Retro Bowl: Removing Temptation For A Better Life

I recently deleted a cute little video game from my pocket computer. I had only downloaded it about 3 days prior, and it was free to boot. It was an awesome game called Retro Bowl. It featured little football players that you draft and manage throughout their imaginary careers, including playing as them during their pixelated games. These games lasted less than 5 minutes each, which was an ideal amount of time to waste when picking up your phone to waste it.

The game combined my love of pixelated games with my nostalgia for the franchise mode of the Madden video game franchise. Retro Bowl was a perfect blend.

So Why Did I Delete It After Only 2 Days?

It all sounds pretty cool, right? The issue was that I spent an embarrassing amount of hours playing it. On Monday night, I got into bed before 10pm and played the game well past 11pm. I played it when I got home from work the next day for an hour-and-a-half straight. I played it again that evening while my son sang songs and read books to himself (though he would be doing this even if I were actively engaged). 

In short, this elegant little game was keeping me from living my real life. Luckily, I recognized this and was able to remove the temptation and put an end to the craziness. 

Unfortunately (and it took me a long time to recognize this), my personality is predisposed to achievement. And this is not some kind of low-key bragging.* This is a self-criticism.

In some cases this is advantageous. Our society often puts a premium on achievers**–it’s what we try to instill in our schoolchildren through grades, SATs, and extracurriculars. These activities provide ratings, trophies, certificates, medals, etc. that showcase one’s accomplishments. It’s how one becomes conventionally successful.

In other cases, achievement can be detrimental. As I often find with my reaction to video games, I begin to prioritize collecting points/rewards/higher player ratings (things that are in actuality completely and utterly worthless) as a form of satisfaction. And I hunger for it. At the expense of possibilities in my real life.

Know Thyself

Luckily for me, I’ve figured this out about myself. Like some people who realize they shouldn’t go grocery shopping when they’re hungry, I generally do a pretty good job of avoiding the temptation. I want my life to be interesting, to be productive, to facilitate my learning, and to be a positive benefit to those around me that I care about. These are some of my values. As a result, they should also be my priorities. Losing myself for hours in a video game is completely contrary to these values, and so I forced myself to cut it out of my life because I know that in so doing, I will be happier.

There are tons of other instances in my life where I’ve implemented this kind of thinking to minimize lines of effort that aren’t important to me. However, the lesson can also be applied to things I know I should be doing.

For example, being healthy and fit is important to me, so I should exercise and not consume garbage sustenance. Ensuring my family life is rich and rewarding is important to me, so I should prioritize spending quality time together. These are things I focus my efforts upon because they are important to me. My actions, in these cases, are consistent with my values.

This whole episode has been a great reminder that I need to relentlessly pursue the things that are representative of my values and cast aside the things that are not.

So in the spirit of my Retro Bowl experience, what have you struggled with as far as time wasters go? Weigh in!

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*I think the kids call(ed) it “humble bragging,” though I’m certain if I know what this means then the kids don’t say that anymore.

**Achievers are a subset of game players based on the taxonomy created by Richard Bartle from the University of Essex. His 1996 paper Hearts, Clubs, Diamonds, Spades: Players Who Suit MUDS explains the four types of game players: Achievers, Explorers, Socializers, and Killers. He writes, of Achievers: “Achievers regard points-gathering and rising in levels as their main goal, and all is ultimately subserviant [he’s British] to this. Exploration is necessary only to find new sources of treasure, or improved ways of wringing points from it. Socialising [again, British] is a relaxing method of discovering what other players know about the business of accumulating points, that their knowledge can be applied to the task of gaining riches.” In the real world, I would argue these same personality traits lead people to seek out recognition or status in societal/professional hierarchies and generally end up being what many would consider successful by conventional measures. I could easily write an entire post about this—maybe someday I will.