#287: Josué, Lara, and Link discuss how using video game rules as a framework can help us better understand how to succeed in real life systems. When we deeply understand the rules, we are better at knowing how to play within the rules – or how to break them.

Josué Cardona 0:07
Welcome to gt radio on the Geek Therapy network. During Geek Therapy, we believe that the best way to understand each other and ourselves through the media we care about, my name is Josué Cardona. And I’m joined by Lara Taylor.

Lara Taylor 0:19
Hey,

Josué Cardona 0:20
and Link Keller. yo,

Link Keller 0:24
what’s up?

Lara Taylor 0:26
It’s always it’s always like, I don’t know, my heart stops, are you gonna say me first? Or Link first? who has to say, hey, first?

Josué Cardona 0:35
I never know who it’s gonna be. All right. So it’s my turn this week. And I’ve been thinking a lot about rules. Okay, and specifically, like framing them in the sense of video games and how useful it can be to do that. So let me let me bring up a few examples of what I mean. I’ve been thinking about Breath of the Wild. Lately, I’ve talked to people who the few people I’ve ever heard from who do not like Breath of the Wild. It’s because it’s too open. Like, there’s no direction like you don’t you don’t know where to go. You don’t know what to do. Right? And, and I get that, I get that, right. It’s like, Oh, I need instructions. I need a waypoint. Please tell me what to do. The moment I step out there, and I see 10 different possibilities. I don’t know where to go, and I don’t know what to do, etc. I’ll say, okay, that’s interesting. That’s interesting. And then I’m thinking about the people who are still playing with the physics of the game. And having fun with it, years after it came out, trying to figure things out. And they’re not hacking the game, right. They’re just, they understand the rules of the game. The rules of the world. And they’re, they understand them so well, that they’re able to do things that we never thought were possible to do. And and I think that’s really cool. I think that’s really cool, right? But but it requires a type of understanding of the game mechanics and everything that you can possibly do within that world. When you can, you can’t do to then possibly do these amazing things. And, and it’s not just completing the game, right? It’s like it’s going, just doing all these things that maybe, I don’t know if the game designers weren’t intending for you to do but they definitely weren’t expecting you to do. So I remember, I was working with very small children. I think it was, I think it was still an intern I was like, it must been like 10 years ago, I was around around gt origin story. Time, at the same place the same, I was looking at the same supervisor who told me all video games are stupid. And remember doing a group with these kids. And I remember there being a conversation. It’s I mean, but just seven and eight year old in sitting around this table. And they’re complaining about how they hate that their parents are always telling them what to do. Right. And like you they hate. They hate the rules of their home and tell somebody Okay, so like, What? What do you like to do? Not only like, what are your favorite games, right? And I was like, Oh, I love to play video games with my dad. I remember this one girl was like, Yeah, I love I love playing Call of Duty. I’m like, Okay, cool. So, do you know how to play? Like, like, what are the rules of the of the game? Take Oh, you have to do this. Alright, so what if, what if there weren’t any rules? What would that be like? And then we all start thinking about what a game without rules would be like. So and they came to the conclusion that it would suck. Right?

Link Keller 4:07
chaos

Josué Cardona 4:08
It would really suck. Like, call duty? Wouldn’t be fun if it were if there weren’t any rules? I was like, Okay, so, you know, like, and I get like, sometimes the rules aren’t? Aren’t. We don’t like them. We don’t like the rules. But I feel like only when we understand the rules, can we? And when we accept them, can we then start to play in those spaces and start to do something that you can’t win the game unless you accept the rules of the game. Otherwise, you’re just going to be complaining the entire time, about the rules, and then you’re not playing and then you’re you’re not gonna win it there’s no way to win the game. If if that’s what you’re doing. And so I’ve been thinking a lot about that idea in, in my in my day job and multiple areas of my life. And I even revisit it over the weekend. Victor Frankl’s Man’s Search for Meaning. This is like i think i think it’s relevant. I think there’s something relevant about it. And I’m not a logotherapy expert. So I do not know if this is a good representation of Victor Frankl’s theories, and what logotherapy is about. But in that story, like the first half of the book is him. And I just read read their prologue. And he’s like, this isn’t a story about being at a concentration camp. This is a story about people’s experiences. And basically, he’s in this place, and he’s observing why some people are more miserable. Right, then other people, and why some people are, are actually thriving in this space. That’s horrible. I like the comments where Steve is in the house. Yeah, man. Yeah, my search for meaning is always relevant. Thank you, thank you for validating my idea steve. And so, I, I’ve been thinking a lot about that, in that. I remember all my clients, and there’s something about accepting that sometimes feels like, like, you’re like, you’re compromising, or you’re yielding, right? Like in your, in your in your real life. But only when you get to the point when you can, like, accept that like, Okay, this is something, this is what’s going on. But then you understand the rules. And when you can, and you can’t do and then you can kind of move within that. There’s, at at my job, right, I do I do diversity inclusion work at my, at my, at the university I work at. And this idea has been on my mind, in a way there to where, like, Oh, you know, like some students? Like, why are some students thriving and some not? Right? What is it? about it? And it’s like, yeah, like, you can be in a class with a professor that kind of sucks, right? Then you can either like complain the entire the entire semester about it. But that’s not gonna, like, you’re not gonna get to the to the, you’re not gonna pass the class. Like, it’s like, that’s not helpful. Right? And, and so, obviously, like, I’m thinking about that I’m thinking about clients I had in the past, I’m like, Oh, no, no, this is this is, this is the thing. But for me, it’s been super helpful to frame it in the sense of games, right? Now I’m thinking about it in terms of rules of the game, if I understand the rules of the game, then I can actually get to the get to the end, or I can win, or I can actually do something with it otherwise. And this is where it gets where it’s hard. Like, I think the part where I always remember my clients getting hung up, and it’s the part where I still get hung up. And it’s, I don’t like the rules so hard, you know, that I don’t want to play the game. But some games like you’re just like, they’re just they’re like, they’re just, it’s all just the rules, right? Like you can, sometimes you can change the rules. And sometimes maybe, maybe that’s part of it. But But sometimes you can’t, or sometimes to get what you want, maybe changing the rules isn’t the most effective or easiest thing to do. So it’s been like a, like a, like, I’m revisiting this life lesson that I learned a long time ago. That’s been super relevant this week. And it was a metaph...