OK, is it just me or is anyone else completely addicted to the New York Times daily games?

Like many, I’m besotted with Wordle, but the one that really has my heart is the SpellingBee. Words + puzzles: my jam!

I’m now going to contravene every bit of maternal advice ever drummed into my head by a mother who feared above all other things that I would succumb to the danger of having “a big head.”

Ready?

I regularly attain the GENIUS level.

Now, this post isn’t about what a genius I am, I promise. But getting genius level in my daily SpellingBee fix has reminded me that all of us can attain genius level with a few simple strategies. This holds true whether we’re playing a game or writing a poem or building a company.

Don’t give up.

I know: too simple, right? But actually, I think we all give up way too easily.

Here’s my pro-strategy here: when I get stuck, I stop and do other things. But I always come back, and suddenly the letters show me things that were previously invisible.

Same thing with any problem. Walk away, clear your head, and return when you’re refreshed. Commit to doing this as many times as necessary until you win through.

And honestly, once you’ve decided not to give up, the battle is all but won. The decision itself is the genius move.

Be willing to try dumb things and things you know are wrong.

The point here is to just keep moving, keep fiddling, keep at it. You have to stay in the game to see what’s possible. I try words I know are utter nonsense and just as I’m about to hit “enter,” I spot an actual word.

Yesterday, I was helping a wonderful writer come up with titles for her book. She was deeply attached to one particular title and so it was hard to imagine anything else. I invited her to come up with the silliest, dumbest, funniest titles she could. We made a list of ten or so and had a good laugh – and then she came up with one that may well go on to become the title of the book.

It was the playfulness, the willingness to be wrong, that shook that loose.

Same for any problem or anything we wish to create.

Think in patterns.

Words, after all. follow a number of familiar patterns. If the 7 letters include I, N, and G, it’s pretty clear that a lot of your words will in “-ing.” If you have an X, chances are good it will pair with an E at least some of the time.

We do this all the time in poetry. How is a cat like the sun? To answer this we think through all the qualities of cats and then all the qualities of the sun, and then we draw lines between the lists.

Here, too, we’re picking up the thing – the problem, the game, the poem, the person, the book, whatever – and holding it out at different angles, going deeper into our observation and understanding.

It takes time but honestly, it’s great FUN.

Spelling Bee may well have other lessons for me and if so, I’ll be sure to come back here to share them.

How about you?

  1. Do you play these games? Others? If so, let me know so I can get addicted to still MORE games. 🙂
  2. What strategies would you add to these Genius moves? I’d love to hear.

Thank you, as ever, for visiting me here!

Photo by İbrahim Özdemir on Unsplash

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