Single Player Mode

I just watched Gran Turismo and I told my daughter I would definitely be watching it again. She asked if it was that much of a great movie, I told her not necessarily, but it was about cars and racing and it was inspired by someone’s real story. I joke that if Tom and Jerry did a whole movie about cars and racing, I would still watch it.

I wasn’t much of a gamer growing up, the last game console I actively played was SNES (if you know you know) and I was happy to substitute games for books even as a teenager. The summary of the movie Gran Turismo was about a guy who was so good at the racing game, eventually becoming a real life racer, going on to win 3rd price with other team members at Le Mans (arguably the biggest racing competition in the world), you really have no bragging rights as a racer if you haven’t raced at Le Mans.

Life itself seems like a game or games within a game. Reminds me of Shallipopi’s track saying inside that evian another evian dey inside (can be loosely translated another racket exists inside the racket that exists inside the racket).

I am involved with a few things and one of the companies I am involved with has a podcast. I am responsible for growing the podcast numbers. We have a sponsor that put decent money behind the podcast and they have been asking us for the podcast listenership numbers. The numbers are shit and we can’t even send them, they are very embarrassing. So here I am at 4am in the morning, thinking I should play a game. I simple should just pay people to listen to the podcast. It will work but those people who will agree to get paid to listen to the podcast are actually not the intended listeners and while the increased numbers will ensure we get the sponsorship renewed, the podcast may not deliver on its production objectives, except the play was purely monetization. The other route is to do the hard work of making the podcast interesting enough for the audience and then get them to listen to it one way or the other.

Recently, (I am writing this in October 2023), the media has been awash with news of companies that have raised some serious millions in funding and are winding down. 54gene, Dash to mention a few. And when you start to dissect the story, you hear of monies being spent in questionable ways. In the case of one of the companies, CEO was paying himself $50k monthly, allegedly diverted $8m to properties and luxury cars and you wonder what happened to these guys? Was this the game from the start or did the game change at some point?

In one of the entrepreneurial groups I belong to, there’s a lot of outrage at the seeming madness, I am always careful to judge people though, cause we sometimes end up as what we criticize, I opined that we all are playing a game and one should be true to one’s self with what game one is playing.

In the movie Gran Turismo, there was a scene where the actor said if something didn’t work and he crashed, he will simply press reset. The problem with real life games is there is no reset button. You can’t undo the play, there’s no control Z, we live with consequences of the games we play.

When it comes to this entrepreneurial game, one must take the words of Polonius, King Claudius’ chief minister in the Shakespeare play Hamlet very seriously, to thine own self, be true. Deceive everyone else but know the game you are playing (the extra hype is mine)

I have this entrepreneurial friend who is on this I am helping poor farmers do X, Y and Z bullshit that a lot of international donor agencies like to hear. It is almost like this guy creates a new business for every dimension of this narrative, nigga has gotten over two million dollars in grants (free money) I doubt he can show us 10 famers he has helped. Obviously, he is playing a game, but I tell him not to come and insult our brains when he’s trying to talk about the challenges around what he is trying to do. I hope he is at least honest with himself on the game he is playing.

Another game people are playing is this relocation game. This one is too personal, I will leave it alone. There’s valid arguments for both sides of the coin.

Another game people play is doing a 9–5 or becoming an entrepreneur, my advice, make your life easy, get paid every month. Plus your blood pressure will be normal most times. This entrepreneurship thing is madness eight and a half days out of every ten days. That half day is that your day will start well and just when you are about to start enjoying it, a call or email will arrive and you are killing fires for the rest of the day. If you are comfortable with 8 days of chaos, you should give it a shot.

Another game people play is marriage. What I have learned, men think and act like men in a marriage and women think and act like women in a marriage. The problem usually is the man expects the woman to think like a man and the woman expects the man to respond to issues from her own point of view. Sooner than later, a compromise that works is settled on and the negotiations are on going.

Another game people play is the packaging game. I went somewhere one day and while the car park was full, the security guy agreed to valet park the car, another day, I went to the same place with a different car(older and smaller vehicle), the car park was empty, same security guy came, sized me up and sad oga park outside, at least he called me oga….lol. I used to think vanity lived on the streets of Instagram, but the more I look at LinkedIn, the more I think Instagram is learning. I was talking to a friend the other day and he is an upcoming actor and he said he cannot be seen walking on the streets anymore. I just said in my mind, dey play, make pant dey wear you (there’s no translation for this in English Language).

Again, he is playing a game and as long as it’s a game of his own choosing, then that’s fine but if you are playing a game out of peer or societal pressure, the challenge is you will always be playing catch up and running foul of the rules of the game.

Best advice I can give, play your own game by your own rules and define your own standards of success, and don’t be bothered with how everyone else plays their own game.

Press Reset, then Play.

May the force be with you (Stolen)