Robin Moriarty's framework helps you design your own life game instead of following the default American script. Nick Hutchison walks through the four steps: define your objective, decide how to play, identify obstacles, and keep score. He uses his own life in Argentina as an example, tracking progress through travel countries and yearly goals.
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Hello, Book Thinkers family! Today's book tip is going to come from What Game Are You Playing? by Robin Moriarty, PhD, and the subtitle of this book is A Framework for Redefining Success and Achieving What Matters Most. I read this book over the last week or two, and I had a lot of fun reading it because within the book there are sort of mini workshops along the way and questions that you can answer that help progress towards the end of the book. And I don't want to spoil what's at the end, But you will be designing a game for yourself. So I really did enjoy this book. I think a good place to start this video is by agreeing with everybody that we've all been conditioned by society and our definitions of success have been influenced by the opinions of other people. And sometimes that can feel very constricting. Now, I grew up in the United States and culturally here everybody kind of follows the same path. You get your driver's license at 16 years old, and then you graduate high school at 18 years old. After that, you go to a successful college and you pick out a major, something that you're super passionate about. You're supposed to know what you're going to do for the rest of your life. Then you graduate at 22 and you get a job with a big company, a business card or a name that will impress all of your parents' friends. After that, you kind of work your way up the corporate ladder, but don't forget to get married along the way and have your first kid by 30 years old. If you don't, everybody will judge you. After that, you continue to grow, you get promotions slowly over time. Don't be too risky. You end up with 2.2 kids and maybe a couple dogs and a white picket fence around your house, and that's the definition of success. We don't even question it at all. And if you don't fit that box, it's uncomfortable. One of the cool things that I did learn in this book is that not only is it uncomfortable for you when you're operating outside of that zone of comfort, but it's also uncomfortable for other people. And that's why you're getting judged. You kind of have that inner anxiety like, wow, I don't fit the box, this is so uncomfortable. And then other people judge you because you're not in that box and because you're uncomfortable in the first place. So it just makes everything worse. And I did enjoy reading that because it helps me to explain a lot of these feelings to other people. Now, I've decided to live outside of the box, so I've experienced a lot of the stuff that she talks about in this book. Ultimately, you're going to help— or what's going to happen when you read this book is that Robin is going to help you reframe that definition of success into something that provides you more fulfillment. And then she's going to help set up the steps to become successful at implementing that game. So Robin, for instance, she loves to travel. And I really identified with this part of the book because she lived in Argentina for a while. I lived in Argentina for over a month at the start of 2019, and I absolutely loved it. But a lot of people questioned me when I went. Why are you going? How do you work remotely? What's that even like? You're not going to an office every day. That's so unproductive. Working from another country? What's the point of that? And what's funny is while I was in Argentina, I got to drop all of that kind of stuff and I got to live the life that I wanted. And I didn't feel as boxed, to use that term again. I didn't feel like I was in that box, like I was constricted by everybody else's opinions. And I did little things, and I became uncomfortable intentionally while I was out there, like going to a bar or restaurant by myself, which you would never do here because you'd get made fun of, and the judgment from other Americans, for instance, would just be too much to bear. But there it was okay. So a lot of these cool realizations happened. But her game is to travel the most, to experience cool cultures, to work internationally for big business, and to have other people fund those travels for her. Now, she got a lot of judgment. Okay, well, you don't have the husband and you don't have the kids and you, you're not going to soccer games on Saturday mornings. Like, there must be something wrong. You must not be happy. But that's just not the case. She defined a different game and she decided to live by that. And I'm trying to do the same thing in my life. So this book was really validating. There are 4 questions or 4 areas or steps that you can focus on If you'd like to define a new game for yourself, and we all should be doing it. The first is, what is your objective? What do you want in life? Is it more travel? Do you want to spend more time on a specific passion of yours? Is it finger painting? Do you want to ski more often? Do you want to take longer lunches at work? Do you want to eat healthier? Do you want to go to the gym more? Like, what is your goal? Define the objective. Then how do you play your game? Basically, How do you spend your time, talents, and resources to achieve your objectives? So you, you start to define it a little bit more. You get into the thick of things. For me, I love to travel internationally, and eventually I'd love to become independent and financially free and be able to do everything when I want to do it. So if that's my objective, how do I play my game? Well, I play my game by saving up money and finding a job that allows me to travel for the time being. I need to launch a business so that that can supplement that income. I need to diversify my investments and stuff like that in real estate so that I can eventually become financially free. Those are the things that I need to do. So I've defined that. Then the next item here is what obstacles must you overcome? Well, there are tons of them, and a lot of them are centered around fear, but some of them are tangible obstacles like money and things like that. So what obstacles do I have? To travel the world and be financially free? Well, one is I need to find a job that allows me to work remotely. One is that I need to overcome the fear and all the objections and insecurities that come with living a remote lifestyle and traveling the world and not being around all of your friends all the time. People judge you for that kind of stuff. You know, the money thing is a big deal. It's expensive to travel the world unless you're doing it while working, which is just a different question. And then number 4, how do you keep score to know that you're winning? Part of my 2020 goals, if you watched that video, were to travel to 5 new countries. I did that in 2019, and I'm doing that again in 2020. So keeping a scoreboard and measuring yourself against other people in your circle, or measuring yourself against the previous versions of yourselves— there's so many different ways to keep score. And the number one rule in this book is that you are playing your own game. You get to set the rules, you get to set up the scoreboard, and you get to track it, which is the most fun part. So anyway, I hope this video made sense to you. It's very— it follows a nice progression in the book. I don't know that I was able to replicate that as much or articulate it as much as I wanted to, but I really did value this book. If you suffer from a fear of other people's expectations, if that creates anxiety in your life and you don't love the life that you're living, the game that you're currently playing, read this book. It's going to be a huge help to you. And I know that I get DMs from people all the time asking me questions about these subjects specifically. I think this a great book to help set you in the right direction. With that, I'll let everybody go. Pick up a copy of this book. You will not regret it. Go read something and have a great day. All right, bye.
