Missing the Point

Owen has the games that you all remember from your wee days--Memory, Candy Land, Chutes & Ladders. The funny thing about playing with him is that he has no concept of winning. You can tell him until you are blue in the face that the point is to get to the end first or collect the most matches, and it won't make the least difference. In each game, he has his very own goal. In Memory it is to get the pair of cards that he likes the best (the birthday cake). In Candy Land he loves the gingerbread space (near the VERY beginning of the path) and yearns to draw that card. And in C & L he only wants to climb the tallest ladder (not so he can get near the end, but simply for the joy of climbing it). I am a very competitive individual, and this way of playing games makes me want to tear out my hair. And then the other day, I realized that I live out his game theory on occasion. I become so fixated on some random goal or idea, that I miss the whole point of the journey. And I imagine that God is watching, trying to tell me that the point is not to find the stinking birthday cake cards, but I'm so determined, I can't hear Him. And then when I don't get the birthday cake match, I freak out, and can't be happy with the perfectly good pair of dinosaur cards that I found.