Last night I came across an ad for, “Age of Empires III.” Empires III, at its most simplest, is a real time strategy game where players create battles with empires in order to win the world. It looks interesting.
I haven’t played either Age of Empires II or Age of Empires I, but I’m intrigued nonetheless. As I read the internet glossy of the game I remembered a time when I enjoyed playing computer games. Playing games was fun, it was interesting; something that captured my motivation. I would stay up hours into the night playing games that, compared to the technology available now, were quite unrealistic and rather simple.
Something has changed for me as I’ve gotten older. I’ve forgotten how to play and enjoy things for the sake of enjoyment. I don’t know how to just be, to just relish the moment. I am noticing that for my life to have meaning, for my existence to matter, I have to be producing something or being something. I do not know how to relax. I do not know how to simply live.
I don’t think that the inability to be without being is only my experience. It is a conditioned response, something that is learned in this middle America culture of mine. I watch myself “teaching” my daughter to be productive, to learn, to study, to make something of herself. The desire to strive, to become something “great” is not something I asked for, but it is something that I have been given. My choice now is what to do with it.
In terms of Zen, I simply watch, notice, then say, “Isn’t that interesting.” Here I am, this capable and talented woman and I only believe that I am living the life I have been given if I produce, or work or create. Then after I notice, I must laugh, because socialization is my own worse enemy. How humorous is it that I must do something different than just live to be worthy of my life?
In terms of Christianity I cannot help but think of Jesus’ idea that, “the kingdom of God is now.” It isn’t in getting water from the well, it is talking to the woman leaning against it about living water. It isn’t answering the call to throw oneself from the steeple, but to wait the desire out. Christianity teaches me that the space between the halves of broken bread is where life is found.
How to turn these theological musings into action? This is always the question isn’t it? For any of us that walk this road of spiritual exploration we must find out how to move the notions of our heads into our hearts and bodies. I think I am going to buy Age of Empires III and learn how to play again. I am going to waste time by all social standards and watch the kingdom of God unfold.
