I've had continued reflections on the way Tetris is a metaphor for "real life."
There is something oddly satisfying in watching the blocks fit into places. When you get the blocks you need to complete the line, you experience a sensation of success; of overcoming the challenges. You are victorious over the challenge presented to you. You are in control.
When you get blocks that don't fit neatly anywhere, you experience a sense of frustration. That ill-fitting shape is an obstacle to order; it is getting in the way of the plan. The screen becomes untidy as small gaps appear in the middle of the work, unaccessible until you clear the clutter above it. Until then, they keep vigil; visible reminders that we've made a mistake and are imperfect or the game has thrown us something that doesn't make sense, and juts out annoyingly, hindering our plan.
I know I want my life to be simple. And when all the blocks fit into the right place, I experience a sense of accomplishment that says "I have control of my life." Control matched with simplicity gives the illusion of power and safety. If I am in control, nothing can surprise me and I can protect myself from getting hurt.
But nothing prevents the ill-matching issues from coming. And eventually, whether I like it or not, I have to accept I have no control over what comes crashing down. Things don't fit in an orderly fashion and I have to learn to negotiate it; those blocks that jut annoyingly into life, in the walk way and sure to be tripped.
But whatever blocks come (the one's that fit neatly into our well-constructed lives or the ones that simply get in the way and nag) we are responsible with what we do with them. Control over life is a myth. Control over how we deal with it, however, has always been in our grasp, despite the temptation to "play the victim" (this is to distinguish from those who are true victims of violence or circumstance), and hand over the controls to someone or some thing else. Or even to a false ideal. Then there comes the temptation to set the game down, refusing the work to fit them at all, and excuse ourselves from confronting the challenge and the hurt doing so can bring. Of course, then life eventually becomes a wreck as the pieces stack themselves haphazardly, giving the illusion that we are more victim of cruel life than ever and granting permission to shut down and die.
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3 comments:
Excellent, David. The illusory nature of "control" versus the actual control that we really do possess, which is a gift, an offering, a responsibility, and an identifier of who we are. So, are you still playing the game?
Of course! Only when I'm in my "second office" though. How else am I going to learn about life unless I eschew it altogether? >.>
Ah, I see! Great point. This assumes, doesn't it, that "life" is something about which we might learn, like a commodity of some kind? Or, as Seinfeld suggested, is life an experience from which we cannot learn a thing? I say it's spinach and to hell with it!, as a woman in my parish often quips.
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