Deeply Played Games

My keynote address at the NASAGA conference (2006) was called "Deeply Played Games."

Here's why:

"The games that we play the most deeply, as kids or adults, the games we play hour after hour, day after day, year after year – these are the games that are the 'good' ones, these are the games that affect us most deeply, and in these games we can find the bits of cultural DNA that are most deeply embedded into our collective psyche, so to speak, as it were. In Tag, Hide-and-Seek, Checkers, Football, we develop a common understanding of fairness and cheating, leading and following, winning and losing.

"The good games. The games that get played deeply. The deeply played games.
Playing them over and over, we begin to understand the game itself. Playing on different sides, in different positions, we begin to see the whole of the game, the web of strategy and counterstrategy, of trying to tag someone, of trying not to be tagged, of hiding and seeking.

"Deeply played games are games that we, for a time, can almost give ourselves over to completely, just about abandon ourselves to totally, get very close to divorcing from all other realities, embracing entirely, more or less. And the more we, as they say, “give it our all,” the more fun we seem to have. And the better we become at playing them, at understanding them. The more grace we can bring to them. The more of ourselves."

Should you care to read the entire address, you'll find it here.


from Bernie DeKoven, funsmith