Do you remember a short drama series in the 80s called The One Game? The plot centred on a battle of wits between an arrogant businessman and a eccentric games developer within a ‘reality game’ named after the title of the show.  I loved it and had a chance to watch it again recently.  Like all quality entertainment, it has aged very well.

It got me thinking about other attempts to use the ‘game’ motif to blend mundane reality with the extraordinary.  Here’s what came to mind.

The Game - A film in which “wealthy financier Nicholas Van Orton gets a strange birthday present from wayward brother Conrad: a live-action game that consumes his life.”

The True Game – A fantasy novel in which the world is like one, massive game of living chess.

The Most Dangerous Game of All – A short story about a hunt-loving aristocrat who goes after the deadliest game there is: another hunter.  For variations on this theme see films like Predator, The Running Man (forget the film, read the book), Hard Target, and The Condemned.

The Magus – A serious novel about a young man who who becomes “embroiled in psychological illusions of a master trickster that become increasingly dark and serious.”

Which takes us full circle.  And don’t even get me started on Wittgenstein’s language games!

I’ve been challenged on the helpfulness of the ‘reality versus game’ dichotomy we live by after re-reading Flow by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi.  Here’s what he says:

“The more a job inherently resembles a game – with variety, appropriate and flexible challenges, clear goals, and immediate feedback – the more enjoyable it will be regardless of the workers level of development… There is no question that a playfully light attitude is characteristic of creative individuals.”

I’m reminded of some other quotes found in Pink’s A Whole New Mind.

• “The opposite of play isn’t work.  It’s depression.”  Brian Sutton-Smith
• “Games are the most elevated form of imagination.”  Albert Einstein
• “Play will be to the 21st century what work was to the last 300 years of industrial society – our dominant way of knowing, doing and creative value.”  Pat Kane

There are so many implications in this for how we approach our work and shape our lifestyle.  Entrepreneurs must reflect on the implication of the ‘business as game’ model of ethics.  For me, it raises big questions about how I design my training courses.  When a newbie, my courses were information rich and substance heavy.  I tagged on exercises if there was time.  Now, I try to balance talking with doing, change the pace, and introduce as much variety as possible.

But perhaps even that isn’t enough.  Maybe the whole day should take the form on one, big game.  Heck,  who wants to limit training to the training room anyway?  Let’s take the game of learning out into everywhere!

Only one problem.

How?

Here are some aptly themed books to help you out:

If Life is a Game, These are the Rules: Ten Rules for Being Human

Games People Play: The Psychology of Human Relationships

The Game of Life and How to Play It

Image credit: Corey Leopold.

BBC reporter  Razia Iqbal has written an excellent article called The power of language in which she traces Barak Obama’s oratorical skill back to his relationship with the written word.  In this, he follows great presidents such as Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt.  Roosevelt, who has been called the most serious reader of all the American presidents, had a few good quotes about them.

“I am a part of everything that I have read.”

“If this nation is to be wise as well as strong, if we are to achieve our destiny, then we need more new ideas for more wise men reading more good books in more public libraries.”

Or, as one of the greatest writer-philosophers of the American literary traditions has it…

“Books are the treasured wealth of the world and the fit inheritance of generations and nations.”

The one who write those last words was Henry David Theroux.  Who?  The author of classic self-help book Walden, that’s who.

By the way, this last link is is a rich resource if you’re a fellow book-nerd like me.  Question: What’s the one thing we like better than books?  Answer: Books about books!  This site is an on-line deposit of of ’50 Classics’ series by Tom Butler-Bowdon, a man who should be given an honour for services rendered to the cause of books.

Former President Bill Clinton has revealed that one of his favourite authors is Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi with his theory of ‘flow’ or optimal experience.  Clinton has also recently released a list of his 21 favourite books of all time.  I was impressed to see that the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius made it.

We haven’t yet been informed as to what former President George W Bush’s favourite books were during his time in office.

We aren’t likely to, I trow.

In the workshop I did four things.  First, I discussed Seligman’s analysis of the three types of happy life: the Pleasant Life, the Good Life, and the Meaningful Life.  Then I explored the whole notion of optimism, perhaps Seligman’s main contribution to the field of academic psychology.  After lunch, it was time to check out our signature strengths.  Finally, we applied all this to the area of work, that most usual and difficult source of unhappiness.

During the course of the course, one of the students told me about a website called TED that contains all sorts of goodies on this type of topic.  We had a look at it, and sure enough, it contained all manner of wonders.  Here you can hear Martin Seligman on the state of positive psychology (which was so good, we actually watched it there and then).  You can also hear Mihály Csíkszentmihályi on flow.  Check them out.  Its good at all times to go back to the sources!

After the workshop I received an email from another of the participants alerting me to a rather interesting critique of Authentic Happiness by a UK author and ‘existential therapist’.  Some the the criticisms are in fact questions about  research methodology or exhaustiveness of approach, and apply to any empirically-based theory.  Others touch on points of philosophical definition, and take us outside the Seligman’s intended domain.  But perspective is a virtue, and it is healthy to read all sides.

So was the workshop half empty or half full?  It was full of people, full of ideas, full of discussion, and full of enthusiasm.  Thanks to everyone who came and made it such a positively brilliant (or brilliantly positive?) day.

I came across a little nugget of gold in the otherwise dross-filled YouTube recently. It’s a live discussion between Mihály Csíkszentmihályi and Martin Seligman on the Charlie Rose show on the subject of happiness.

This is a little like overhearing a conversation between Eric Clapton and Mark Knopfler talk about playing the guitar…

For those of you who don’t know, these gentlemen are two of the biggest names in the contemporary self-help movement. Having said that, they are both professional psychologists and respectable academics, so don’t be too sore on them.

Csíkszentmihályi is famous for discovering the concept of ‘flow’. Flow is a mental state of complete concentration, when a task requiring skill totally absorbs the person undertaking it. In such a state they are intrinsically motivated to accomplish their task, and as such gain a feeling of great fulfillment, freedom and enjoyment. In a word, flow makes people happy. Very happy.

Seligman is the leader of the Positive Psychology movement in the US. He attempts to focus his research on human wellness rather than the usual emphasis on mental illness. ‘Learned helplessness’ is contrasted with the counter-intuitive concept of ‘learned optimism’. Seligman insists that happiness is a skill that can be acquired through training, just like any other.

The first part of the video is about the Palestinian Presidential elections. So move on to 28 mins to get to the relevant stuff. It makes for fascinating viewing!