What's on your bingo card? The Game

Life's the caller; you're the player ... let's see what life brings us.

Life bingo … what’s coming your way?

If you’re still on what some of us still call “Twitter,” you may have come across Ryan Hamilton, a new voice on the political abortion scene. Ryan and his wife went through a traumatic pregnancy that needed to be terminated but ran afoul of the Texas anti-abortion laws. Thankfully, Ryan’s wife survived and he started telling their story … and began getting a lot of push back from the anti-abortion crowd. This just seemed to energize Ryan and his voice is gaining strength.

One morning a commenter said to Ryan:

“Ryan IDK if being a national women's health care educator was on your 2024 BINGO card but you are such a light. Thank you for your voice. Thank you for your energy. Thank you for continuing!”

Recently, the bingo card metaphor has been used frequently to highlight surprises, as in “I bet that wasn’t on your bingo card.”

All of this made me wonder if the bingo card idea might not be a fun way to think about our lives … what we want, what we don’t want, and what might completely surprise us. Suddenly, I wanted to see what might be on my bingo card and drew a 25-square bingo card in my journal.

Life Bingo Game Card

How to play the game

First, of course, life is the caller and you are the player, filling in squares on your own card.

List 8 things you want or would like to have happen. Then, list 8 things you would rather not have show up. After that, you’re ready to play by just watching what life brings you. However, you could think of ways to encourage more of what you want to have happen and plan how to deal with those things you’d prefer not to happen. Because, life being life, you’re likely to get some of each.

Also … I set aside the center square for a “major unexpected shift.”

Regardless of what life brings you, you can win this game. As you start to notice things happening in your life, enter one or two word descriptions into an appropriately designated square with an eye to bingo-ing a row, column or diagonal. Set up some of your own “prizes” for bingos … plus, I will comp a three month subscription for each bingo if you share a comment about your own experience with the game.

Starting now … and the little things count

My first squares: I had just set my board up when I received an email invitation to participate in an open-entry art exhibition with the university. Since it wasn’t on my “wanted” or “not wanted” list but it is a surprise, I entered it in one of my “surprise” boxes.

A couple of days later, I unexpectedly discovered a piece of my Personal Knowledge Management (PKM) system (more about this later in the Messy Organizational Tools Series). And, this weekend I attended a Solstice Festival which has always been a favorite and wound up feeling disappointed. This reaction needs more thought but I put it in a “not wanted” square, so I’ve got a vertical going, and needs one “not wanteds” and one “wanted.” It’s interesting to be staying open to acknowledging what I don’t want, which I would normally just slide by.

Would love to have some of you come play bingo with me.

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P.S.

Kristi Keller

and I have recommended two title evaluators recently. I’ve been “testing” them and thought you should know that the title for this post received a 50% rating from one and a 100% rating from the other. ;-(

When I added “The Game” to the title, the score went down on one to 92% and up on the other to 51%. It also sent me the feedback that the title was perceived as negative. I’m using it anyway.

I still think using these analyzers can help us think more deeply about our titles, so here’s the links to them again …

Omnisend

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