Life is made of many games: Relationship, building family, career or money game (just to name a few). Choose what game to play.
In order to be happy and fulfilled:
- Choose what game you want to play
- Play the game
- Win it
- And let go of it
Don’t get trapped in playing the game forever, living in anxiety and postponing happiness.
Stop keeping up with the Joneses! Adult games are very well designed. You can play them infinitely. You can:
- accumulate wealth infinitely
- work your entire life to reach some sort of status you had as ideal or even just to meet someone else’s expectations of you
- play victim and suffer on behalf of others or blame others for your own short-comings.
Whatever you choose, play, win and move on. Don’t fall in the rabbit hole of fearing to loose what you have achieved.
Take time to identify and understand the game you are playing. Self-awareness is key so you can actively choose what game to play. Or choose not to play any games and live in contentment. Not wanting something is just as good as having it. That gives you freedom and power. Whatever happens with you will be fine for you. As important as knowing what you want is to know what you don’t want.
“There are so many things in this world I don’t want”. – Socrates
Be aware that every time you play, there will be ups and downs. In the relationship game, you may get the girl(s) /boy(s) and sometimes you won’t. When playing the money game, you may get the wealth you desired or loose it. In the career game, you may have gotten the job tittle you worked so hard to get.
Once you achieve your goal, that is when you should celebrate that you won the game. Be happy and content now. Don’t go into the rabbit hole of having fear of loosing what you got. You won. Enjoy, let it go of your anxieties and feel contentment.
Find your “Lagom”
In Sweden, there is a word that is used very often called “lagom“. It means not too much, not too little. Just enough. For the majority of Swedes, a lagom life is when you have achieved the 3Vs: “Villa, Volvo, Vuvve” (literally translates: house, Volvo, dog). Once this is achieved, there is a high level of contentment.
I personally found it very strange this behavior, coming from a very capitalist background that promotes for people to always want more. Given that government provides to all public basic needs (heath-care, infrastructure, social welfare, etc), there is very little to be worried about. This is true in all Nordic countries. That is why it comes as no surprise that Nordic countries are always in the top list of “Happiest People on Earth”.
We all have flaws. Self-awareness will help you to identify what you want and as importantly what you don’t want. So take some quiet time with yourself, without and distraction to observe your thoughts and listen to your deepest self. Then actively choose what game to play and reach contentment.
Enjoy the game!
