Tag Archives: #paperback

Celebrating Gameful Blogging on Medium.com

3D image and cover design by Alice Jago

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This week I am celebrating the launch of my new book Gameful Blogging on Medium.com.

One article that served as the last chapter in the book was celebratory as well. It was article number 200 I published on Medium since starting writing and publishing there on April 30, 2020.

You can read it here (it is a free link, meaning that you don’t have to be a Medium subscriber to be able to read it):

To read the book as the whole in a polished and revised shape, as well as to get access to all the original articles on which the book is based, check out on Amazon under Gameful Blogging on Medium.com: Thirteen Levels in the Epic Adventure of a Top Writer and Super Creator on Medium.

If you want to see where else you can find and buy it, check out this page here.

Free Speaking Game for the Self-Gamification Happiness Formula

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Here is the second blog post in a new series featuring videos on YouTube, where I read a short paragraph from one of my motivational books and use it as a prompt to speak freely.

This idea was inspired by the free-writing exercise well-known among writers.  I used dice and timer to turn this free-speaking exercise into fun games. I hope you enjoy watching them and maybe trying out this gameful approach for yourself and tasks you want or need to tackle today.

In this video, I read from my book, Self-Gamification Happiness Formula: How to Turn Your Life into Fun Games.

I am reading a paragraph from “Chapter 9. The Starting Point and the Next Step.”

Here it is if you want to read along, prior, or afterward.

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The prompting paragraph from the
Self-Gamification Happiness Formula

I could do the following in those “odd” places where I don’t have all the tools needed to make progress with my project; and these are the things I could prepare or use before going to those places. (Examples: put a notepad with a pen in the bathroom, print out the chapter of my thesis I am working on to take and read on the commute, download a free app to plot my novel, put a dictionary in the kitchen to look up the words for kitchen appliances in the language I want to learn, in the small breaks while cooking):
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The next step

To take this game to the next level, I invite you to read the book and try out the exercises inside it. To look at Self-Gamification Happiness Formula and buy it on Amazon, click on its title or the image below. Please note that you can buy the book as an e-book, paperback, or audiobook:

If you want to see where else you can buy it, then go to the book’s page on this website here.

Alternatively, you can subscribe to my page, Optimist Writer, on ko-fi for $5 a month, and besides supporting what I do, you will also get access to all my motivational books, which I share there once a month or each time a book is out. Right now, you can get access to five of my books there — one upon subscription or one-time support and four in the posts solely for subscribers. Since the beginning of February, the Self-Gamification Happiness Formula is one of these.

Enjoy your day and make it gameful! ?

The Balance Game Gets an Upgrade

My new book Self-Gamification Happiness Formula: How to Turn Your Life into Fun Games is just out, born exactly two weeks ago, and already I am adjusting my latest self-motivational game design, which I call “Balance Game.”

I am adding badges. I had a particular asterisk system to motivate myself to do some things before the others, but this system didn’t work for too long.

Why? There might be many reasons. The asterisk system worked similarly as earning five stars each day. So it wasn’t bringing anything new, and I wasn’t learning anything new, but playing games is about learning. So I got bored. And the asterisk marks were not colorful. Not like my beloved pink stars. There could be many other reasons my clever mind can come up with. But the fact is that I started failing to reach the daily goals I was reaching easily previously.

So there was time for a new upgrade to keep the player (me) engaged.

I did test one badge for one thousand words written in one of my current works-in-progress. But it looks like I want more than one badge. So now I am curious what kind of badges I will come up with. So, I, as a player and designer, can come up with new ones depending on what and when I want to achieve something.

The picture I took today shows four badges:

  • “1k” stands for 1000 words written for my new book.
  • “1W” stands for doing all the wellness tasks (the E (eye gymnastics), SP (practicing straight posture), and W (workout mixed with yoga exercises)) before lunch.
  • “S” stands for calling it a day and going to get ready to bed before 10:30 PM if the following day is a working day, and midnight if the next morning is a weekend or a holiday.
  • “1h” means working for a project for more than an hour apiece.

I can guarantee that there will be more.

If you want to know why I do all that and why such an adjustment of self-motivational game designs is needed, then read the following excerpt from the Self Gamification Happiness Formula:

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There will always be more than one design

I discovered something interesting about myself in relation to project management and the means I used for it. I realized I was under the illusion that one approach or system was a magical solution that I could use from the moment I discovered, tested, and liked it, until forever.

As I continued turning my life into games, I learned that one system/approach for recording and planning tasks might be appropriate (and fun) at some times in my life, but not at others. I used apps, monthly calendars, weekly, daily, Microsoft Excel, sticky notes, etc. All of them were of value at one particular time. Sometimes I used several simultaneously.
Right now, I stick with paper planners. In addition to the family calendar, I use three planners for the following: one for appointments, the second for appointments with myself (i.e., to-do lists), and the third is my self-motivational game feedback system with points and bonus stars. The latter two are the tools I currently use for my application of self-gamification (the same books I mentioned by name in chapter 11, section 2, activity 2).
But even using paper I felt I should have had one perfect system to record my tasks as well as the points. At some point though, I realized this is not only impossible but also unreasonable.

Being different in almost every moment is the main reason.

Thus, don’t stop experimenting. A design for your motivational games that works well today might not be appropriate a month from now. Don’t judge yourself for changing.
Don’t judge yourself for trying to find the perfect design, either. It seems to be normal for us humans to try to find one ideal solution for all time.

Approaching my self-motivational game design as a game in itself was of great help, and a great discovery for me. If I enjoy the game I design, I play it. If not, then just like passionate players of strategic games, I make notes for the next moves, which are to change the design for the next round.

I was curious once to hear Alex Rodriguez (nicknamed “A-Rod,” an American former professional baseball player) when being interviewed by Ellen DeGeneres, describe why he and Jennifer Lopez (“J Lo”) went to a TruFusion bootcamp and liked the new workout approach so much. In other interviews too he has pointed out that doing only one type of fitness is not only boring but also stressful for his body, having had both hip and knee surgery.

Here is the description I found for this new popular workout: “TruFusion is the latest innovation in group fitness offering multiple studios under one roof at an affordable price. With up to 240 group classes weekly in over 65 different styles, TruFusion gyms provide the hottest blend of yoga, kettlebell, Pilates, barre, bootcamp, boxing and cycle classes.” (https://www.franchisegator.com/franchises/trufusion/)

Over sixty-five different styles of classes? Is it any wonder that this style of workout is so popular? It is quite understandable that it never gets boring to practice it.

So, why do we try to find one single way to manage and carry out our projects and activities? The curious thing I observed is that many of us not only try to find one perfect approach to almost everything, but we also try to “sell” something that works well for us now as an ideal solution for everyone for all time.

Why not instead just enjoy what we do and be curious about how we can modify it, along with the change in our interests and behaviors that occurs all by itself?

Here comes the message of awareness, extended to include what we have established about game design and gamification:

Being a kind and honest designer and player of self-motivational games is the key.

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P.S. You can purchase the Self-Gamification Happiness Formula and/or read the complete introduction and part of chapter 1 by clicking here or on the image below: