“Once in awhile you get shown the light, in the strangest of places if you look at it right,” is a broadly applicable line written by a recently departed favorite poet/lyricist of mine. More on him in a later post. But this week, while trolling Youtube for inspirational guitar content, I came across two pre-teen sisters who reside in rural Japan. You suspect I speak of Satsuki and Mei*. No. I speak of Audrey and Kate.
I am a guitarist. I play for fun and the adulation of adoring masses. Which means I play for fun because there currently are no adoring masses. Many people would say I’m pretty good. I think I’m a hack. But, I have been fortunate to play in bands with many people better than me, and that has made me much better. So much so, I even get paid to play these days.
This week I came across a video of 10-year-old Audrey Shida absolutely slaying Slayers song “War Ensemble.” Now, I am no fan of metal, thrash, screamo, death metal, or any of the other genres where ‘shredding” is the ultimate compliment that can be given to a guitarist. But I challenge you to watch this video and not be blown away by the technical proficiency and the outright endearing nature of Audrey’s skills and her sister Kates pluck. These two could be Satsuki and Mei.
Audrey got good because of “Rocksmith.” This is no silly Guitar Hero where you use a contrived instrument. This software builds real skills through “Gamification.” Gamification relies on practical psychology and is applied at the largest, most successful companies to motivate employees.
What exactly is Gamification? One of the simplest forms of Gamification is getting a stamp every time you buy a coffee. Collect ten stamps, and you get a free drink. It’s like completing a level and getting a reward.
Online, it could be the use of gaming elements like leaderboards, progress bars, and loyalty points. These tricks tap into our natural instincts: competition, exploration, curiosity.
In fact, it’s a very clever use of psychology.
A great app that gamifies your finances is “Mint.”
How do you Gamify your life? Let’s say we are trying to start a new habit. There are habit tracker apps. I’ve spoken before of the bullet journal, which I use religiously. You can embed simple graphic charts, handwritten, to track habits and Gamify your habit building.
When I want to improve something, I always Gamify it. Let’s say I want to speed up BLOG Post writing. I will track the time it takes me to execute on each element. Each BLOG post is another try to get it done faster with high quality. Or maybe I just estimate how long it will take me to do one task, say review my inbox that has built up 137 messages. I can do that in 40 minutes. Ready, set, go! My stopwatch on my iPhone is launched, and I’m off to the races.
Gamify your life, people! It makes growth fun. And, I’m gonna try Rocksmith. Soon, you’ll be able to hear the dulcet tones of my band “Blue Honey” interpreting “War Ensemble!” Not quite shredding, I imagine.
*My Neighbor Totoro.”
