Hoo boy. I listened to a podcast about games this week, and there are two sentences that keep popping into my head.
The first sentence is the assertion that a game is: voluntarily taking on unnecessary obstacles to create the possibility of struggling to overcome them.
He says: “In normal life, you go through the means for the sake of the ends. You go through all the struggle because you want this independent object and the only way to get that money, to get that job, to get that car is to do this other crappy stuff. In games, you take on the goal for the sake of the struggle.”
My brain is noodling on this. I surmise it connects to how satisfied entrepreneurs are with their work life — the feeling that we voluntarily chose the obstacles we face. It also resonates with studies that people who thrive at work are people who feel a high degree of autonomy — they believe they are choosing many key aspects of the challenges they face.
He also mentioned this game designer, who said the most important tool in the game design toolkit is the points system, “because it tells the players what to desire.”
Knowing what to desire is a life’s work, and often part of the conversation I have with clients about how they’re spending their time and energy. They’ve concluded that they’ve been winning the wrong game, competing for points that don’t get them what they value most.
Who tells you what to desire?
