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The Great Game

usetawuz

usetawuz

Senior Registered
From a historical standpoint, the Great Game was the shadow war between Great Britain and Russia played out in northern India (a portion of which is now Pakistan) and Afghanistan. The documentation of this time period makes for amazing reading.

But the more compelling aspect of The Great Game to me is that in discussion with my guidance, that is their term for the game they are watching...the play they are directing...and the stage production of the life we are living. We are the stars cast in the role of the character we chose and were born to play. Every aspect of our lives are overseen by guidance, and they are aware of every one of our thoughts, ideas and impressions, and use that information to better advise and assist us in performing our role in this performance to the best of our abilities. For them, and for our greater soul, this life, or life-play, is the "Great Game". I have been fortunate to see an amazing view of about 20 guides racing around all abuzz and working in what looked like a "behind-the-curtain" flurry of stage activity between acts...the excitement, optimism and absolute joy regarding the Great Game was palpable. I kept hearing "The game is on! The game is on!" as these amazing beings worked to assemble whatever situation was going to provide events, situations, or places for the acting human beings to play their roles in accordance with their life plan or script. Simply an amazing view into what makes up our lives...or how our lives work.

This seems to support the idea that "All the world's a stage...", and the overall impression I've gotten each time I've seen anything along these lines is that "if you are not having fun, you are not playing the game the right way!" So, in the manner of wishing luck to someone about to step onto the stage, and with the best of intentions , I suggest you all "go break a leg!" and may you each enjoy your personal Great Game!
 
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I'm more convinced with each passing day that life is only a game, and I love the expression "The world is our stage". I feel we live too worried about earthly events, and even when some of us are quire certain that death doesn't exist, it's hard to maintain that state of mind, that this is not "real" at all and that whatever we do has a meaning, and if it's "wrong" (right and wrong are only human relative concepts), it will be forgiven.


Sometimes I also doubt if believing this is just a way to calm our minds. There are times I'm at ease and I'm happy with the idea, it's as if "I truly know", this happens when I trust my feelings and intuition. But then I find myself trapped in my body and in this "reality", and doubts come back again. I guess being human is being confused most of the time.


And of course it's very hard to explain to the people I know. Most of them don't understand the concept of preplanning (not all is written, we all have free will... or that's what I believe), they don't understand that the apparent suffering in the world is for a reason, no matter if we want to learn or not, it's there for us to experience and grow. And if I told them life is a game they would look at me bewildered and say "Oh, yes, tell that to the little girl raped, or that person who was murdered". I say death is not real, it all ends when we die, I say that what we do here on Earth stays here, because fortunately the spiritual world has other rules. But for them death is still very real, and even when some of these people believe in life after death, they still don't understand that our human lives are not "the real thing".


I guess that when you've remembered several deaths, all different, all in different circumstances, when you know that you go somewhere, change costume and come back to play again, that gives you a different perspective. I suspect one of these people interpreted I didn't value life the same way, and that killing someone was still "wrong". Maybe he thought that as death doesn't exist, that gives me the right to kill everyone. But I think he forgot we all have experienced being killed too. I think it's quite the contrary. Experiencing death a few times, from all sides, gives you the knowledge that life is unvaluable, as it's filled with opportunities to grow. If it ends, you always can start again.
 
Our views seem to dovetail quite closely Eowyn...you describe some of the same conversations I've had. While there are some of us who can see beyond our human condition, I sense those who are so inclined to run from the mere concept did not include such a possibility in their life plan. As guidance once explained to me when I had come upon a particularly recalcitrant and fairly convincing sceptic "just because she doesn't, can't, and won't see it doesn't mean she isn't playing her role...much greater the surprise when she transitions and realizes you were right!" I feel it is a gift to have obtained this knowledge and I go through life with a much greater appreciation for everything and everyone knowing they are consciously or subconsciously playing the role of their lives...truly!
 
usetawuz said:
I feel it is a gift to have obtained this knowledge and I go through life with a much greater appreciation for everything and everyone knowing they are consciously or subconsciously playing the role of their lives...truly!
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I'm beginning to see it that way too. You can't change people, you can't change the world, it's this way for a reason even when we don't fully understand. It may be frustrating but these skeptics become just another trial for me, as they make me doubt, they make me think... only to reassure me even more of my own beliefs at the end, as after all it's me who has the memories and the validations, things they won't even dare to search because of their own skepticism. It makes me sad, especially when I've been accused of running away and not caring, but they just don't understand reincarnation is not something to debate theoretically, it's something you have to live and feel, that's what makes you think and change, not hearing the million words I can say to them.
 
It's a ride...


It's a ride


:)

...The world is like a ride in an amusement park, and when you choose to go on it you think it's real, because that's how powerful our minds are. And the ride goes up and down and round and round, and it has thrills and chills and is very brightly colored, and it's very loud. And it's fun, for a while.
Some people have been on the ride for a long time, and they've begun to question, 'Is this real, or is this just a ride?', and other people have remembered, and they've come back to us and they say 'Hey, don't worry. Don't be afraid, ever, because this is just a ride.' and we KILL THOSE PEOPLE.


"Shut him up! We have a lot invested in this ride! SHUT HIM UP! Look at my furrows of worry. Look at my big bank account, and my family. This just has to be real."


It's just a ride.


But we always kill those good guys who try and tell us that. You ever noticed that? And let the demons run amok. But it doesn't matter, because ... It's just a ride.


And we can change it anytime we want. It's only a choice. No effort, no work, no job, no savings of money. A choice, right now, between fear and love. The eyes of fear wants you to put bigger locks on your door, buy guns, close yourself off. The eyes of love, instead see all of us as one.


Here's what we can do to change the world right now, to a better ride:


Take all that money we spent on weapons and defense each year and instead spend it feeding, clothing, and educating the poor of the world, which it would many times over, not one human being excluded, and WE CAN EXPLORE SPACE, TOGETHER, BOTH INNER AND OUTER, forever ... in peace.


-- Bill Hicks (1961 - 1994)
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usetawuz said:
This seems to support the idea that "All the world's a stage...", and the overall impression I've gotten each time I've seen anything along these lines is that "if you are not having fun, you are not playing the game the right way!"
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The game can only be played "the right way" when no-one bends the rules or no 'higher authority' moves the goal posts mid-game. Unfortunately this isn't the case (on earth). So, while all the world is a stage, there are plenty of souls who do not always play within the spirit of the game, leaving some souls with little choice but to either step off stage or improvise. Having to continually improvise lifetime after lifetime probably starts to grate. It's also hard to consider losing your job, house and health and being forced onto the street as "having fun", while the employer who once employed you is living off millions a year and well in excess of what he/she requires. It is possible that the rich, gluttonous employer, who is "having fun", is the one who isn't playing the game the right way.
 
I appreciate your comments firebird, but to me those difficulties and outside influences forcing us to improvise are part and parcel of the game. I see the plan or play being written and the souls or players choosing roles and as guidance assembles the environment or set for the play to begin, we stand around anticipating both our roles and trying to get hints of how others will play their roles and what we will do with all the potential variables we will encounter. In my mind it is all part of the game.


One example from my own experience was going from a very high financial position to near subsistence level in a matter of months due to the dramatic change in the real estate market between 2008 and 2010. My life, and the role I played, through no fault of my own, was instantly recast and I could either resent it and thrash around, or realize the change in the play and find a way to play my role in a manner which would benefit my family and friends. I chose the latter and matters have improved significantly, albeit in a different direction than before, and I am looking forward to more and greater drama, comedy and romance as the script unfolds.


I can't blame and don't see anyone, any organization or cabal of ne'er-do-wells as responsible for the fall I experienced...I actually feel I benefitted from it all...as painful as it was, the pain is now gone and I can clearly see the dramatic change in landscape surrounding me and the many, many more doors I have available to open. To me, while we begin with a script, there is no "right way" to play the game..."we buy our tickets and take our chances" and hopefully see our role as one in which we can determine how we choose to play it.
 
Sorry, I do disagree. It would be nice to think that everything is as it should be, but it's not. What it is is mostly a case of cause and effect .... and often individuals/souls not thinking about the consequences of their actions before acting. 'Thinking' is a hard concept for some to grasp :laugh: And you would be surprised to hear just how many people 'think' they understand the term 'consequence', but really don't.


There are indeed times in which the plan is not being fulfilled and cases where souls have been given the option of moving back into the light because their soul group members have reneged on the pre-plans (it really does happen). Sometimes the outside variables are not always part of the big game. No-one expects a drunken spectator to run onto the field and disrupt a game during a crucial period that affects the result. Is the team that would have and should have won that game, but lost instead, now expected to be happy about that? .... and if they're not, well then it's because they are not playing the game ....


Sometimes a soul who has decided with its other soul group members to reincarnate, aborts because they change their mind .... causing miscarriage and great emotional pain to the mother (is she expected to be happy about that)?


In my mind and to my knowledge, not everything that happens is part of the game. That is too simplistic a view. The game is much more complex than many of us can ever fathom while in human form.
 
firebird said:
In my mind and to my knowledge, not everything that happens is part of the game. That is too simplistic a view. The game is much more complex than many of us can ever fathom while in human form.
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I think this is the key. Of course it's more complex than any of us can imagine, because we're just human, we don't even know that death is not real, our reality is what we see and what we have to suffer in this cruel world. Being a game doesn't mean it always have to be fun. When you're playing a game of soccer, is it fun to receive some kicks, to be insulted by spectators, to lose? No, it isn't. Is it hard to make a strategy? Of course it is. But as it's a game, when it's over, it's over. You can be friends with your rival even when moments before you wanted to kill him. And maybe he was hard on you and you knew you were not as good as him, but at the end that makes you stronger. You learn to play better with each match.


The thing is that not everything is preplanned, and... I suspect the plan is not fixed either, it's something dynamic, because everyone has free will so every decision can affect your own life too, after all they say we're all connected. That's what the coach does all the time during matches, doesn't he? To change the course of the action if it's necessary, only we usually are not aware of this. Is it bad if someone doesn't reincarnate and you have a miscarriage? Well, could be from our human point of view, but probably we will understand when we are in the spirit world, and probably we will want to have the option to do it too.


That's how I see it anyway.
 
To me, while we begin with a script, there is no "right way" to play the game
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I think that it's too easy to live in ignorance of it. I do believe that we choose the life we lead and we will all have multiple "purpose points" that if we're mindful of, we'll reach and many things in our lives will coalesce into a significant path change.


I also don't believe that anyone gets off scot free. I have little proof other than a few coinciding dates, but I'm quite certain my father's mother was the Dowager Cixi in her last life. In China, she wielded unparalleled power but as my grandmother, she was abandoned at an orphanage as a child and lived lonely and sad life.


She was also quite manipulative in the same sense that Cixi was, but she was no wear near as successful. Needless to say, I never got along with her and felt uncomfortable around her.
 
Usetawuz, now have to agree with you on how much this is, that Life is like some Great Game. I remember my father saying in the later part of his life, 'Just Enjoy Life'. Yes do think how much we all can get caught up in everything thinking we can change everything when in reality is it all a game and we can't change a thing. I sometimes personally just sit back so to speak and just watch the game going on.


I remember several quotes from Joseph Campbell on this who wrote the book on 'The Power of Myth'. His quotes dovetaled exactly more or less with what you were saying above. And his quotes paraphrazed was more or less like this below. I will have to get the exact quote for ya. But it is exactly along the lines above you were talking about.


' The world is a mess, it has always been a mess, and always will be a mess. We cannot change the world but only yourself. You can decide to live in the world in joy and participate in the sorrows of the world. '
 
KDB...in response to your comment, the first thing that came to mind was "Lighten up, Francis!" I'll leave it at that.


Kmatjhy, as ever, you just get it.
 
KDB said:
Calling this a "game" makes it sound so trivial, maybe because it was meant to sound trivial by those that call this a "game".
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I couldn't agree more. As I said in my post, the 'game' is much bigger than many can fathom. Any person that should stumble across the truth would never call this a 'game'. The terms 'war' or 'enslavement' are probably more appropriate ... and this goes well beyond just the earthly realm. ... only imo of course.

KDB said:
Calling this a game excuses all. Empty the prisons. Dont defend your life or the life of another, because it's just a role, just a game. Just let them die. They chose it for themselves, right?
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This has been the great illusion or 'game' foisted upon us.
 
It's serious, of course it is.


But it's also fun, if (when) you 'get' it. More serious than chess. More important than tango. Longer lasting than 'death'... More fun than anything... Transcendent of fear... Deeper than 'love' (at least the way most people do it)... Life. There is no substitute. Enjoy it. Appreciate it. It doesn't last... It is what it is.


Pay attention. It's fleeting.


Try not to miss it.
 
To go along with that, I would also add that our experience here, much like ourselves, are defined by the choices we make.
 
KDB said:
I deleted my first reply to this OP, because it was a little harsh. So if you think my reply was bad, you should have seen the original.
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There was no need to delete. Just because your opinion doesn't gel with the OP does not mean your opinion isn't valid or less valid, no matter how many others agree/side with the OP


----


It is important to ask on whose terms are some people apparently not playing the game right because they are not having fun? Who is the 'authority' that has set down this rule/idea?


Using my previous example: the rich, gluttonous employer, who is "having fun", but who has negatively impacted on the lives of many of his former employees, isn't playing the game the right way, he's just a mindless git.


and


What one person 'gets" and what I 'get' is dependent on what we each know. The question is who really knows/understands more of the truth? Do I know less than you? The game IS bigger than most people are LED to believe.
 
I pretty much agree with firebird - the "Game" isn't fun if you are losing. We may decide we took it too seriously on "the other side", but here on the earthly plane, it's really hard to hold that perspective. Sometimes, life is fun, and sometimes it is almost too terrible to be endured. Of course, it's Thanksgiving evening, I have cranberry sauce on my big toe, and my husband has fallen asleep wearing a hat that replicates the bottom half of a turkey, complete with drumsticks. It does have it's pleasantly ridiculous aspects. ;)
 
BriarRose said:
the "Game" isn't fun if you are losing.
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Indeed, but every FAIR game has an individual or team that comes off 2nd best. No, I'm speaking more about external forces that seek to control/manipulate the game - in many ways, and on many levels beyond our comprehension - with negative consequences (effectively hijacking the game). E.g. Have you ever been attacked spiritually? Have you ever experienced days where what occurred was directed/controlled/manipulated by something other than you or the people you came in contact with? .... presumably this is part of the game and we're supposed to laugh about our own lack of control?
 
I'm considering everything you're saying KDB, and firebird. It's easy for me to empathize with your feelings about this. I have been attacked emotionally, but I don't think any of my human protagonists has had the knowledge to mount a psychic attack. Is it correct to say that neither of you believe in a benevolent "heaven"? Do you believe the entities Ustawuz and I call "Guidance" have malevolent intent? If not "Guidance", what force is at work? How do numerology and astrology play into this, firebird? Are we born with "bad stars"? I know that's a complicated question to answer, but it's a sincere one.


I agree the "Game" is rigged. I came from humble beginnings, and somewhere around the age of 25, I realized that the circumstances I was born into made achieving success in the way our society measures it much more difficult than it was for others, born into easier circumstances. I thought, "The boat has already left the dock, and I didn't even realize the ship was sailing." Even then, I thought I was blessed from being born in a country where I had any chance for safety and comfort at all. The question here is really "Who rigs the game?" Do we agree to our circumstances, as some believe, or is life just a cruel cosmic joke? The idea that we agree shifts the responsibility onto us. Is it a New Age hoax being passed on to psychics, and people seeking enlightenment by Guidance, so that the idea takes root in the general consciousness? Interesting - I've invented a New Age conspiracy theory. :rolleyes:
 
I think we're coming from a different place, because I don't consider other humans in the equation. Yes, they have a very negative impact, but what they do is "on them". I am only responsible for myself. I am only concerned with what happens "above". I would find malevolent Divine guidance hard to accept. It's possible that heaven is neutral and merciless. I have to say that I really don't know. I don't subscribe to any religion, and I just sift through people's beliefs, formulate my own, and act accordingly. If a little "opiate of the masses" makes me feel better, and allows me to function in this world with a little peace in my soul, so be it. My only caveat is that I not use religion to harm others. If you don't want that comfort, and can't take it "on faith", that's fine. The harm or benefit of that only affects you. Since no one on the forum "sells" any particular theory or set of beliefs, we are all welcome to believe what we wish.
 
Now personally like above, I do believe like Usetawuz that it is like some big 'Game' and each of us are on when we come into life are like some actor or actress playing a role on some stage - the stage of life.


Earlier I mentioned some comments by Joseph Campbell. Now personally when I first stumbled onto Joseph Campbell and his 'Power of Myth' in the early 90's, it did wonders in my life then. See earlier in my life when I was young, I was caught up bigtime in the Christian Fundamentalist Church. But in going into the mountain wilds, the church and that thinking so quickly faded out of my life when in the mountain wilds, I experienced so much realities to life it seemed. And then ever since as a young kid have I always been attracted to everything Native American it seems. But for myself, I do love these quotes by Joseph Campbell which do believe is relevent to this discussion. These come from the book, 'Reflections On The Art of Living, A Joseph Campbell Companion'. Before I just paraphrased them. But here are the quotes in full for everyone ...


"Participate joyfully in the sorrows of the world.


We cannot cure the world of sorrows,


but we can choose to live in joy.


When we talk about settling the world's problems,


we're barking up the wrong tree.


The world is perfect. It's a mess. It has always been a mess.


We are not going to change it.


Our job is to straighten out our own lives."


"What we are really living for is the experience of life,


both the pain and the pleasure."


"Negativism to the pain and the ferocity of life is negativism to life. We are not there until we can say 'Yea' to it all."


"Being alive is the meaning."


"The privilege of a lifetime is being who you are."


Okay take a look at life, in life one has both the good time and the bad times, the happy times and also the times of sadness and the pain. But isn't it all a part of life. Isn't it all what we go thru and experience being here in a human body again. And looking at reincarnation - past lives, isn't it all sort of like someone choosing a character to play in some role playing game. In life there are huge differences in how one is in life and what they experience rather a male or female, rich or poor, what career one chooses, or what country one lives in and so forth and so forth. Some might say it is all only to learn something and dealing with karma, and once things are dealt with then we won't have to come back. But what about all the Enjoyment that a life brings, that one gets when one experiences another life again. I personally think that the one who thinks it is just about karma or learning this or that misses the boat on the subject. And my father had it right when he said, 'that we just want to come back and Enjoy another Life again'. Yes there will be pain in life but also the joys in life.


And this brings an old 'Star Trek' episode to mind. In that episode, Capt. Kirk is divided between his good and bad parts of himself into these two separate totally good and totally evil parts of himself. And then the crew has to figure out a way where they get their 'old' Capt. Kirk with both parts of himself in one piece. Take a look at life, isn't that the way it is with life is actually being a combination of both the good and the bad. And in coming into another life again, how much do we just want to experience it All and we do experience it all when in another life again.


And back to the beginning, I look at it this way that in coming into a life and who we choose to be has some big reprecussions as to what we will experrience in that particular life. And so how much it is just like when we choose to be some character in a role playing Game or as an actor or an actress choosing some role in a play on some stage. So personally I just will agree with Usetawuz that it is some Great Game or we having a role on some 'Stage', The Stage of Life. And if one truly truly believes in reincarnation and Past Lives, think about the represussions of such as Dr. Stevenson aluded to.


My two cents for whatever it might be worth. Wishing Everyone the Best!
 
I remember the Star Trek/ Capt. Kirk episode that kMatjhwy mentioned, and it is a perfect analogy for life. If we are all both good and bad, then it would follow that life would be the same. I believe that the Old Testament Jehovah was a "flawed god", and the Divine has evolved along with us. I think we are the vehicle through which He learns, and experiences. I wish everyone could experience the joy that exists here on earth, because it's a waste not to enjoy what we can. I find, in my own case, that joy is a choice. We can find things to be happy about, or not. Sometimes, I have chosen the negative, and now that I'm older, I realize what a mistake that was. My peers are starting to pass on, and I hate it when they do so without ever having gotten "it" right.
 
I loved your words, kmatjhwy! That's exactly how I'm beginning to feel. Of course it's not easy, so I can understand KDB too, but I guess it all comes down to our human need (or habit, or whatever) to define what is right and what is wrong, and we all forget that we see the world through our human eyes, and the rules that apply here don't apply in the afterlife. I believe the world is just this way because it has to be this way, because it's the best way we have to experiment whatever we've come to do (even if it's just to enjoy another adventure). I don't believe all we experience has been chosen, but even if it's bad, it doesn't matter in the other side, a place I imagine filled with peace, love and joy. Here you have contrast, you have light and darkness, day and night, cold and heat, love and hate, ups and downs, we say one is good and the other is bad, but is this real or is it just our limited perception? Without bad experiences maybe we'd never be aware of how much courage we have or how much we would fight for the things we love. Suffering pierces your heart but it makes you move and wish for a better world, if everything is perfect you don't need to do this, if we want everything to be perfect, we can always stay in the other side, but I think that would be like being punished staying in the classroom while everyone's in the schoolyard, getting some bruises on the knees but having more fun than looking at the walls.
 
A game? Didn’t your mothers teach you anything? It’s not a joke if you’re not both laughing, it’s not fun if one says it isn’t, and it’s not a game if there are no rules. Note to anyone or anything out there who thinks I need to ‘loosen up!’, ‘take a pill!’, ‘relax!’, or ‘smile!, you might want to be careful. I am in fact a humourless stick who will, since I am being told I need to free my impulses, respond to your advice with thrown pots and cursing. Seriously - denigrating the feelings of others is a low-rent version of blaming the victim, which is exactly what I’m getting from the whole ’life is just a game and loads of fun, why can’t those unfortunate masses of war refuges, raped children, starving people, torture victims, mutilated women, mothers in anguish see that, are they stupid or something?’


We turn aside from the suffering of others because we can’t deal with it, and not in the sheer amount of it in the world, we’d be overwhelmed, so avoiding it is the only change we have of happiness ourselves. We justify our coldness by claiming the victims must have brought the horrors on themselves, they asked for it, wanted it, deserved it, are guilty of something, earned it in this life or in a past, they shouldn’t weep so much, they should be good sports, don’t take the deaths and rapes and tortures so seriously and stop making the small percentage of us who have the good fortune (at the moment) to live among the comfortable elite feel guilty.


This is an understandable method of coping for humans - and maybe if you are among the comfortable elite you do have the right to enjoy life and to be grateful and appreciative of your blessings - but I’m not buying that it means that there really is a cosmic game being played. Life does have light and dark built into it but I’ll be damned if I’m going to intentionally work for the side of pain and injustice. If your faith and beliefs allows you to face horrors with equanimity then yay for you but remember it is only a belief without proof, and judging others as poor fools for not falling in line with your beliefs is...well, that’s what many religions do, I guess.


It isn’t necessary for the participants in a game to enjoy it, only the spectators, so it is possible that we’re players in some cosmic version of a pit bull fight and The Powers That Be are the ones having the fun. I don’t think so but sometimes I’m cynical and wonder. Nor do I think we’re under some obligation to kowtow to or follow the orders/game plan laid out to us by a spiritual overlord. But I also don’t think we’re fully informed contestants who’ve agreed to our own abuse. I hate games, anyway.
 
I have to admit that I've often felt that life is a cruel, cosmic joke, and that we are pawns on a chess board. I am one of those who has often been accused of being negative. I agree, Sister Grey, that we turn away from suffering because it overwhelms us. I don't think anyone deserves to suffer, which has led me to wonder if God made us, got bored, and then wandered off to make new worlds. It's an eternal conundrum.
 
I like to think, that as good as it is, it's isn't perfect. I get the impression that god is just some sort of "source" (indeed once, while sitting in church, I heard in my head "all god is is the collection of all the positive energy in the universe") rather than some sort of galactic zoo keeper or owner. I really think everything here is people helping people.


The issues to me are on a smaller scale as it's difficult to decide did I ask / plan for this? or does, ah hem, crap really happen? I think it's a bit of both. The big things are planned while the small things can be anything. But small things can turn into big things and ah boy! There goes that yin and yan thing we were talking about before again..
 
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