You ready?
Here it is.
I'm not sure how many people have played the Game of Life, but it's a board game where you have a spinner and move around the board, doing things like getting a job, getting married, having kids, and getting a raise. In most cases, the Game of Life is the typical suburban lifestyle: you go to college, get a job, get married, have kids, and then you retire and die.
I played this game alot when I was a kid and I remember always getting really angry because of the stop signs. In the game, you could spin around the board until you hit a stop sign. Even though you might have only moved one space and you spinned a 10, you have to stop and do what the sign said. The stop signs always say things like get a job, get married, or buy a house, and you had to do what it said, regardless of your feelings about it. Being a typical 7 year old boy, I always got really angry when I had to stop and get married (since girls are yucky).
That wasnt even the worst part. The end of the game bothered me the most. On the way, you got a job and made money. At the end, you have to count up your money and see which retirement home you get to go into: the pitiful log cabin or the giant mansion. It's then that you realize that all the game was about was money. It didnt matter that you had kids or a wife. All they did was cost you money. Money you could have used to get into the giant mansion.
Now, that game scares me. I am often terrified that my life will be like that. Just a one way road to retirement and death, with a few stop signs along the way, forcing me to live some idiot's idea of "life." Then, you would look back and realize what you lived wasnt life at all. It was just a pointless existence based on getting money and being forced into jobs, marriages, and houses you never wanted. What kind of twisted person could call that "life?"
Probobly the same twisted person that wants to brainwash you into a suburban lifestyle. It even says it on the box. "Hi! We're a stereotypical consumer whore family! Now go get a house in the suburbs and have two kids so you can waste your life being a cubicle slave!" What family even looks that happy while playing a board game? I dont know about anyone else, but playing board games with my siblings usually meant that one of us was going to be telling on someone by the time we were through.
I guess what i'm getting at is that our culture needs a better definition of "life." I am terrified of living the game of life, but so many of us are living it because we think that's all we have. A wise man once said "If you're awesome, be awesome." Our whole world needs to stop thinking in the mold that society has said we should live in. We need to start realizing our full potential as God's children. I dont think that God have every wanted our lives to be limited to houses, jobs, and getting married. To quote an annoyingly popular song, "We were meant to live for so much more, but we lost ourselves."
One last thing to add. If you ever see me, twenty years from now, living in the suburbs with a wife and two kids playing stupid board games,
Please punch me in the stomach
~Jared
12 comments:
Uh, wow?
While I agree (to some extent) with the theme of this post, I find your analogy a tad... weird.
It's just a board game (and a damn fun one at that). (insert shrugging emotion face)
I do agree that some people do tend to "settle" instead of reaching their full potential; and in all honesty a 9 to 5 job, living in suburbia doesn't sound appealing to me at all, but that is just my opinion and my point of view.
There isn't anything wrong with that life and I think that was a bit of a harsh generalization to make. And I quote: "Then, you would look back and realize what you lived wasn't life at all. It was just a pointless existence based on getting money and being forced into jobs, marriages, and houses you never wanted."
Some people are content with that lifestyle and weren't forced into any such things. And it is absolutely not true that a person can't fulfill their destiny living that lifestyle. It may not be your calling, but you never know that it may be someone else's.
Just because a person is settled into suburban life with a family and not of risking their life as a missionary in another country doesn't make their purpose less important. just so long as they're not living in complacency and are actually living the life God called them to. Which I think was really at the heart of your post.
I'm done now. THE END.
To be a total and complete peacenick and quaker, I agree with you both.
I agree with your idea behind the blog Jared, but I do also agree with bradley, living a suburban life isn't really that bad either. I mean, look at it this way. I plan on being one of those guys who gets a job and gets married, and I will probably be living in the suburbs too. However, my real life has something the board game doesn't have. I have a calling and a unique destiny. While I may not know what my destiny is, I am pretty sure it will include getting a job, having a career and having a house, getting married etc.
I must say though, I do agree with the premiss of your blog. Most people do live in mediocrity, but I don't think that can be said of you, or me, or bradley. I am pretty sure we are gonna be a bunch of old guys who are gonna screw the big retirement home and keep on with our lives and being awesome till we die. Cause thats how we roll.
Stick it to the Man.
~Donovon
(P.S. I will come find you in 20 years, and if the above has been done, I will punch you in the stomach.) haha
Aren't you glad that actual life isn't a board game? I think that the makers of the board game should re-think a few things- like the forced marriage- I mean, who are you even married to?!?!!? And the whole kids thing... I do like the "Adopt a baby" option... or maybe I'm thinking of Sims? Anyway, I have duly noted that I have your permission to punch you in the stomach twenty years if you do become a husband and father in suburbia.
To Brad: Are you suggesting that it is ANYONE's destiny to live just so they can acquire money to retire? Mostly the point I was making about the board game is that it is built for kids, and (at least for me) it kind of trains you to think of that as the life you need to lead. The issue about the game, if you read the post, was that at the end all that mattered was the money, since you either went to the log cabin or the mansion. I have no problem with what people might call a "suburuban lifestyle", but thats not what the game is. The game is making you live a pointless suburban life that ends with money being the only thing you should have cared about (kind of like monopoly) It kind of sounds like to me you think that it could be someone's calling to live for acquiring money, and there I have to disagree with you.
Basically, Donovon, I think you got what I was trying to say. Our lives are not like the board game "Life" so we should stop pretending they are and start living in our destiny, whether it involves settling down with a wife and kids or spending the rest of your life single. Either way, God calls us to more things than the stupid "Game of Life" does.
Basically, I still agree with both of you, because if I didn't, that would be confrontational, which goes against the doctrine of not offending anyone.
I don't think that Bradley's point is what you think it is, but I will let him defend that.
Its a stupid board game first of all.
Second of all, I do think that some people could live their life just to make money. I think that is the calling of SOME people in this world. Here is the difference though. There is not any christianity or realism in the game, but there is in actual life. God can use people whose calling is to make money and work a 9-5 and have a wife and kids etc. I mean, thats pretty much what my Dad does, though he is a little but more unique than one of the playing pieces in the game, I think God uses him to finance the kingdom of God. While it may not be a popular idea, some people are called to bring in money for the kingdom to finance Gods work (like missionaries and churches etc.)
In the spirit of tranquility, lets all remember this all originated from a meaningless board game some of us played as kids.
I really don't feel like arguing at all. Let me just say that you completely misunderstood me (which people seem to be doing a lot lately) and I get really tired of having to explain myself.
Never said it was anyone's destiny to save money for retirement. I was merely saying that a person CAN live a suburban life and STILL walk in their destiny. God doesn't frown upon a person just because their not off doing something HUGE and MONUMENTAL in man's eyes. God doesn't place one persons calling over the other.
THAT is what I was saying. And that is where YOU twisted my words.
But, I really don't feel like getting in an argument as I'm in a good mood today.
:)
and, again. It's just a bloody game and I hope you don't seriously think that it's a brainwashing device. If that's what you believe I might have reason to question your sanity...
Games have to have an objective and Life and Monopoly's objectives are to have the most money at the end. Played the games all the time and they never made me think that what life is all about. Lord, Jared...
^hmmm... looks like you changed your mind about not being confrentational.
To be honest, none of what ANY of you are saying is about what I wrote or meant. I think everyones words have been twisted now.
I am so freaking tired of having to explain myself this much, and I was really hoping thst everyone would get my meaning, which absolutely no one does. I guess I shouldnt have bothered posting it.
ok, my last comment is just to say i'm sorry about all this. Looking back on all the comments I made, I have to admit that some of them were pretty hostile and altogether unChristlike and immature. I'm sorry to anyone I made them to.
Just as a closing statement, I would really hate for you guys to think that I was insulting people who are suburbanites, or, as many of you brought up, your family. I do not in anyway think that any of your families or relatives are wastefull suburbanites who spend all their time playing board games. In fact, I see alot of your families as the exact opposite.
The only point that I was trying to make about suburban people is that I feel like society has always told us that life HAS to be like the game of life: get married, get a house, have a job, ect. To be honest, I felt like that was the life I had to lead because no one suggested too much of an alternative. As I get older and get ready to leave home, I think im sort of starting to see that life doesnt have to be like that, even to the people actually living a typical suburban life. That life is more than the house you buy, the person you marry ect ect. That God has a whole lot more for our lives than just living in the suburbs and getting money. That God is going to use you in ways so much bigger than that, no matter where you live. I think alot of you have mistaken me for some missions obsessed radical in assuming that I think that you arnt serving the Lord unless you are running around the world. However, that is false.
I could keep typing about this, but, looking at the progression of the conversation so far, I think I will just stir up more and more contreversy by talking.
Again, sorry about the hostility Ive had.
I guess foreign countries are right about American people being confrontational...
I was being a bit of a jackass, but I get worked up and I like to speak my peace...
Sorry for being so opinionated and I just hope you know that I don't hate you, Jared. Far from it.
I haven't talked to you in awhile either and the internet is too not personal so I'ma call you sometime soon. SO ANSWER!
;)
Man, I hate it when my non-confrontational yet non-conformist views get me in trouble. haha ;)
Discussion is good, and at least the three of us are able to realize that at the end of things, we are still friends and brothers in Christ. Props yall. (and apologies if anyone was offended by my pithy comments)
i was intending on writing a great enlightened comment, but it seems that the three of you have pretty much said, over the course of your argument, everything i intended to say. So for that, bravo.
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