Candy Crush Focus

Leadership (and life) lessons are everywhere .... even in a silly game we waste time with on our phones. Today I thought I’d share with you a few of the things I've been thinking about that I've learned from Candy Crush. (and in case you’re not familiar with it, Candy Crush is a somewhat obsessive game that I may or may not play once in a while on my phone : )

Candy Crush is all about knowing what your task or goal is for each level, and then concentrating on reaching that goal. If you don't pay attention, you're run out of moves before you've gotten enough "candies" to complete the level. With the new year and many people setting goals for 2023, it seemed like a good time to talk about the need to focus on those goals, which is a lot of what I think Candy Crush can show us.

The Candy Crush Focus:

Just when you get comfortable with what you’re doing, something changes.

Candy Crush starts out slow and easy --- all you have to do is “clear the jellies.” Each time you do it, you move up a level, and it becomes a little harder, but essentially, you still just have to clear the jellies. And just when you feel pretty good about your “mastery”, it changes up --- you all of the sudden have to move a cherry or acorn down the row, or get a certain combination of candies, or clear all of the blue or red candies. You can never just sit back and know you’ve totally got this game, because right when you do, something changes. Sound at all familiar???

You have to focus on the goal.

Once you get a little ways into the game, each level has a different focus. Some levels focus on clearing the jellies, and that’s the easy part. But some focus on getting combinations of candy bursts and striped candies, or getting a certain number of green and blue candies only. If you’re not paying attention to the goal, you can never win. You have to plan your strategy to match the goal, and keep that goal in mind as you play the game. Otherwise you lose focus and although you might clear all of the jellies, or get 20 candy bursts, you still don’t beat the level because you haven’t met the goal. 

One thing to remember with this is that your focus needs to be on your goal for that specific level. You can't just think that your end goal is to reach level 2000 (or something like that) .... you need to have smaller goals to complete or beat each level. Knowing where you want to go - having a big end goal - is great, but the knowing the smaller steps that will get you there is what is really needed for steady movement toward that end goal. 

Celebrate the wins

Candy Crush celebrates every single level you beat with a BIG todo! (or tada!)! With lots of music, confetti and fish flying all around, flashing words like “Super Awesome,” “Delicious,” “Sweet,” “Divine!” and all kinds of other stuff. It’s really not that big of deal to finish a level, and honestly, I get impatient waiting for the celebration to finish, but still, the game is big into celebrations. Maybe we should be a little more “Candy Crush-like” in celebrating the small stuff too, and in celebrating the small stuff when those we lead and mentor complete a "level" or even just a task. It's something to consider, don't you think?

And that’s all for today …. if you play Candy Crush, enjoy! If you have not played and think you want to see what it's about, my advice to you is to keep the goal for each level as your focus and don't get complacent ... and celebrate when you get that big win!