We often find ourselves playing roles in a grand play. From a young age, someone subtly nudges us onto a stage, hands us a script, and directs us to act according to lines we never wrote.

Take the familiar concept of a board game, like Monopoly. When you first play, you learn the rules. You find out that there's a specific way to move, buy, and win. In *They Would Be Gods*, Anthony Forwood argues this is a metaphor for “social conditioning.” Society hands us our Monopoly rulebook, only instead of property trading, it's full of life's "shoulds." Boys "should" love sports, while girls "should" play with dolls. Adults "should" chase certain jobs, buy particular homes, and live in predefined ways.

Back in the day, our parents and grandparents got their rulebooks from religion and schools. These pages dictated the paths they should walk and the roles they should play. But now, our rulebooks’ authors have expanded. Television shows, billboards, and even harmless product labels etch guidelines into our lives. Imagine if, in a board game, the dice always told young boys to charge forward aggressively. At the same time, girls should take careful, measured steps. Or if game cards pushed certain stereotypes, limiting players' choices. Over time, players would start believing that's the only way to play, even if it's not.

But here's a radical thought: what if we decided to rewrite our rulebook, dive deep past these external cues, and tap into our genuine desires and inclinations? Remember the joy of playing a game for the first time, not to win or follow the rules but to experience and enjoy? That's the essence we must recapture, the unscripted spontaneity before society handed us our roles.

Americans have always celebrated pioneers, trailblazers, and those who dared to toss aside the manual and chart their course. So why should our journeys be any different? After all, the most memorable games aren't those where we follow rules to the letter. Those are where players brought joy, innovation, and their unique flair to the table.