Why Do We Play Games?

Well, we know that playing games is a way for children to have a dress rehearsal for roles they will play in adult life. Generally speaking, little girls have played "Cooking," "Mommy and Daddy," and "teatime" and other social games. Generally speaking, little boys have played games like "Cowboys and Indians," "Cops and Robbers," "War," and other antisocial games. Some of us had played "Kick the Can" (and been the Can). And some of us have played "Doctor" (but let’s not go there.)

In childhood games, there appears to be Pretend Play (as above), Sensori-motor Play (Hop Scotch, etc), and Games With Rules.

We've all played these games. I remember playing "work" when I was a child. I got my self one of those fashioned roll-topped desks, and them some junk mail my parents would let me have, then an out-of-date time stamp, and a stapler. And then I pretended to be an adult at work in a desk job. Isn't that sad?

We never stop playing games. Especially Games With Rules. Some of you may remember Dr. Eric Berne, the psychiatrist who wrote the book, Games People Play, which introduced his new discipline of Transactional Analysis. Berne pointed out that human beings tend to spend a good part of their lives falling into psycho-dynamic routines as they interact. These routines have the character of Games With Rules and Berne’s book contained descriptions of the games and what the rules where. He said some games were Life Games, some were Martial Games, some were Sexual Games, and some were Good Games (i.e. games that helped and didn't hurt.) He gave some evocative titles to the games he had discovered. Like, "If It Weren't For You," "See What You Made Me Do?" and "Ain't It Awful." My favorite was the Sexual Game "Let's You and Him Fight."

A long time ago, there was a episode of "Magnum, PI" where Tom Selleck's Hawaiian detective was teaching a beautiful bikini-clad young woman how to swim. After she left, the supercilious Jonathan Quayle Higgins III came by an pointed out to Magnum that the woman was in fact a world class Olympic swimmer. Magnum replied, "I know Higgins. How to you have fun in life if you don't play games?" Exxxxxx-zackly!

We may be asking the wrong question. Maybe it’s not "why do people play games," but "why do people work?" There are savants who have noticed that some people work hard during the day so they can come home at night and pretend to a craft WORKER in World of Warcraft. It may just be that Work is playing a game that you don't like. So maybe the key to happiness is playing games you do like.