Life is exactly like a game you are playing where you are the player but whatever happens in the game doesn’t really affect your real self—just like in any other game. That’s what most of us kinda overlook. But if we can get to the depth of this, then something truly magical can start happening. 

Once we truly understand this philosophy, then it might look like things are affecting us on the outside, but from the inside things are gonna remain untouched and unaffected. It’s exactly like a role you are playing, an actor whose acting. He is crying, laughing, loving, smiling, screaming, and all of that stuff, but deep within he’s not affected by it because he knows he’s playing a role.

If you can’t understand this, then there is no other way to tackle problems permanently. Surely you can work things out on a temporary basis, but if you wanna remain peaceful in the long run, you gotta understand this sooner than later.

Just imagine if you are playing a video game, but you forget that you are actually playing a game then who can save you from this gigantic misunderstanding? 

This is precisely why we make the wrong kind of decisions in life because we are taking this game of life rather too seriously than it was meant to be. We have associated ourselves with the player who’s playing the game, which is the root cause of all the problems you have in life. If the player gets hurt or becomes sick we will become all morose and gloomy and vice versa.

We will play this real game of life better once we understand that the consequences of the game aren’t actually gonna affect what we truly are. But we do the exact opposite of it, we forget we are playing a game, we confuse ourselves with the player playing this game, which is why we are not able to give our best shot in this real game of life. 

This is the reason why we are sooo good at giving advice to others, but suck when it comes to applying them to ourselves. We need to fathom that whatever is gonna happen with the player isn’t gonna affect us and that’s precisely when we become absolutely fearless and once we become fearless, the potential of this real game of life becomes limitless. 

Most people either identify themselves with their bodies or their minds. Our minds act like the software that is responsible for the smooth functioning of the hardware, which is the body in this case. In reality, you are neither the software nor the hardware—you are actually the one creating and modifying both of them continuously. You are the designer of your system. 

You are the one who has the remote controller of the player who’s playing this game on the TV—you are not into the TV screen actually playing the game. Once you understand this reality, then you will become the designer, a true player in the real game of life.

 

And what is this Game of Life actually About? 

To configure and program the software (mind), and the hardware (body) in such a way that it reaches its highest potential to adjust with the underlying circumstances and situations. This includes all your relationships, your work, your career, your social work, and so on. 

If you don’t wanna go deeper, just keep this thing in your heart, “Life’s a Game”. You won’t lose anything if you believe this, but you will gain everything. Because now you will be able to play this real game of life the way it’s supposed to. 

When you play video games you don’t reach level 10 on day 1, but that doesn’t mean you quit playing the game itself. You try again and again and again, you fall and you rise, making your game better than before, filling in your gaps and perfecting your imperfections. And slowly and gradually your game improves, you start having fun, and you keep on going to the next level.

The real game of life too works like this except the fact that the video game generally has the last stage or a level which is the final phase. The real game of life has no end and that’s the beauty of it. Perfection is just an illusion that doesn’t exist in the real game of life, which is what makes it even more interesting and enthralling. 

If you become perfect in this game then where’s the fun in that? Things will become stale after a short while and you will get bored. As long as you are alive, your sole aim should be to keep on improving your game on the inside, and the outside will automatically take care of itself.

When situations get hard, then that is actually life’s way of saying, “Congratulations, you have passed the previous level, and welcome to the next level. So buckle up and get ready to show your next move!” Now instead of cowering your way and succumbing to the hardships and challenges, say “Alright Life! I accept your challenge, show me what you got and give it your best shot.”

 

The Next Level in this Game

People are confusing. They don’t want to keep on repeating the same level in a video game, but when it comes to the real game of life, they don’t want to go to the next level. If you can actually change and live your life this way, you will practically change your life for good. Just imagine, right now our common reaction to stress, negativity, or failure is often so miserable.

But what if you start enjoying them too? What if you take them up like a new challenge to solve, a new level to reach, the part that makes the whole game interesting? Won’t it just change the whole dynamic of how we are used to seeing things altogether?

Just like without darkness, light is meaningless; similarly, without challenges life is incomplete.

But we don’t really think this way. We think like a miser, just wanting to get things done as fast as we can instead of making ourselves better. This is why we are not able to grow in the real game of life and ultimately become gloomy and give up on life. Here, we are giving up our own control, and letting people, situations, and possessions control us, which is not a state you wanna be in. You wouldn’t like your neighbor or your boss playing your game for you now, would you?

Some people are stuck on the same level of the game all their life because of their ignorance and stupidity, while some don’t want to step up to the next level because of fear and their attachment to their comfort zone. Neither of the paths isn’t gonna make you whole or happy from the inside. And all of this is actually common sense, nothing hard or tricky to grasp once you get the essence of it. 

Things get boring when we start repeating them. This is the primary reason for boredom in people’s life. The truth of the matter is that every day brings a ton of new opportunities, new challenges, and new experiences which we choose to ignore so subtly, and then we complain, “life sucks”, “life’s boring”, “Oh there’s nothing new going on in my life, the same old” and so on.

 

Final Thoughts

It’s time we start celebrating every level we clear so that we can enter into the new one with fresh exuberance and a positive zeal. This real game of life is not just about clearing levels all our life, but ultimately enjoy the ride. 

You don’t know what tomorrow holds, hell, you don’t even know what’s gonna happen the very next second, and that’s the best part of this real game of life. Don’t you wanna see what you are going to do next? Isn’t it exciting enough to guess your next move in the future, only to later find out that you did something entirely different from what you thought?

Life itself is honestly the best adventure, thriller, romcom, funny, horror movie you are ever gonna watch in your entire life. Very few people are actually playing this game of life the way it’s supposed to be—fully alive and active in each and every moment and doing everything to the best of their abilities. Things that seem impossible for the normal crowd will be a cakewalk for them because all of this is a game to them. They will be able to imagine things that normal people can’t even imagine in their wildest dreams.

If we can live our lives this way, which isn’t actually that hard, then where is the fear now? Our bodies are meant to die, the mind is meant to die. You cannot save them even if you want to. But even after they are gone, you are still alive, and that’s what most people don’t realize.

There’s something that has never died, and will never be able to die. What if you can realize that you are actually that particular thing only all along? You have been playing this game for so long without knowing that you are in a game. Well, now you do! It’s up to you now how you wanna play it out? Fearfully or fearlessly? Playfully or boringly? With love, joy, care, and compassion or with hate, fear, jealousy, and callousness? The ball’s in your court.

 

 

You have to FALL in love with this real Game of Life to RISE in it.