Life is a game

Games are like reality but in a box. This may not be quite obvious but hang on for a while.

How do you define a game? I am not 100% sure but I am pretty sure it has to look something like this:

* It has rules.
* It is limited.

I can't figure out anything that I call a game that doesn't fulfill these criterion. With limited I mean that the rules that I apply to the game are at some point turned on and off. A football game for example has clear rules, but they only apply for 90 minutes (at the time, until the next game). When the game is on, other rules of other games are turned off. With this I mean that there can be games within the timespan of other games, but that only one set of rules apply at the time. While playing football we live in a democracy for example. But on the field the rules of democracy are disabled, and you are not allowed to determine the football game by popular vote. Is democracy a game then? Yes, it has rules and it started many years ago. It is actually also bound to stop sometime, be it due to war or the collapse of the universe. This new exciting type of game is a little different: it is played for an unknown time. The game of democracy is also paused when for example your mother demand that you do the dishes and you enter a new exciting game of family. These rules are dynamical and varies between families.

You may question this with something like this: "Your definition of a game is so broad that I can't figure anything out that isn't a "game"." This is precisely true and it takes me to my next statement; games don't have an antonym. I will help you and propose that the closest we can come to something that is not a game would be called "reality". The thing is that reality is not experienced objectively but by humans, and we live finite lives and follow rules while living our finite lives. Our lives are also small boxes placed in reality. Such rules are not meant to mean "rule of law"; those can clearly be broken. The rules I mean are for example cause and effect and laws of physics, but social laws are also useful when discussing the subject. If I rob a bank, I may or may not go to jail but the action itself affects the way people act towards me, usually due to the applicable social norms and conventions that exists.

So with my definition of games, life is definitely a game. We play it for an unknown but finite lifetime and we play it by rules (except if you are Neo in the Matrix). When we die we leave the playground (although we hopefully affected other people in a positive way, but that is then part of their games and not yours).

If you can believe this I have some ideas of how I can use this and develop some appropriate philosophy, based on how I like to play games. This is what I like in games.

* They are clear enough to understand.
* You can differentiate between success and failure.

Knowing me I realize that both these are an effect of me being very competitive. I hate games i which I don't know how I am doing and who is winning. How do I translate this to how I should live my life? The rules of our life are clearly very messy, and often good things comes with bad and vice versa. This is how I should it.

* I make my own rules, but call them ideals. Then I live by them. This satisfies my desire for clear rules.
* I set up goals. When reaching these goals it is the definition of success. When not, it the definition of failure.

This is surprisingly almost how I live my life. It has its problems, especially I have to experience loads of failures when I don't reach my goals. But in the end it is all of what I appreciate in a good game.

You may object and say that you can't set up your custom made philosophy based on what you like in games because "life is more serious than games". Then you are completely missing the point. Life is a game. But since we live in it we perceive the stakes of the game to be very high. But in principle it is not different from playing Super Mario with only one extra life and no continue. Besides that Mario gets extra lives by lethal mushrooms while we die from them.

Can you derive your philosophy from what you like with games?

With this we can now be very constructive! For example; knowing a persons favorite game may tell much about the persons' philosophy. Examples (Very Quasi scientific at best) :
No favorite game -> Either depressed or at least not much of a philosopher.
Solitaire -> Either a Christian fundamentalist (simplistic enough for you?) or hermit (no opponent to play)
Poker -> Poker professional (Self explanatory)