When you love it, you can't leave it

bydeelilah

1.3K followers

2 years ago

When you really like a game a lot, you play it a lot. You want to win. You keep coming back to it until you win, and then win again. Winning is satisfying and addictive. When you love it, you can't leave it alone.

I am probably not the only one here who is addicted to winning at something. I don't usually care about games, but besides Wealthy Affiliate, and possibly a trip to the casino, there is a notable exception.

This is a silly little story about an old Radica hand-held FreeCell game, but if the principles were applied to our businesses here at Wealthy Affiliate, we would eventually find ourselves winning a trip to Las Vegas.

During my semi-truck driving days, most of the 2000s, computer games' were fairly unsophisticated. So were cell phones. We used cell phones but the concept was so new to us we were horrified to hear someone talking on a phone in a restaurant. I carried a real camera and bought real film. One day I noticed the stores were phasing out film and the camera store I took my film for developing was phasing out film as well. What was going on?

Online was going online.

Soon, I found my self talking (whispering) on my cell phone in truck stop restaurants right next to all the other patrons talking on theirs.

Me and Jacques the Truck Dog

My husband, Steve, and I drove up to 2500 miles a week, up to 24 hours a day. One of us drove and the other slept. As the passenger, riding, we appreciated the spectacular views for many waking hours. The cover image is a mountain range in the middle of Nevada.

But 402.76 miles of dry grass, brown rocks, and sage brush lining the roadside of I-80 crossing Wyoming could be considered boring, It is boring-- hence, the game of FreeCell.

I did by this time add a laptop computer to my official driver arsenal and it came loaded with a small assortment of offline games, good old Solitaire's family of card games. I tried them all. Solitaire seemed to be all chance. Spider was exhausting. But Free Cell was fun, hard sometimes, but fun. I learned there was a way to solve every game, of which there are thousands. I liked that idea, not just chance, but a solution, every time. (Recently, I read there is one unsolvable puzzle, but I haven't found it yet.)

If I lost a FreeCell game, which was often, I would use the replay feature and play it over, and over, until I won. It became an obsession to win this game.

We went supply shopping one day in Walmart, probably in Wyoming, which is truck friendly. 5 stars for Wyoming, despite boring I-80. There were several amazing steak house restaurants, which were truck friendly.

(An aside: Most Walmarts and Cabellas provide some truck parking, at least in the daytime. I became a fan of any business who did that, because truck parking is a nightmarish problem.)

In the games' department of Walmart, I discovered a hand-held Radica FreeCell game. This, I would have to try. It would be so much easier than plugging in and booting up. So I bought it.

Freeing it from its packaging was my first challenge. Then, of course, it took a decided effort to learn. Naturally, nothing looked the same on a 2X2-1/2 inch screen, i.e., a new learning curve. I did reject it for a while, maybe a year. I learned how to write poetry. Finally, I dragged it out of the laundry basket at the foot of the bunk and debunked it. Yay. It's become my bedtime habit.

Magic Machine

Notice there are four lines showing. You can scroll up and down to reveal all the screen, but you can't see all the lines at the same time. There are three more below what is pictured. One day my husband suggested I should win the game without scrolling up and down. So I tried that and it is much harder. It now becomes a memory exercise. But I got hooked on this new brain cell growing method, and now it's the only way I like to play.

The day may come when I can't find this machine anymore since it's been out of production for ten or more years, no more in E bay, no more in Amazon. Anyone have one? Then I will need to retrain myself to look at the seven lines all at once. It's the only way shown on computer, phone, etc.

I have other stories based on this silly little machine. Watch for an article about supply and demand.

For now, did you notice any similarities between one's learning and mastering a game and the larger, more relevant, challenges we face every day, perhaps here at Wealthy Affiliate, or in building any business, anywhere? It takes perseverance and it takes persistence, which is OK, when we are learning, then doing, something we love, and we are having fun doing it.

1. Find the right platform/niche and learn it.

2. Determine to win.

3. Have fun.

4. Set goals, learn skills and make them a habit.

5.Determine to win, do it over, no matter how hard it seems.

6. Have fun.

7. Set more goals, polish skills, learn new skills and make them a habit.

8. Determine to win, do it over, and over, and now it's easier.

9. Have fun.