Life is not a game

[firstlook]

Posted by Newlyn (here)
It's playing a game you never really chose.

I dont believe thats true. I think we all want to play this game in some degree or another.

[modwiz]

I like the OP's take on games that they have rules and, more importantly, they have winners and losers. There is no escaping that simple fact. There can be gracious winners and good sports (losers) but a game has competition at the core of its concept.

Play is different. You can play without playing a game.

So for me life is my ART!.

I am creating it and add things to it that represent who I am and other things that just please me.
Still other things are experiments, like different drapes on a window.

Mostly I am composing though. My song, my play, ballet or artistic endeavor and going for the most fun doing it.

I work to delight myself, and others if it is workable.

One thing really irritates me though.....

Someone messing with my art. If I sit at a piano don't come along and add your own notes while I am playing or pick up a paintbrush to add your own strokes, unbidden.

Many of the spiteful things are done without real forethought. One of our big problems is people living lives without much thought.

That's why we live in the world that we do. Most of the thinkers are stinkers.

Yes, time for a wake up and realize that life is not a game.

[jorr lundstrom]

Posted by firstlook (here)

Posted by Newlyn (here)
It's playing a game you never really chose.

I dont believe thats true. I think we all want to play this game in some degree or another.

I dont know who you mean by we or wot it is you call this game.

But I do hope that those who choose to spend their lifes playing

games have conciously chosen the games they are playing,

so they are not just reacting pawns in someone elses game.

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=gbP4CAMHiKA

Sorry, I couldnt find the original recording by Bob Dylan ( kind of blasphemy)

[Icecold]

Posted by modwiz (here)
I like the OP's take on games that they have rules and, more importantly, they have winners and losers. There is no escaping that simple fact. There can be gracious winners and good sports (losers) but a game has competition at the core of its concept.

Play is different. You can play without playing a game.

So for me life is my ART!.

I am creating it and add things to it that represent who I am and other things that just please me.
Still other things are experiments, like different drapes on a window.

Mostly I am composing though. My song, my play, ballet or artistic endeavor and going for the most fun doing it.

I work to delight myself, and others if it is workable.

One thing really irritates me though.....

Someone messing with my art. If I sit at a piano don't come along and add your own notes while I am playing or pick up a paintbrush to add your own strokes, unbidden.

Many of the spiteful things are done without real forethought. One of our big problems is people living lives without much thought.

That's why we live in the world that we do. Most of the thinkers are stinkers.

Yes, time for a wake up and realize that life is not a game.

The whole idea of 'waking up' really begins with Gurdjieff.


One of the sayings of the Sufis is that the tragedy of human consciousness is that we think we are awake, but have merely fallen asleep in life's waiting room. In the early twentieth century, G.I. Gurdjieff, a mysterious and charismatic figure, started telling people in Paris and St. Petersburg and New York that he had learned how to awaken from the trance our parents and cultures taught us, and that could teach others to awaken, as well. Gurdjieff claimed to have learned the art of awakening from Sufi masters and other "remarkable men" he had encountered during a decades-long quest in Central Asia.


One key to Gurdjieff's method was that it is not necessary to believe in any dogma, only to perform certain experiments, to achieve the results he claimed. Another key was that it did not require complete retreat from secular life; "the Work" could be accomplished in the midst of daily life. But the bulk of the experiential component of the method was long unknown to those outside Gurdjieff's inner circle. A veil of secrecy surrounded the methods he taught directly to his disciples, although Gurdjieff was the author of several books (written in a convoluted, elusive style).

Gurdjieff died in 1949, but his disciples have continued the tradition into the 1990s. Once-secret ideas, however, have leaked out of Gurdjieff's disciples' control, and some of them were deliberately revealed. "Waking Up" is Charles T.Tart's exposition of Gurdieffian ideas in terms of contemporary cognitive sciences and plain-spoken common sense. Learning to pay attention, for example, is one of the first steps toward full awakening. Where Gurdjieff's students performed esoteric exercises, Tart shows how you can exercise the same faculty by playing a game of ordinary solitaire with the right kind of mindfulness.

People of the world don't look at themselves, and so they blame one another.


Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=J_xFkfK4OEg

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=yEdCXRGJuM8

[777]

Posted by jorr lundstrom (here)
Thank you Newlyn for your ideas on this. I would like to explain my point of view like this and

we will se if its clear enough. Life as such is no game. You can choose to play games in your life if

you so like. We are been taught from early in life to compare, thats okey because in that way

we learn differences and similarities. But then we are taught to attatch values to the differences.

We learn that we are better if we run faster, is better on math, if we get higher marks

in school and so on. So we learn to compete with others. And this program continues through

most peoples life. But a human being is an end to him/herself and dont have to compete with

anyone, not even with him/herself. Competing is a source to a lot of disaster. Love

Competing comes from the ego's desire to be more than the next man's and thus validate itself into existence like a leech supping on your very soul's essence. Life for me is to abstain consciously from playing the ego's game whilst enjoying the memories my being has within it's current vessel.

[Wings]

Posted by Odah (here)
This is a game .. YOu first have to figure out why you are playing to get a clue of what the real rules are. The current phase of the game is don't wake up from it . If you are still in the phase where you think killing of those who are in control will do any good. You are not awake. Plannign to kill them doesn't make you like them .. IT keeps you exactally how they want you to be. You don't even know who the real players in control of this are .. they are quite hidden and quite spread out..

The only way to win this game is to figure out how to not play again.

Yes I agree .... you've hit the nail on the head.

[jorr lundstrom]

Posted by Wings (here)

Posted by Odah (here)
This is a game .. YOu first have to figure out why you are playing to get a clue of what the real rules are. The current phase of the game is don't wake up from it . If you are still in the phase where you think killing of those who are in control will do any good. You are not awake. Plannign to kill them doesn't make you like them .. IT keeps you exactally how they want you to be. You don't even know who the real players in control of this are .. they are quite hidden and quite spread out..

The only way to win this game is to figure out how to not play again.

Yes I agree .... you've hit the nail on the head.

Yeah, I can see why you consider this a game, wotsoever this might be. I also admire your ability

to read wots written, and your conclusions. You seem to have contemplated this subject a lot.

Thank you for your postings. Its always interesting with different opinions.

[Icecold]

I've never considered life to be a game. In my mind that is a ludicrous concept. There are games in the world and
I've played them. There is a science called game theory. But life is too short and precious an opportunity to be thought of as a game.
Certainly the soul is not concerned with games. It knows exactly what the purpose of life is and its agenda is to observe and absorb
within itself lessons and karma. People who believe that life is a game are deluded, asleep and utterly confused.

There is a deadly trap that lurks in the new age movement. It is to hold the believe that happiness is the goal of life. It isn't. Happiness is a bi-product of understanding and accepting one's lessons with grace. So life is not a game, it is in fact a spiritual schoolhouse.

[Jake]

"Dear Father, We Dream. WE DREAM! We dream,,, While we may. Who are we to need? WE NEED! We need, while we wait. While we wait."

Lyrix to a Niel Diamond song from the Jonathan Livingston Seagull soundtrack. I can't watch it anymore. I cry like a baby the whole time. Especially when this song comes on. If you have never watced the movie or read the book, you should! I feel like Jonathan. He is constantly asking himself the same question. Is life a game? (metaphorically, not directly...)
No I do not think so. I do resonate with the concept of us choosing our lives here on earth. A friend of mine likes to describe life as a trip to the county fair. You can choose the 'kiddy' rides. or . You can choose the roller coaster, which has ups and downs and twists and turns and you feel like you just want to die, but more likely you will vomit.
(I must have chosen the roller coaster.) No, not a game. But a choice. That resonates with me.

[shadowstalker]

It's all a matter of perspective to me.
If one dwells on the negative, they will only see negative.
If one only sees good then they will only see good.
If one is in the middle they will see both.

It's what ever your core soul is working to work thru.

Soul contracts are tricky to deal with if you don't remember what it is.

Life is more of a script as many people here have said, and as we are waiting for the fat lady to sing, we are impatient for it to hurry up and play out, some get agitated, some become more great full and are appreciative of the fact that they had the opportunity that they where there in the middle of it all, for we are in this together to help make changes in this play if we don't like what we see or hear. We are the changes that we forget we are.

[truthseekerdan]

Every person and every form is but an idea in the mind of God/Source. Each person originates from Spirit as consciousness. Consciousness begets thought. Thought takes form. Although we perceive our bodies to be separate from one another, we are all just different forms projected from the same Universal Consciousness.

The Source's "dream", for lack of a better term, is our whole universe. And just as our dreams are an integral part of our thoughts, the universe is an integral part of Source's thoughts. Our universe is not actually a dream like the ones we experience as human beings. Dreaming is just an example with which we are all familiar that demonstrates how an environment and characters can be created out of pure thought and still seem very real to us.

Source created our universe because it is simply its nature to create. The universe is a creation born of pure joy and the thrill of witnessing one's own thoughts manifested into reality. Source's purpose is to delight not only itself as a unified Being of Light, but also itself as a Collective Being composed of all the bits of self-awareness invested into thought-forms populating the universe like characters in a dream.

Namaste ~ Dan

[Creative Lorraine]

Hi there I resonate with vision... I am ADD last night I saw these video's on Jessica Schab
Crystal Child
Project Camelot interviewed her 2 yrs ago which I enjoyed but didn't keep up with her ...
As always searching for different Knowledge to resonate with on my Journey

I share these video's with you and maybe a discussion can come from them...
I do agree to Play while we are on earth as a child...

Hopefully you can be patient watching there is a translator with Jessica Schab
The first Video start at 3 minutes

https://youtube.com/watch?v=xipAFnw2JfQ
https://youtube.com/watch?v=3D509...eature=related
https://youtube.com/watch?v=Cf2cx...eature=related
https://youtube.com/watch?v=uRz8H...eature=related
https://youtube.com/watch?v=9PE4a...eature=related
https://youtube.com/watch?v=FFl1m...eature=related
https://youtube.com/watch?v=tGAEi...eature=related
https://youtube.com/watch?v=R9iUk...eature=related

Luv
Lorraine

[jorr lundstrom]

Posted by modwiz (here)
I like the OP's take on games that they have rules and, more importantly, they have winners and losers. There is no escaping that simple fact. There can be gracious winners and good sports (losers) but a game has competition at the core of its concept.

Play is different. You can play without playing a game.

So for me life is my ART!.

I am creating it and add things to it that represent who I am and other things that just please me.
Still other things are experiments, like different drapes on a window.

Mostly I am composing though. My song, my play, ballet or artistic endeavor and going for the most fun doing it.

I work to delight myself, and others if it is workable.

One thing really irritates me though.....

Someone messing with my art. If I sit at a piano don't come along and add your own notes while I am playing or pick up a paintbrush to add your own strokes, unbidden.

Many of the spiteful things are done without real forethought. One of our big problems is people living lives without much thought.

That's why we live in the world that we do. Most of the thinkers are stinkers.

Yes, time for a wake up and realize that life is not a game.

Yes for some its leela, the play of God, for some its art, for some its a mystery to be lived.

And none of these approaches have wiinners and losers.

I think having as much fun as possible is great. LOL

Irritating, hmmmm I can get irritated if someone asks me how it is, because it takes me out

of my flow. I have to stop and examine how it is. And when I answer they are not interested anyhow. LMAO

[HORIZONS]

Ageless wisdom...

Row row row your boat
Gently down the stream
Merely merely merely merely
Life is but a dream.

[Bill Ryan]

--------

Life is a game. All of existence is. But that doesn't mean it's trivial.

Two kids chasing each other in a playground is a game. But so is intergalactic war.

Some games feel serious when we're losing, when it's someone else's game and not our own, when we don't know what the rules are, when it seems impossible to win, or when it seems we have too few players on our side.

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=ic70cVN5IdQ

[Star Gazer]

Posted by Bill Ryan (here)
--------

Life is a game. All of existence is. But that doesn't mean it's trivial.

Two kids chasing each other in a playground is a game. But so is intergalactic war.

Some games feel serious when we're losing, when it's someone else's game and not our own, when we don't know what the rules are, when it seems impossible to win, or when it seems we have too few players on our side.

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=ic70cVN5IdQ

What's your definition of game, Bill? Enjoyed the video.

[Bill Ryan]

Posted by Star Gazer (here)

Posted by Bill Ryan (here)
--------

Life is a game. All of existence is. But that doesn't mean it's trivial.

Two kids chasing each other in a playground is a game. But so is intergalactic war.

Some games feel serious when we're losing, when it's someone else's game and not our own, when we don't know what the rules are, when it seems impossible to win, or when it seems we have too few players on our side.

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=ic70cVN5IdQ

What's your definition of game, Bill? Enjoyed the video.

Game = a purposeful activity with team-mates and/or resources/assets on one's side, and factors/circumstances (or groups, or people) operating against you.

Examples of games:

• Chess
• Football
• Climbing Mount Everest alone
• Sending men to the moon before the end of the the decade and bringing them back safely (JFK)
• Stopping Adolf Hitler (or anyone else that one doesn't like)
• Inventing a working Free Energy machine
• Becoming a millionaire
• Becoming a parent
• Becoming enlightened
• Ending unnecessary suffering in this universe

(+ about 10,000,000,000,000,000,000 other examples....)

[jorr lundstrom]

Bill, I suppose you speak about content, not life itself.

[Icecold]

Bill:

Life is a game. All of existence is. But that doesn't mean it's trivial.

Two kids chasing each other in a playground is a game. But so is intergalactic war.

These are examples of games in both a micro and macrocosmic sense. Both are illusions. One on a grander scale than the other.
They are both a failure to recognise the true purpose of life in the universe. That of lessons. Both activities are a distraction from true purpose of life.

Although both may be regarded as utlities to create lessons. So then, the game function is a tool to produce the lessons required.

[InCiDeR]

.
My humble opinion:

If life, as we know it, is a game or not depends on what level we look at.

Body realm
There are much ongoing games within our conscious creation called earth, the spirits use 3D [body/mind/spirit]-complex to play them out. There are a set of rules that this complex has to follow, which we probably once agreed upon. Your body is not allowed to fly if not in an airplane etc.

It is all about experience. Lessons of teachings and learnings.
What is and what is not.
You will not be able to learn anything if you can't relate to and define something else (duality), otherwise you will not know what you learnt - if anything!
You can't learn and experience good if you can't define evil.

Spirit realm
But if we talk about the spirits behind the 3D complex, they only use the body to play.
The spirit has no set rules, it would be able to play and create as it like in the sandbox of intelligent design, called universes.
But still, when the spirit use a body to play, the body in itself must follow a set of rules (game).


Conclusion:
It is both a game and not a game.
It is both a play and not a play.
All in the same "time".


@Icecold.
I second that George Gurdjieff is a very interesting guy. IIRC the students of his later developed a technique called "Stop" to help you find your true being.
(I have this software on my computer)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G.I._Gurdjieff