Sometimes life is like Tetris

Do you know the feeling when you played something for a while and then stop. You go back to the real world but your mind still applies the same thinking patters like in the game? You brain still recognises shapes everywhere and tries to stack objects?

Since games often consist of obstacles and problems thrown at the player, you can be stuck in that problem-solving mode. Your brain might take a while to transition back.

Recently, when I finished a session of rapidly falling blocks, I still had the visuals in my head when I switched from the game to a conversation. My inner eye could still see the shapes and patterns in front of me. Until my brain finally ended up back in reality.

That’s when this metaphor came to my mind:

Sometimes life is like Tetris

You go through life and collect non tangible things sich as experience and connections. Let’s envision them as blocks for now.

Then you move through life and collect more and more; education, training, certificates, jobs. All make up building blocks of your life. And you build layer by layer.

Sometimes it fits perfectly and your CV is perfect and you land that new job. You align a full row (called Tetris in the very same game) and it’s great.

Other times it doesn’t fit as nicely; you don’t land the job you wanted or a project derails. Its like you’ve built a stack with gaps and can’t complete the row. Things seem to go haywire.

As you go along more blocks are thrown your way. More opportunities come along. And quite often there comes a series of blocks that just match wonderfully! This one goes here, that one over there. Boom, Tetris!

Building blocks of your life

In my mind I see the blocks as your achievements, jobs you had, people you met, a business you build, networks you create.

Sometimes things don’t seem to add up or don’t see to go the right way; the new role you got doesn’t fit into your career as expected, that Side-project you started doesn’t seem to lead anywhere.

And then there it is, the 1×4 block that will save the day! It all makes sense now; you met someone through the job you started and later you start working on that side-project of yours together and it’s great!

I’ve seen that in my life too: did something here, then there, worked on this then that. Years later I got to use it all again in my own business. The blocks fell into the right places. Tetris!

What am I getting at?

• Blocks coming at you are new opportunities
• Don’t wait for the one piece forever, use the blocks you have
• You have to keep playing to find opportunities