A video game led to this post; I was\nwatching my two grandsons \u2013 well, actually playing with as well as watching \u2013\nin the video gaming phenomenon \u201cFortnite\u201d last night. The game is a massive\nmulti-player online comic warfare fighting game; hard to describe. It allows\nfor teams and squads to fight with or against each other on an island. You\nsearch and find weapons, you harvest materials such as wood and stone to build\nwalls, ramps, or towers, and you find shielding and ammo hidden in chests\nthroughout the map. It is completely non-graphic with regards to violence and\nin many of the play modes, the character respawns to fight again, while in the\nother modes the match is over and character is returned to the lobby to play\nagain in a different match. You can also \u201cdress\u201d your character in \u201cskins\u201d,\nwhich are exotically cartoonish costumes that often follow the current theme of\ngame: Star Wars recently.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When \u201chit\u201d, your character may flat\nout die, or may be knocked down in which a countdown timer begins; if a\nteammate reaches you before the timer counts down, they can revive you. During\nthis match I was hit and was down. My grandson told me that he would come over\nto help me and revive me. I said no, don\u2019t bother, to keep fighting and not\nworry about me as the timer was about to expire and he would have to travel a\nlong way through an area filled with the enemy team; that he should go on and\ntry to win the match. But he insisted and he ended up being killed as well \u2013\ngame over. I, of course, felt bad that he had died trying to save me and apologized\nfor making him lose the match. He was very upset that he had been killed and\nhad failed to get to me and he apologized to me! And it was then that the seed\nof this post was born. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
For me, it was just another match \u2013 I\nreally didn\u2019t care if I placed 1st<\/sup>, 20th<\/sup>, or last \u2013 it is\njust a game and I was playing primarily so I could play with my grandsons. But\nfor him it was a contest; a test of skill and ability; which is what most of\nthese games are to young folks \u2013 early battles in which they can safely test\ntheir skills and their limits, hone their skills in competition. Don\u2019t get me\nwrong, the games are more than that; they develop eye-hand coordination, the\nfundamentals of teamwork, social interaction, strategic thinking, and cause\n& effect consequences, all in a safe environment. They can also be\nprofitable: the winner of the 2019 Fortnite Tournament held in NY was a 16yo\nboy who walked away with the $3 million prize!<\/p>\n\n\n\n Back to the topic at hand. My grandson\nchose to attempt to revive his teammate rather than go on to try to win alone\nbecause that is what teammates do; it is how he learned the game and how he\nlearned the rules of engagement in this mock battle. It is what a teammate is\nsupposed to do. It is also the foundation of altruism, heroism, and\nselflessness. In various matches over time, both my grandsons have gone back\ninto the thick of the fight to try to revive me or another teammate and I am so\nproud of them for embracing that ethic in their personal repertoire of values.\nThe policeman that steps between the victim and the aggressor, the fireman that\nruns into the burning building, and the solider who runs back into the battle\nto carry out his buddy are all people who embrace these same values.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But there is more here than that \u2013 so\nmuch more. While just a game, it \u2013 their behavior \u2013 is a model for life. As I\nhave explained to them many times, they are going to lose \u2013 no one is\nunbeatable \u2013 no one is going to win all the time. It just does not happen. Yes,\nthere are some rare elite athletes who manage to end a career without a defeat,\nbut given time, someone would have eventually defeated them. And taking it up\nseveral levels higher, no one leaves life undefeated \u2013 we all end up dead. And\nwhile that elite athlete may have escaped defeat for their career, I guarantee\nyou that they lost elsewhere: other sports, games, cards, lotteries, or love.\nThey surely lost somewhere along the way, it is a given, a fact of life. And I\nwant my grandsons to know that; to know they are going to lose. <\/p>\n\n\n\n But my point is not about accepting\nloss easily or otherwise, only that it will happen, that it is inevitable. We\nalways strive, fight, to win, but that will not always be the end result. And I\nwant them to know that. But at the same time, I don\u2019t want them to stop\nfighting to the end. You see, our goal should NOT to be unbeatable, it should\nbe to ALWAYS be unstoppable. You never stop trying, you never give up. Yes, you\nwill not always succeed, but you will not stop trying until there is nothing\nleft. That should be our goal. It is a lesson that will serve them well through\nlife, as it has served me well through mine. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I recall starting the cross-country\nseason in high school with brand new shoes and quickly developed blisters; I am\nsure that if you have read my posts, you will have read this story, this\nanalogy, of the bleeding feet more than once (Age is\nInevitable, Naturally<\/a> and The Fog\nThickens<\/a>). But it is exactly about that, about not stopping, about not\ngiving up. Despite the hardship, the discomfort, the difficulty, or the odds \u2013\nwe have to keep trying, to not stop and give up. No matter the \u201cgame\u201d, the\ntask. We are all given deadlines in our lives, everything has a time limit: all\nchallenges are bracketed with time constraints. We usually don\u2019t consider just\nstopping and giving up, but there are times we do, during the toughest of times\nperhaps. And those people who achieve, who succeed, who rise and flourish, are\nthe ones who don\u2019t ever give up. They are unstoppable, not unbeatable. I\u2019ve\nbeen beaten many times at work and in life overall, but have never given up,\nnever stopped fighting. (Although I have wrestled with the idea that retiring\nwas essentially giving up, a theme I still have not fully reconciled with\nmyself.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n My grandsons are young, cubs still,\njust beginning to learn the rules of engagement of life. But they are learning\nan extremely important lesson early. And I expect, I know, that it will carry\nthem to great successes throughout their life as long as they hold that value\nclose to their hearts. And dear reader, please consider that in your daily\nlife, whatever personal battle you may be waging. Yes, sometimes you will lose,\nbut never stop fighting, never stop trying, never give up. Whether it is to\ncomplete a report for school or work, to lose 10 lbs., to exercise more, or to\nquit smoking \u2013 whatever your personal challenge is, you have no chance of\nwinning if you stop and give up. But if you keep trying, keep fighting? You may\nsurprise yourself with the fight within you! And above all else, please teach\nyour children that they are not unbeatable but that they should always be\nunstoppable.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A video game led to this post; I was watching my two grandsons \u2013 well, actually playing with as well as watching \u2013 in the video gaming phenomenon \u201cFortnite\u201d last night. The game is a massive multi-player online comic warfare fighting game; hard to describe. It allows for teams and squads to fight with or […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2114,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"ocean_front_end_style_editor":"no","ocean_post_layout":"","ocean_both_sidebars_style":"","ocean_both_sidebars_content_width":0,"ocean_both_sidebars_sidebars_width":0,"ocean_sidebar":"0","ocean_second_sidebar":"0","ocean_disable_margins":"enable","ocean_add_body_class":"","ocean_shortcode_before_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_after_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_before_header":"","ocean_shortcode_after_header":"","ocean_has_shortcode":"","ocean_shortcode_after_title":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_bottom":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_bottom":"","ocean_display_top_bar":"default","ocean_display_header":"default","ocean_header_style":"","ocean_center_header_left_menu":"0","ocean_custom_header_template":"0","ocean_custom_logo":0,"ocean_custom_retina_logo":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_height":0,"ocean_header_custom_menu":"0","ocean_menu_typo_font_family":"0","ocean_menu_typo_font_subset":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_size":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_unit":"px","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_line_height":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_unit":"","ocean_menu_typo_spacing":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_unit":"","ocean_menu_link_color":"","ocean_menu_link_color_hover":"","ocean_menu_link_color_active":"","ocean_menu_link_background":"","ocean_menu_link_hover_background":"","ocean_menu_link_active_background":"","ocean_menu_social_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_links_color":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_color":"","ocean_disable_title":"default","ocean_disable_heading":"default","ocean_post_title":"","ocean_post_subheading":"","ocean_post_title_style":"","ocean_post_title_background_color":"","ocean_post_title_background":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_image_position":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_attachment":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_repeat":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_size":"","ocean_post_title_height":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay":0.5,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay_color":"","ocean_disable_breadcrumbs":"default","ocean_breadcrumbs_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_separator_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_hover_color":"","ocean_display_footer_widgets":"default","ocean_display_footer_bottom":"default","ocean_custom_footer_template":"0","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"ocean_post_oembed":"","ocean_post_self_hosted_media":"","ocean_post_video_embed":"","ocean_link_format":"","ocean_link_format_target":"self","ocean_quote_format":"","ocean_quote_format_link":"post","ocean_gallery_link_images":"off","ocean_gallery_id":[],"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2107","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-life","entry","has-media"],"yoast_head":"\n