Osu! and the Ego, holding on and letting go

In many games and human disciplines in general, there are many ways to improve your ability and performance. Whether that be trying a different technique or using various analogies and abstractions to understand an idea in a different way. For example we often consider graphs or diagrams in maths and science in order to gain an understanding and intuition for the topic, taking advantage of our ability to easily understand 2d and 3d spaces as humans. For more mature and complex fields there are many such improvement strategies, but for newer and less complex/decomposable fields like Osu!, there exists a smaller bank of strategies to pull from, and the dominant advice you will find on internet forums is just to “play more”. And while it’s undoubtedly the main way to get better at a game as mechanically intensive as Osu! I was left unsatisfied all the same.

So while trying to come up with ways to be better at Osu!, I stumbled on something interesting - ego gets in the way of flow. You see, Osu! is a game that requires a high degree of focus for many minutes, and small mistakes can be costly for your score and rank. As a competitive person I would often berate myself and compare myself to others in my head when I missed, which would result in more misses since my focus was no longer solely on playing the game. What if I could play without distracting myself constantly? Is it possible to induce this kind of flow state in myself? How do I lose the self consciousness and completely merge my actions with my awareness? I think the problem can be solved by reducing the involvement of the ego while playing.

Now when I refer to ego, I am referring to it more as it is understood in Buddhism, as an individuals conscious identity. In other words, it is the thoughts you have about yourself. Are you quiet or loud? Are you a happy person or sad? analytic or empathetic? When you answer these questions you see what type of conscious identity you hold about yourself. When you feel insulted the ego is what takes the hit. If you are called stupid, the ego is what rises up and says “I don’t want to be viewed that way!”, or “ok I know, but I still feel bad because society looks down on less intelligent people”. It all depends on whether you consider yourself as smart or stupid.

When I play Osu! or study for an exam, or speak to someone, or do many of the things in my life in general, my ego is constantly telling me I must be better, I must do this to a high standard, I must succeed more than others, because this is the type of person I am. But there are a set of things we do, not primarily because the ego tells us to, but because we have a deep interest in them, because of our constantly evolving biological programming - the parts of yourself that are automatic and unconscious. These types of activities often invoke almost magical, self evident and resonant feelings inside ourselves. For example: the feeling of being fully engrossed in the sound of a song you like, or the feeling of the wind in your hair while sitting on your favorite bench at your favorite park. Why do you want to create art or write to express yourself? Why do you have a particular favorite color? If you keep digging into the answers for these questions, I would wager that they don’t have easy, ego based answers for most people.

Now don’t get me wrong, I also enjoy the ego involved parts of becoming better at Osu! the same as anyone else, the joy of knowing how far you’ve come, the happiness you get from knowing you are a top n% player. But I think playing Osu! is also one of those activities I am just drawn to. I found that when I tried to focus on that while playing, to fully engross myself and be present in that moment, it was easier to perform better and enter into a flow state, tapping into those positive feelings.

Imagine what we could accomplish if we could create what we want to create, connect with others and express ourselves without first thinking, how will I be perceived? or Is this behavior consistent with my self identity? It’s in those thoughts that we often lose the point of why we are doing it in the first place, and we turn something that should be enjoyable into an uncomfortable and unsatisfiable chore.