I always dare to steal the idol. Which
renders the question, (do you dare take the idol?), at the beginning of
temple run rather redundant. After all, why else, would one have clicked on the
icon, the anguished face set in gleaming gold.
It’s a game I played as a
four-year-old, and it’s a game I play now.
Over the intervening 13 years, I
can’t quite see much improvement in graphics, the main character is still oddly
angular against the scenery, and the apes? gorillas? chasing him are
even more uncomfortably rendered.
Even so, it’s an interesting experience.
I’m not much of a video game person.
Which is perhaps obvious, considering I just referred to the avatar as the main
character. (wait, what do the kids even call it these days?)
However, the purpose of this blog
post, inasmuch as these blogposts are purposeful, is not highly unskilled
musings on video game graphics, but to answer why I play this particular video
game.
In the Bhagvad Gita, Krishna sanctifies exercise as a form of worship. He states that
exercise, as with all other forms of disciplined activity done with a disregard
towards the end, are akin to sacrificial offerings.
This definition of an act, worship, through the
thought processes it is comprised of, disciplined thought and detachment,
fascinated me.
In this blog post, I wanted to define meditation similarly.
I should start with the disclaimer that my knowledge
of meditation is about as deep and profound as my knowledge of video games. Most
of my experiences of meditation have been with school. Our yoga teacher
interspersing her soothing chants with screams of “Stop
giggling”, was perhaps not the most wholesome meditative experience. (Another
experience of meditation is Lumosity Mindfulness,
which I unsuccessfully tried to use to fall asleep for a brief period of time. (The
instructors sweet, soulful voice haunts my nightmares to this day))
Well, from my very, very shallow conception of
meditation, I’ve always found meditation to be the controlling of your thoughts,
pinning your mind down. However, I’ve always found it more helpful, to think of
meditation as allowing though to flow.
When I think about thought, thought is non-verbalized
words. Eg, “Aghhh I’m starving how much longer is this
going to take”, I thought.
But prior to that is the clearly disparate sensation
of hunger, the physical symbolisms, the ache in the stomach, the increasing
irritability.
I’m fascinated by that liminal space between
sensation and conceptualization.
But in between those two regions of feeling
something, is what come after the physical feeling, but before the words, the
conceptualisation. I find that liminal space between sensation and
conceptualisation fascinating because it’s by definition undefinable.
I can’t quite write about that zone because that
would be going to the conceptualisation zone. To begin to write about it, is to
immediately leave that space, because it is a space without words.
It’s an ineffable place, but let’s call it the
impulse zone.
Thus, meditation to me, is clearing the obstruction
of words from the pipeline from impulse to action. Mediation is any act that allows
thoughts to flow fast and most freely, without the fetters of words.
To me, Temple Run is exactly that clear road from
impulse to action.
It demands every cent of my non-habitual gamer’s attention.
A split second is all it takes, for your avatar to
die with a resounding, thwack.
Nascent words are crushed by the relentless turns, the gaps in the road, the abrupt
coin showers.
You are but your thumb and index finger, you are but
the slant of your wrist.
You are in the liminal space.
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