Graduate and I could get paid that sweet sweet startup money!ДЄs I write this today, at 35 with two kids and barely into what I consider my вЂњreal adulthood,вЂќ money is a means to an end. It helped that I enjoyed the problem solving and tinkering but the #1 overriding factor was money. No disrespect to other majors but in 1998, computer science at a premier university was your meal ticket. I chose Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University because your chances were pretty good. When I was deciding what to study in college, the number one factor was the career prospects of that field. Money is important but is it the objective of life? If you were to ask someone ambitious, hungry, and 20 - money seems all-important.ДЄsk someone who is 40. The goal of The Game of Life is to вЂњCollect money and LIFE tiles, and have the highest dollar amount at the end of the game.вЂќ (By the way, there's a space where you pay $5,000 for spring break if you go to college - that alone should disqualify this game from Real Life!) The goal isn't money

What you decide in your twenties is not your lot in life. What you decide at the beginning of the game does not set your path for life.

It also ignores how often someone can change careers at any time. If you have skills that are in abundance, you can't. If you have skills that in demand, you can command a higher salary. Let's ignore the other mechanics of the game (how paydays are determined, other benefits like the Computer Consultant gets paid $50,000 anytime the spinner stops between numbers or comes off the track) but the basic premise is that to get a higher payday you need to go to college. There are 9 careers and only 2 careers (Doctor, Accountant) require a college degree. If you go to college, you are saddled with $100,000 of debt but you could get a career with a higher salary. There are вЂњTrade salary card with any playerвЂќ boxes you can land on but those were added later to balance out the game, there's no Real Life equivalent. It starts at the beginning and it determines your income for (potentially) the remainder of the game. In The Game of Life, there is only one major life-altering decision you can make вЂ“ Start College or Start Career. (OK I let them play it but you get my point, but no thanks to Monopoly) There are more than two paths

That's why I won't let my kids play The Game of Life. The Game of Life is one massive invisible script for how you should Real Life. Invisible scripts, a term I learned from Ramit Sethi, are those beliefs that are вЂњpre-written by our societal values.вЂќ Limiting beliefs, which seem to go hand in hand with invisible scripts, are those beliefs that constrain us in some way. We go through life with invisible scripts and limiting beliefs. (or more to the point, it would have messed me up if I believed life had to be lived that way) Here's something I realized much much later вЂ“ the Game of Life kind of messed me up for actual life. (what we really need is The Game of Being a Kid вЂ“ I'll trade being told to eat my vegetables if I don't have to write TPS reports) It was fun because it let you pretend to be an adult while you were a kid. You gave the spinner a whirl, drove your little plastic car around, and вЂњlivedвЂќ life вЂ“ picking career or college, getting married, having kids, buying insurance, upgrading your house, etc. If you were a kid in the 80s, you probably played it too. When I was a kid, one of my favorite games was The Game of Life.

Game of life career cards