Hilarious Comic on the Philosophy of Competition: Nietzsche, Buddha, and Epictetus Play a Board Game

Board games are a metaphor for life:

Everyone plays differently. Some people are possessed by an all-consuming desire to “win,” while others are happy to simply roll the dice and see what happens.

However you decide to play, one truth remains:

Every now and then, you’re going to get a bad roll of the dice.

How you react to that depends on how you’re playing the game.

As someone who used to be viciously competitive (I nearly got into a fist fight over a game of Cranium once), I loved this cartoon from Existential Comics, which takes the “life philosophy as a board game” idea to an amazing extreme and pits some of the world’s most iconic minds against each other in a game of Sorry!

In one corner we have Friedrich Nietzsche, the famous philosopher, poet, and critic of culture who once stated:

“…the strongest and highest Will to Life does not find expression in a miserable struggle for existence, but in a Will to War, a Will to Power, a Will to Overpower.”

In the other corner, we have the Buddha and the Stoic philosopher Epictetus, both of whom are famous for preaching acceptance and freedom from desire.

It’s a safe bet these fellas play the game differently.

Remember:

There’s no right or wrong philosophy — it’s all about how you choose to play the game.

Sorry! and the Nature of Suffering by Existential Comics

Are you more of a Nietzsche person, or a Buddha person? Choose below: