Finishing The Game of America

What I was thinking about today is that I have finally finished playing the Game of America.

I reviewed video games for many years as a journalist, but it was only today that I really thought about America itself as a video game.

It is not that I won the game in a traditional sense, but that I completely played through it.

I have won at a lot of things—I have had an amazing life, I still do, and I always will—but more specifically, I have completed the levels.

I finished the High School Level, the College Level, the Marriage Level, and the Divorce Level.

I completed the Post-Divorce Engagements To Other Women Level, and the Living With Other Lovers Level.

I won a bunch of national awards as the best writer in America three times, so I successfully got through the Journalism Level and the Success Level.

I paid off my house, clearing that level, and retired at 49, completely finishing the Retirement Level.

For the last 10 years, I’ve been focusing on therapy, personal development and getting my health in optimal order. Everybody tells me I look amazing, so I've finished that level.

I got my gallbladder out, passing the Major Health Concern Level.

I’ve had amazing amounts of sex and an untold number of friends, finishing the Work Levels, the Friends Levels, and the Lovers Levels.

I even finished the Pet Levels. I don't have any pets anymore because I raised a bunch of them and they all died, because that's what happens when they get old. I am the cat whisperer, so I passed that level.

Over the past year and a half, I finished the level where I finally got cured of all my garden-variety mental problems, like the abandonment issues I carried from being abandoned as a child. I got cured of my PTSD and my anxiety. I still have a little ADD because that is with you for life, but I am doing pretty good with it. It never stopped me anyway. I always used it to my advantage to clear all these other levels.

I passed the levels where you don't get killed by some rando. Years ago, I was sent to the hospital by a guy who ran a stop sign, totaled my car, and left me with a traumatic brain injury that I had to deal with for a couple of years. I passed that Health Concern Level.

My parents died, and that was fine because they abandoned me, so I reached the Orphan Level.

I got solar panels on my house, passing the Futurism Level. I had an electric car that got destroyed, which also pushed me into the Futurism Level, even though I don't have it anymore.

I’ve done OK on social media, so I’ve gotten through that level.

I stopped following politics, so I finished that level. I don't read the news anymore. I'm past that level. I don't keep up with pop culture anymore, so I finished that level.

There are a whole bunch of other things I did. I got a violin scholarship, passing that level, and I was a teenage stripper and sex worker, passing that level.

I had a spectacular relationship with my Nana. She was the main person who raised me. She's my Obi-Wan Kenobi, so I passed the Obi-Wan Kenobi Level.

In the past several years, I got free of people who became insufferable or mentally ill, screaming into the void all the time.

I also did twenty-something years of therapy, passing that level as part of fixing my problems and curing my stuff.

For quite a few years, I used to go back and forth between 8-year-old me and contemporary me. About half a year ago, I finally coalesced those two facets of myself. Every day since then, I have dragged the 8-year-old me into the future along with contemporary me, so now there is just one integrated me.

As a result, I am the strongest I have ever been with people. I am not trying to be sentimentally romantic anymore. I am not trying to get married all the time, or find the love of my life, or chase a soul mate.

I am not trying to constantly prove to everybody that I am the greatest lover in the world. I still have tremendous lust, but I don't feel the need to go prove it, or pound my chest like Tarzan, or constantly sweep lovers off their feet romantically and sexually. I beat that Sentimental Romantic Level and the Casanova Level.

I don't have any regrets for any of the levels I’ve played. That is the whole point about the game. The Game of America is about getting through the levels the best you can. It is not about being Number One in every single level—that is impossible, and there is nobody on Earth who is number one in everything.

You just have to get through each level the best you can.

When I was a video game reviewer, I was always mystified by achievement chasers who tried to be the achievement king. Why do that? Just try to have fun on the level you are playing.

I have tried to have as much fun as I can and be as fulfilled, happy and safe as possible—the least amount of suffering, the most amount of joy, laughing, loving, and feeling good.

I became not religious necessarily in the way people usually think of it, but I do 20 minutes of meditative prayer mantras every day. I don't belong to any particular organization. I wrote the mantras myself. Because of that, I feel connected to God, life, existence, everythingness and me more now than ever in a sublime, superb way.

I am grateful, appreciative, and thankful to be alive and free every day.

So today, I thought to myself:

Man, I have really finished the Game of America. Maybe it’s time to begin the Game of Another Country.