Lifestyle Gamification is simply treating your life as if it were a game, and you are a hardcore player who is trying to be the best at the game.
Hardcore players spend hours everyday trying to improve their abilities and beat the game. When they are not playing, they are reading strategy guides, going to online forums, and constantly thinking about how to make their game stronger.
Most people agree that the Lifestyle Gamification philosophy (concept of playing your way to success) sounds appealing, but they have no idea where to start. This post will explain to you how to begin your quest of greatness and fulfillment.
Each step isn’t very easy (especially when it deals with understanding yourself better), but nor is playing a game the first time eh?)
Step 1: Determine the Game you are playing
First and foremost, in anything, you need to figure out what kind of game you are playing.
What are your life goals, what are you passionate about, and what do you want to achieve? Are you playing a game where you try to make an impact in this world by utilizing your skills and resources around you to solve world problems? Are you playing a game on reaching the top of your organization in the shortest amount of time, trying to accumulate as much money(points) as possible, or picking up as many girls as you can?
You have to think very carefully about what you care about and what accomplishments would make your life meaningful. Choose a game that you feel is worth it and when at the end of the day (or your life), you would feel good because you had accomplished meaningful things and had beaten the game with a high score.
Step 2: Determine your Role in the Game by understanding your Stats and Style
Once you have identified the game you are going to play, you need to figure out what role you will play and what the skill sets or resources you must have are.
Let’s take my Game of trying to make as big of an impact in this world as possible as an example. Once I have determined that my end goal is impact, I need to figure out what the best way to get to that goal is.
That’s when you look at your “initial stats.” What are you innately better at than the people you grew up with? Were you always quicker at doing math? Were you the more sociable leader? Were you more creative than your peers?
I turn out to be better at creating creative connections in my head, establishing deep and meaningful relationships quickly, and discovering the potential of people and mobilizing them. I am also relatively emotionally stable and can withstand high stress.
Finding your initial stats is actually something extremely difficult to do, but you can only do it through a lot of self-exploration and trying out TONS of new challenges.
Unfortunately, there’s no meter to tell you your stats, and you have to kill enough monsters or get hit enough times to figure out the actual numbers. Being a NPC in town doesn’t help.
After you have determined your Initial Stats, you then need to think of the occupation you want to be in.
Don’t just pick something your stats point to, find something that you love doing as a lifestyle.
In games, I personally hate being a sorcerer where most of the time I’m hiding, hitting, and running, even though I could potentially become very strong with it.
Sometimes the easy road is not the most fulfilling. When you think about your occupation, deciding how you can use your initial stats to beat your game (the ultimate goal) in a way you enjoy doing is key.
OK, this step takes ages, and most people never do it before their midlife crisis. But that’s why so many young people don’t know what they do, and so many older people hate their jobs – they don’t invest time into this.
The first “build” of a character usually turns out crappy unless there’s guidance.
Back to my own example, I feel that since I am good at leading and dealing with people, have a strong balance between random creativity and systematic analysis, and can withstand a lot of stress and uncertainty, my occupation should be an Entrepreneur.
I can create new systems to improve the world in a creative and interpersonal manner, while withstanding the stress of things-gone-wrong which businesses face all the time.
My systems creation talent and my passion to help others grow also suggest a side specialization of a Consultant or Coach.
Step 3: Plan out a Character Skills Growth Road Map
Once you have decided on the Game you are playing and your Occupation, it’s time to plan out a “build.”
If you have done the last few steps correctly, this shouldn’t be too hard. Knowing who you are and where you want to be is far harder than knowing how to get there.
When you envision yourself accomplishing your goals in the future, what are the skill sets that you need?
Whatever the skill sets are, make sure you focus on those, and don’t spread yourself too thin.
Sure, you can have unrelated skills as long as you can see how they work together (for instance, Bilingual in Chinese and English, Leadership, Finance, and Sustainability Knowledge can work out well if you plan to become a financial leader of a sustainability firm that will expand to Asia).
Putting 2 skill points in sword technique, 2 points in spear technique, and 2 points in axe technique does not make a strong character when you can only yield one weapon at a time.
Step 4: Find Teammates and conquer easy Quests to Level Up together
After you know your occupation, stats and planned skill points, the only thing left is to build alliance and conquer smaller quests that will give you experience to level up and beat the game.
So holistically, to gamify your life well, you need to have good Occupation, Stats, Skills, Alliance, and Quests. Each of these things I will elaborate more upon in separate blog posts to get you to live a successful and fulfilling life. My goal as a Lifestyle Gamification Coach is to help you level up and become the strongest player on your server.
Get mentored by Yu-kai Chou
Every week I hop on a conference call to teach, answer questions, and give feedback to members of Octalysis Prime. If you want to take your Gamification practice to the next level, then come join us.