What Cookies Taught me About Automation

All he said was, “Check this game out, but don’t get too addicted.”

Our buddy, Adam, said this as he smiled and went back to what he was doing. One by one, I saw this game take the lives of my friends and they became trapped in their new addiction.

Luckily for me, I stopped at 17 cookies. I knew if I kept going, I wouldn’t be able to escape.

But what was this game that took the lives of my friends?

Cookie Clicker. And that is exactly how the game works. You click on a giant cookie, and you receive cookies for every click. Do you want 50 cookies? Simply click on the cookie 50 times. You can also spend your cookies to buy ‘power-ups’ to help you generate cookies faster. The cookie counter shows how many you have accumulated so you can show off your baking skills to others.

But why is this game addicting? It depends on the person. Soon, I saw 5 of my friends clicking away and the race was on.

“I’m at a thousand,” said one person.

“Well, I’m at 5 thousand!” said another.

For a few, it became a competition. They would look at their rival’s screen and started clicking faster and faster, until their hand looked like Stephen Hawking’s.

The competition was so strong, but in the end, it was a digital number that didn’t amount to anything but bragging rights.

It became quiet and all you could hear was hundreds of soft clicks.

t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t…

All of the sudden, James yelled “Sextillion Cookies!”

Everyone gathered around his computer screen and couldn’t believe their eyes. How did he get so many cookies and what were those creatures hovering over his screen?

James sat back in his chair and laughed at everyone’s reactions.

Everyone chimed in, “How did you do that?” — “You Cheated!” — “That’s not fair!”

James apparently automated his cookies by installing an auto-clicker (yay automation!), giving him the ability to click 10 times faster than everyone else. He also implemented a few other strategies to give him a huge head start, making it easy to collect sextillion within moments of playing the game.

This reminds me of life. People are constantly playing the game of life through different strategies/motivations:

Competitive – Strictly playing the game to say they are better
Enjoyment- Playing the game, but doesn’t care who wins
Work Ethic – Grinding through each day to better themselves
Philanthropic – Working hard to benefit others around them
Systematic – Using a ‘smarter-not-harder’ approach to play the game

I will often find myself in category #4: Work Ethic. The only problem with this is I tend to get stuck in the ‘rat race’ and can become burned out after some time.

Which category do you fall into when you play the game of life?

Which categories should you belong to instead? I don’t know about you, but I would rather take James’ automation approach. Create a system that will work for you (#5 Systematic) and have fun/relax while you reap the benefits (#2 Enjoyment). This is what automation is all about. Creating a system to reduce stress while increasing happiness.

Think about your life right now. What category have you been falling into lately? Does it make sense to stay there, or would it make more sense to jump to another category (maybe leverage some automation)?

While you are thinking about this, go ahead and collect some cookies on the cookie clicker game!