You Can't Win

Whatever game you're playing, it probably doesn't exist, so you can't win it, but you can do something even better: you can be free of it.

I’m sitting in the wings of a women’s brunch, being introduced as the speaker, and battling butterflies.

My book Loveable had been released six months earlier, and these women have invited me to talk about worthiness. During the talk, I plan to share this story from the book:

A few years ago, an Icelandic tour bus driver contacted police to report that a foreign tourist had gone missing. The driver described the woman as “Asian, about 160 cm (five foot three), in dark clothing, and speaks English well.” Fifty members of the tour group set out on foot to look for the woman. In all the confusion, it turned out the reportedly missing woman was actually a member of the search party! She had changed her clothing at a rest stop, and the bus driver no longer recognized her. Unbeknownst to her, she was searching for herself. Later, the woman would say she didn’t recognize the description of herself.

Few of us do.

If I told you about someone who is gloriously messy, beautifully weak, breathtakingly strong, lovely and good and whole and holy, would you recognize this description of who you already are? Most of us don’t, so we abandon ourselves and go searching for ourselves in relationships and purpose. But we won’t find ourselves there either, because, like the woman on the Icelandic tour bus, we’re searching for a self that was never really lost to begin with.

As my bio is read by the host, I know my butterflies are the butterflies of someone in a search party, looking for a self that was never lost to begin with. I become very still. I listen for the voice of Grace that is always whispering just beneath the cacophony of our inner chatter. And I hear something I’ve heard countless times, but I hear it more clearly than I’ve ever heard it before.

“There’s nothing to prove.”

There is nothing to prove. It’s tempting to hear it that way. It’s tempting to hear, “Look where you’re at. People are paying you to speak to them. You’ve already proven yourself. You’ve won the game. Now enjoy it.”

But that’s not what I heard. I heard something else.

There was nothing to prove. “You haven’t proven yourself, Kelly, because there was never anything to prove in the first place. You can’t win a game when there’s no game being played. But do you know what’s even better than enjoying that kind of game? Being free of it.”

That was years ago, and you might assume that once you hear something so clearly, you can quit listening for it and move on. But that’s not how it works. You don’t stop eating after one meal. You don’t quit exercising after one workout. You don’t take one bath and remain clean for the rest of your days.

The healthiest things must be done over and over again, forever.

So, last week, when Liz Gilbert gave this prompt in her weekly invitation to write ourselves a letter from Love—Dear Love, what would you have me know today about my value?—I listened once more, and this is what I heard:

Dear Kelly,

Since you were about six years-old, when you held up that soccer trophy and your family gushed over you, you’ve been playing games to prove your value. The world presents you with games to play. Your mind creates games to play. Your religion made existence into a big game, which some will win and most will lose. Your ego has even turned your purpose into yet another game to be won or lost.

But, Kelly, my earnest little competitor, your purpose won’t dispel your pain. You can’t win your way to worthiness. You’ll never shed your shame with a trophy of any kind. There’s only one way to be free of your shame. You must see through the illusion.

You must see, there are no games.

Yes, this can feel a touch boring to begin with. Where’s the drama? Where’s the thrill? Where’s the rush of victory and the agony of defeat? And yes, it can feel a little directionless at first. After all, if you’re not trying to score, what exactly are you supposed to do? (Do you see now how much that sounds like an addiction?) And most of all, if you’re not trying to be extraordinary, doesn’t that mean you’re just ordinary?

Exactly. You’re ordinary. And there is loveliness in ordinariness.

A single golden leaf, rocking gently toward the ground in an autumn forest, unseen by a single human eye, is thoroughly ordinary, and utterly beautiful. You think you need to be a grand oak tree, towering over the rest of the forest, a tourist destination. But that’s just a game you made up. You, my fleeting friend, are but a single golden leaf, rocking gently toward the ground of your existence.

Are you valuable? Wrong question.

Are you beautiful? Without question.

Whatever game you're playing, it probably doesn't exist.

The shame game, or the worthiness game, or the identity game. The marriage game, or the dating game, or the singlehood game. The career game, or the entrepreneurial game, or the leaving-a-legacy game. It just doesn't exist. We made it up a long time ago to compensate for the pain of being a vulnerable little one amongst other human beings who were also in process.

You can’t win a game that never even started.

But you can do something even better.

You can be free of it.

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• What games have you already quit playing? What games do you want to quit playing? What other reactions does this post evoke in you? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments—I’ll be sure to reply!

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