Game of life

Stock market is a place of tremendous activities. The players in this marketplace try to hit the correct price of the stock(s) which is dynamic itself.

It is like players trying to hit the moving ball in the game of football or hockey. All the players of both the teams make moves in anticipation of the correct position of the ball to hit for placing it inside the opponent’s goal- post. The team that has more hits is declared the winner of that match. But the game never ends and players start preparation for the next match.

In the stock market, the two opponent teams are called bulls and bears. Bull is a player who thinks that the price of a stock will move up. He is an optimist. On the contrary bear is pessimist in approach who feels that the price of a stock will go down.

Both the players have their own reasons, analysis and information about the price movement of a stock. The actual price is a combined output of several internal (performance, growth potential, image or goodwill of the company etc) and external (Government policies, economic environment, demand and supply position of the product etc).If the price moves up bulls gets benefited and vice-versa.

In this game the number of players is not limited or fixed. In fact, as the number of players increases, the game becomes more dynamic and interesting. The other noticeable difference is that any player can change or switch the team any time. A bull can decide to play bear and a bear can change his/her outlook and become bull at any point of time.
Then there are brokers who make profit from both the parties in a deal and there are also regulatory bodies to act as referees.

The price keeps on moving up and down (both logical and erratic moves) and there are gainers or losers with every move. The endless cycle goes on making newer highs and lows. There are some big players who can manipulate the price to some extent for a short duration. There are also small investors or traders whose number is the strength and who collectively can also change the direction of market for sometime.

Many people make huge money in stock market with most of their moves. These are two types of people. First category is hard working and knowledgeable people who makes very correct assessment of future. The others are the simple souls who show courage and gamble and get favorable results by chance. The money is made by a set of decisions- buying on low price and selling at high. The timing of these two is very critical.

But most of the people also loose money in stock markets. These are the people operating from fear and greed. They buy and hold stocks due to greed and sell due to fear. And they do not analyze themselves nor gamble boldly (without attachment).There timing is ‘out of sync’. They work on the tips from others. Due to leverages available in the market sometime people loose or gain many times of their actual capability.
Like a playground and stock market, our life is also such platform where we see similar moves and activities. We all take small actions/moves with time which are based on either our analysis or our gamble instincts. Some people are gainers most of the time. They gain physically, financially, emotionally and psychologically. These are considered successful people. Then there is lot of common people. They gain sometime and loose many times. These just miss the perfect timing and keep on learning from there mistakes.
For some activities we play in closed boundaries of family and profession etc where changing team is a rare phenomenon though possible. We change roles with times. Son becomes father /grandfather, employee takes ownership, and friend becomes relative and so on. But number of players in one’s are of influence is limited. This is similar to the setting of game.

In some spheres we can change our position and compete with unlimited players. We gain or loose depending upon matching of our outlook (optimistic or pessimistic) with the reality. WE invest our energies accordingly and keep on changing our outlook .This is similar to the setting of a stock exchange.

As we change our positions with time, so is everyone else. The complete system is dynamic. On every issue there would be normally two extreme/opposite of views by people-be it expert or ignorant. Only time will prove, ‘which one is correct’?

We can learn some tips from our experience of games and stock market and apply to life to make it interesting. Some suggestions are given below in this regard-

1. Others may have different views than yours. They are not your enemies or friends. Learn to respect them. If you are right on some issue, others need not be wrong. Do not discard other’s point of view even it looks silly by your standards.
2. Be a good sport-person. Learn to accept the decision of referee, even it appears wrong. Also learn to accept defeat the same way you accept victory.
3. After the event (match/ transaction) is over, don’t get emotionally attached to it. You have to take new positions according to new game field/ market. The cycle will never end, though the pattern may repeat.
4. If you are hurt by someone, don’t take it personally. He/she is just another player or speculator like you. Forgive him/her and learn from the failures.
5. Try to come over ‘greed and fear’; otherwise you will waste your energies.
6. No one is perfect all the time. It applies to you and your guru also. Whole truth can never be available in the limited view finder of individual mind machine.
7. Only dead does not have capability to change. The beauty of life is its dynamics.
8. Life is series of choices. Invest your energies with care and take positions with due considerations to all available details. At each point of time, you have to choose one of two opposite choices.
9. Each individual is unique. You project your identity/impression in the world by the series of choices you make.
10. Decide on each issue, whether you want to become leader or follower. Leaders live life like passengers of executive class. They have abundance of facilities and attention. They can write their own rules, but are lonely at the top. Followers are the crowd of economy class bound by strict rules and regulations and avail limited facilities. But they have abundance of relationships and emotions.
11. Do participate actively in the game of life unless you are too old to become a judge or too young to just be the spectator.