Life. Beautiful; infinitely diverse; unbearably painful & challenging; rewarding and glorious; utterly limited yet seemingly limitless. It is an absolute joy, a pleasure, and a privilege to be alive... especially as a human... and especially in this time!

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For as long as I can remember, I escaped from Real Life by diving into fantasy realms. Science fiction & fantasy, novels & comics, TV & Movies. I could live other lives, on other planets. I could feel in control of my life, the way my story was unfolding, the way my character developed. Imagine my mind-blown-ness when I had the epiphany that we are already all playing the most epic, evolving, varied role-playing game in existence. It is on such a grand scale, that literally every other game, book, movie, or other story you have ever experienced exists WITHIN it.

Because these games and myths and archetypes are all drawn from the game of Real Life, we can find in them many truths, many powerful tools, and many reminders of just how fun life can be. For years I've had this knowing that I would be creating a book breaking down everything I've learned on my journey from depression, escapism, addiction, and self-hate to joy, excitement, healing, connection, and purpose. [And plenty of things I wouldn't say I've learned yet as I'm still working on internalizing & embodying them.]

Finally, in November of last year, this knowing that had been floating around in my head and coming up in conversations burst into the physical world! In 2 weeks, while staying with my friends @truniversal, @joycamp-benny, @holarchy, and @seededvision, page after page came through. I went from never having written a word of it, to pumping out a 25-page Google Doc.

Since that time, more and more little pieces have fallen into place, things have become clearer, and I've been working on fleshing out the scope, layout, and flow of the book. It became really clear to me a couple of months ago that what I am actually creating is the container, and that I don't need to write this whole book. Have you ever seen an RPG source-book that has an "author's" name on it? Of course not, they have the name of the game on the front, and inside is a list of the whole team who created it. This realization was SO profound, and it's been a weight off my shoulders to come to this clarity, and now I can feel the momentum building in that direction!!

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The Vision

The idea behind this book is actually pretty straight-forward & simple on its face. I am creating a source-book, equivalent to the Player's Handbook, to help guide people through taking control of their own experiences, to maximize the effectiveness & joy in their lives, to understand the way the game works and how we can play within those rules. Using stories & archetypes from sci-fi & fantasy, along with specific structures & guidelines from a variety of role-playing games, we will be breaking down everything needed to live an expansive & joyous life.

The book is going to be 100-150 pages long, filled with images & graphs, with about the back 1/4 being an appendix offering deeper research sources for all of the topics brought up in the book. This is effectively a quick-start guide, giving just enough to start the gears turning, and then directing folks to hundreds of books, documentaries, and projects which they can pursue to dive deeper into whichever topics are present for them at the time.

From the front, I want the book to have a tome-like feel to it, similar to the PHB image above. With varied & entertaining images throughout, writing from many different creators (hoping to get @larkenrose to write a piece on Tolkien's ring of power as a metaphor for statism), as well as plenty of charts & graphs to help expound some of the concepts.

Everyone involved in the creation of the book will be listed in the credits, will receive free copies of the physical books when they happen, and I'm brainstorming the best way to distribute earnings from the project. To begin with, the funding will all be used to get the physical copies printed, but I see this project having untold potential for growth & reach.

The Needs

This project needs you! Just last week, @phillyc wrote the first submission to the project, and I'm feeling excited & overjoyed to see the idea spreading, the container unfolding, and the energy & thoughts of others coming in!

If you are an artist, a writer, or even if this project just aligns with you, please get involved. We need all sorts of artwork, input of further learning to include in the appendix, LOTS more content. If anything wants to come through you, please reach out, if you've already written something that fits or could with minor tweaking, please reach out. If you just have ideas for a category or section, but have no desire/skill to write it, please reach out!

If you feel called to get involved in this project, you are more than welcome to contact me directly (Discord: ), and if you want to post things on Steemit connected to this, please use #realliferpg so it can all show up in one place :-)

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The Status

So far, the book is almost exclusively from my brain, and I'm looking to change that in big ways. I'm going to lay out here what the structure looks like so far, including links to all of the sections that have been put on Steemit (all of which are still WIP as well)

• Introduction
• Welcome to ‘Real Life’
  • Is Real Life an open world or linear RPG?
  • Open World - Create Your Own Storyline
  • Don’t act like a Non-Player Character (NPC)
  • There Are No NPCs - The Need For Consent
  • Key Principles of the Game World
  • The Tao / The Force / Divine Order
  • The Hero’s Journey
• Character Creation
  • Birth & The Early Years
  • The Importance of your Personal Vision
  • Character Classes by @phillyc
  • Some Example Classes
  • Alignment
  • The Brain
  • Layers of Decision Making & Mental Programming
  • Traumas: Curse & Opportunity
  • Skills, Mastery, “Progression”
  • Being/Finding a Teacher
• Playing the Game
  • Your Body - The only piece of equipment you have your whole life
  • You are what you eat
  • One life to live, Real Life is hardcore
  • Relationships
  • How Relationships Shape Your Character
  • Ability & Skill Checks: The Importance of Confidence
  • Quests/Missions
  • Questlines/Campaigns
  • Get out of your Comfort Zone
  • Communicating with other players (PM, LFG)
  • The “Mainstream” = Meta-Gaming
  • Currencies, and the Exchange of Energy
  • The World, Zones/Servers, Governments
  • Inventory, Stuff, and Attachment
  • Guilds/Clans = Tribes, Corporations, and Governments
  • The value of gaming in-game
• The Many Kinds of Magic
  • The Elements: Ayurveda & Chinese Medicine
  • Sacred Geometry
  • Plant Magic
  • Magic the Gathering: Lands as Energy
• The Current Patch/Expansion
  • Religions/Gods/Extraplanars
  • A Return to the Village
  • The Recent History and Current State of Currency
  • Heroes/Exalted Players Characters
• Appendix

Opening a Portal

Please, please give ANY feedback & ideas that you have, please pass this on to your friends who would be excited & might want to get involved. I'm ever moving forward with the project myself, but it feels SO much better, and I know the end result will be SO much more powerful by opening it up for others to get involved and co-create with me!

Thanks for playing the game, thanks for stepping up and taking responsibility for your life. Things just keep getting better, the paradigm shift is upon us, and I really see this project as something that can help many people step into their own fullness!

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