Akash Bhat

How to use RPG Games to figure out what to do with your life

Social media and movies have convinced us that we can be anything. Do everything. Pivot constantly. Reinvent ourselves every six months.

You can't, my friend. Accept it. You have limited time, specific talents, and if you're ambitious, you need to stop farting around and figure out what they are.

I keep meeting people who are completely overwhelmed by modern career choices. I was one of them. I've changed my hobbies and side hustles approximately a hundred and forty seven times. Instead of focussing on marketing and writing, I tried building my own SaaS, I started a dog walking company, and in 2022 I went to half a dozen web3 meetups with no technical ability and one ninja cat NFT, all because of the FOMO.

So I started thinking about this differently a few years ago, and weirdly, the clearest framework I found came from video games.

Stick with me. If you don't play games. Even if you think gamers are gross for alternating between doritoes and their keyword with no napkins involved.

Step 1: Figure out your class

In RPGs like DOTA or World of Warcraft, every character has a class. A warrior. A healer. An archer. A mage. And the game breaks down when you try to do things with a class that is not built for.

For the non-gamers: think Lord of the Rings.

Gimli (chubby dwarf with big beard) is your bruiser/tank. Runs into a crowd of orcs, happy as a puppy in mud, solves problems with sheer force. Ask him to analyse a situation or plan strategy? And he will break.

Legolas (lean blonde archer who does shampoo ads) is your analyst. Reads the battlefield from a distance, picks off threats before they become your problem, precise and preemptive. He is not, however, the one you want giving the pre-battle speech.

Aragorn (handsome, masculine guy with a stubble and sword) leads. Not because he's the prettiest, but because he knows how to direct everyone else's energy toward a single outcome. He's the one who makes the whole thing work.

The fellowship functions because everyone knows their role and stops trying to be someone else.

Here's the uncomfortable bit: you have a role too. And most of your career frustration probably comes from trying to play the wrong one.

I'm not gonna ask you to go and change your career overnight because you got that home loan and all that debt from your last holiday to Paris, right? This guide can help you find out what you should do for your primary job/career, or even your side hustle.

These are the ten classes (or kinds of people) that I've identified. Read them slowly. One or two will feel uncomfortably accurate.

1. The Creator — writers, designers, coders, builders. You make things. You just hate selling them.

2. The Seller — you can talk anyone into anything. You thrive on targets and hate sitting still. Deep work makes you want to die.

3. The Connector — you know everyone, you introduce people constantly, and you're able to bring people together for small or big gatherings, and help them consolidate their energy behind a cause or a good time.

4. The Strategist — big picture. Long term. You love frameworks. You hate being asked to "just execute." You like to plan, think things through, and you're currently wasting time accumulating points on 7 different credit cards.

5. The Leader — people follow you, even when you haven't asked them to. They confide in you, even though you don't want to hear about their problems. The weight of decision-making doesn't crush you. It energises you. In your head, you wonder why people can't see as clearly as you do.

6. The Operator — you are the reason things actually happen. You run the engine. You optimise. Did they just want more done in less time? No problem, you'll find a way or burn the midnight oil. You scoff at strategy, have disrespect for tier 1 MBAs and learn more and more about high-performance execution whenever you can. Without you, every leader's vision is just a PowerPoint.

7. The Analyst — data, research, patterns. You're skeptical of gut-feel decisions and you're usually right to be. You have an excellent chess.com score or you like playing the stock market with properly studies picks, and you talk less, listen more in groups, and can tell who's lying, who's hurting, who hates you, and who really likes you when they have no business doing so.

8. The Problem-Solver — you get obsessed with broken things. You cannot leave a puzzle alone. Engineering, product, tech — anywhere there's something to fix. You fought your grandparents for the morning newspaper to play sudoku and you think a 1000 piece puzzle is a good way to spend a Sunday. You like escape rooms and think they're too easy.

9. The Explorer — startups, new markets, R&D. You are allergic to routine. Your problem is finishing things. You love trying new tools and products and are an early adopter of most things.

10. The Caregiver — people open up to you. You thrive in one-on-one conversations. You are the last person to self-promote and the first person someone calls in a crisis. You know just what to say when a cow killed someone's boyfriend.

You will be able to identify with one primary class and one secondary class. That combination is your starting class. Work with it.

Step 2: Look at your childhood

Robert Greene said this, and I think it's the most underrated career advice out there.

What did you do as a kid, before anyone told you to? Before grades, before "career prospects," before you started optimising for other people's approval?

Ask yourself honestly:

A kid who was always drawing and telling entertaining stories is probably a Creator.

A kid who mediated during fights and negotiated better outcomes is clearly a Seller.

A kid who everyone came to with their problems is a Caregiver who doesn't know it yet.

A kid who everyone wanted on their project team is probably an amazing Operator who doesn't know it yet.

A kid who started fun quirky clubs or pulled friends together for hobbies like zine making or discovering new bits of Korean culture is a Connector that doesn't know it yet.

I had nine imaginary friends as a child. Which either makes me a creator, or deeply lonely. Probably both :P

Step 3: Confirm it in adulthood

Childhood gives you clues. Adult experience tells you whether those clues were real.

Ask yourself :

If you are not able to answer these questions, ask someone who knows you well. Ask your parents, ask your friends, ask your colleagues, ask your therapist.

A Creator stuck in a pure sales role will feel like they're performing a role they didn't audition for. A Connector doing isolated analytical work will slowly lose their mind. A Strategist asked to "just execute" will resent every single day.

If your job doesn't match your class, that isn't a motivation problem. It's a mismatch problem.

Step 4: Build secondary skills but don't confuse yourself

In RPGs, a tank can learn some magic. But they will never cast spells like a mage. And that's perfectly alright. They have an edge over other tanks, and more importantly they are able to augment their brutal abilities with a bit of magic.

You can develop secondary skills:

The key is knowing which secondary skills will amplify your primary class — versus which ones you're chasing because you think you should want them.

Step 5: Ignore the noise

This is so important.

Social media will constantly surface someone doing something new and making it look easy. A friend pivots to UX design. Someone quits their job to travel and somehow monetizes it. A 24-year-old you went to college with is now a "founder." Someone around you might be going to Web3 meetups like it is 2022 but you don't have to.

Yes, you'll feel that pull. That maybe you're missing something. That maybe their class is better than yours.

I promise you, it is not.

High performers master one archetype/class before branching out. The ones who look like they're doing everything are usually very good at one thing and have built enough around it to make it look varied.

Double down on what you're naturally built for. Use hobbies to explore the rest. Don't let FOMO eat your compound interest.

My friend Rainar told me, the ones who are known for doing something well, didn't stop doing it for a very long time. Expertise and reputation compound.

So if you feel you are not doing the right thing in life, remember friend, you're not lost. But you might just be playing the wrong class.

And its a real modern anxiety: everyone feels like they should be a founder, creator, investor, traveler, writer, athlete, and productivity monk at the same time.

Figure out the right one. Double down and dive deep into it. Let your expertise compound. Stop re-spawning at level one in a new, wrong class every six months.