Choosing the Right Game: Why Finite Thinking Destroys Infinite Relationships

Not too long ago, I wrote about the differences between jutsu, sport, and do martial arts schools and how you need to find the right school for your needs and goals at your stage of life—athlete, warrior, leader, sage.

Here's the framework:

Jutsu schools focus on combat effectiveness—techniques designed to incapacitate or kill. The goal is survival. The mindset is life or death. Win or die.

Sport schools focus on competition—techniques optimized for scoring points within defined rules. The goal is victory. The mindset is win or lose. Keep score.

Do schools focus on personal development—techniques as vehicles for cultivating character, wisdom, and mastery. The goal is continuous improvement. The mindset is journey, not destination. There is no finish line.

Each has its place. Each is appropriate for certain contexts and stages of life.

The problem comes when you use the wrong mindset for the situation you're actually in.

You've heard the joke:

Or in the first Indiana Jones movie, don't bring a sword when your opponent has a gun.

The joke is about being outmatched, bringing inadequate tools to the situation.

But this misses the deeper point.

Too many people bring a sport mindset—transactional, scorekeeping, win-lose—to situations that require a do mindset.

Or worse, they bring a jutsu mindset—kill or be killed, zero-sum, finite—to contexts that are fundamentally infinite.

They're using finite rules for infinite games.

And that's why they're suffering, unfulfilled, and unsuccessful despite working hard and trying their best.

The Finite vs. Infinite Game Framework

Before we go further, let's clarify what we mean by finite and infinite games. This framework comes from James Carse's book Finite and Infinite Games and was popularized in the business world by Simon Sinek.​

Finite Games

Finite games have:

• Known players
• Fixed rules
• Agreed-upon objectives
• A clear endpoint
• Winners and losers

Examples:

• Chess
• Football
• A court case
• An election
• A tournament

The purpose: To win. To beat the opponent. To finish first. To come out on top.

When the game ends: Someone wins, someone loses, and the game is over.

Infinite Games

Infinite games have:

• Known and unknown players
• Changeable rules
• The objective is to perpetuate the game
• No finish line
• No winners or losers—only those still playing and those who've dropped out

Examples:

• Marriage
• Parenting
• Business
• Friendship
• Personal development
• Art
• Community building

The purpose: To keep playing. To stay in the game. To continue the relationship, the business, the practice.

The game never ends: You don't "win" at marriage and retire. You don't "beat" parenting and finish. You don't "conquer" friendship and move on.

The Fundamental Distinction

• In finite games, you play to win.
• In infinite games, you play to keep playing.

This distinction changes everything—how you think, how you behave, how you measure success, how you relate to others.

The tragedy is that most people are playing infinite games with finite mindsets, and they wonder why nothing works.

The Jutsu Mindset: Kill or Be Killed

The jutsu mindset is the most finite of all.

It's designed for literal survival—you or them, live or die. This makes perfect sense when you're actually fighting for your life.

The jutsu mindset:

• Zero-sum: Your gain is my loss
• Adversarial: Everyone is a potential threat
• Short-term: Survive this moment
• Absolute: Win or die
• No trust: Vulnerability is weakness
• Hypervigilance: Constant threat assessment

This is appropriate when:

• You're in actual physical danger
• Someone is genuinely trying to harm you
• The stakes are literal life or death
• The encounter is singular and won't repeat

This is inappropriate—and destructive—when:

• You're in a committed relationship
• You're building a business
• You're raising children
• You're part of a community
• You're trying to maintain friendships

The Jutsu Mindset in Relationships

I've seen people—hell, I've been this person—approach marriage with a jutsu mindset.

What it looks like:

• Every disagreement is a battle to be won
• Vulnerability is weakness to be avoided
• Your partner's needs threaten your autonomy
• You're constantly on guard against being taken advantage of
• You "keep receipts" of every slight to use as ammunition later
• You see your partner as an adversary, not an ally

The result:

• Constant conflict
• Emotional exhaustion
• Inability to trust
• Erosion of intimacy
• Eventually, the relationship dies

Why it fails: Marriage isn't a fight to survive. It's an infinite game you're trying to keep playing together. When you treat your partner as an enemy to defeat, you've already lost the actual game you're in.

The Jutsu Mindset in Business

Some people approach business like warfare—destroy the competition, take no prisoners, win at all costs.

What it looks like:

• Ruthlessly exploiting customers for maximum short-term profit
• Burning employees because they're replaceable resources
• Destroying competitors instead of focusing on creating value
• Cutting corners on quality to maximize margins
• Breaking promises when it's expedient

The result:

• Short-term gains
• Long-term collapse
• Destroyed reputation
• No loyalty from customers or employees
• Eventually, the business dies or becomes unsustainable

Why it fails: Business is an infinite game. The goal isn't to "win" once—it's to stay in business, keep serving customers, continue creating value. When you burn everyone to extract maximum value today, you sacrifice the ability to play tomorrow.

The Sport Mindset: Keeping Score

The sport mindset is less extreme than jutsu, but still fundamentally finite. It's designed for competition within agreed-upon rules where someone wins and someone loses.

The sport mindset:

• Transactional: I did this, so you owe me that
• Scorekeeping: Who's winning?
• Comparative: Am I ahead or behind?
• Rules-based: What's fair according to the rules?
• Win-lose: One person's gain requires another's loss
• Time-bound: The game has an endpoint

This is appropriate when:

• You're actually competing in a sport
• You're in a defined competition with clear rules
• There's an agreed-upon winner and loser
• The competition has a clear endpoint

This is inappropriate—and limiting—when:

• You're in a long-term relationship
• You're building a career
• You're raising children
• You're part of a friendship
• You're contributing to a community

The Sport Mindset in Relationships

This is where I see most people struggle. They're married—on paper or by intent—but they're still making the relationship transactional.

What it looks like:

• "I did the dishes, so you should do laundry"
• "I planned the last date, so it's your turn"
• "I gave up my career for this family, so you owe me"
• "I'm doing more than you are"
• Keeping mental tallies of who's contributing what
• Withdrawing effort when you feel the score is uneven

The result:

• Resentment builds
• Everything becomes a negotiation
• Generosity disappears
• Love becomes conditional
• The relationship feels like work, not partnership
• You're constantly measuring instead of connecting

Why it fails: Marriage isn't a game where someone wins. It's an infinite game where you're trying to build a life together that keeps getting better. When you're keeping score, you're playing the wrong game.

The Sport Mindset in Friendship and Networking

I learned this lesson from Keith Ferrazzi's book Never Eat Alone. As a kid earning money as a golf caddy, Keith witnessed how the wealthy "did business"—and how they never kept score or made it tit-for-tat.

The 80% approach (sport mindset):

• "I helped you, so you owe me"
• "I'm not introducing you to my contact unless I get something in return"
• "What's in it for me?"
• Calculating the value of every interaction
• Only giving when you expect to receive

The 20% approach (infinite mindset):

• Give freely without expecting immediate return
• Make introductions that benefit others
• Add value because you can, not because you must
• Build relationships over decades, not transactions
• Trust that generosity compounds over time

What I experienced with my wealthy friends:

People bash the wealthy without ever knowing any of them. But here's what I've witnessed: The truly wealthy—not the flashy rich, but the genuinely successful—don't keep score.

They make introductions freely. They give advice without billing. They help people without calculating return on investment. They invest in relationships for decades.

Why?

Because they understand that wealth, relationships, and opportunities are infinite games. The goal isn't to extract maximum value from each transaction. The goal is to stay in the game, keep building, continue creating value.

When you stop keeping score, something magical happens—people want to be around you, help you, include you. Opportunities appear that would never emerge in a transactional relationship.

But this only works if you're genuinely playing the infinite game, not pretending to be generous while secretly keeping score.

The Do Mindset: The Infinite Game of Mastery

The do mindset—from martial arts schools like Aikido, Judo, Kendo—is fundamentally infinite. Based on the philosophy of Taoism, the goal isn't to win or survive.

The goal is continuous improvement, character development, and the journey itself.

The do mindset:

• Process-oriented: The journey is the destination
• Improvement-focused: Better than yesterday
• Long-term: Decades of development
• Collaborative: Your partner helps you improve
• Humble: Always a student
• No endpoint: You never "finish"

This is appropriate when:

• You're building a marriage
• You're raising children
• You're developing mastery in a craft
• You're building a business meant to last
• You're cultivating friendships over a lifetime
• You're part of a community

This is the mindset required for infinite games.

The Do Mindset in Marriage

When you approach marriage with a do mindset, everything changes.

What it looks like:

• The goal isn't to "win" arguments—it's to understand each other better
• You don't keep score—you invest in making the relationship stronger
• Conflicts aren't battles—they're opportunities to learn and grow
• Your partner isn't an adversary—they're your training partner in life
• There's no finish line—you're committed to continuous improvement
• Success isn't measured by who's ahead—it's measured by whether you're still playing together

The result:

• Deepening trust
• Increasing intimacy
• Conflicts that strengthen instead of damage
• A relationship that gets better over decades
• Partnership that feels generative, not exhausting

Why it works: Marriage is an infinite game. There's no "winning." There's only staying in the game, continuing to build together, deepening the relationship over time. When you adopt the do mindset, you're playing the actual game you're in.

The Do Mindset in Business

Simon Sinek talks about this in The Infinite Game—businesses that last are playing the infinite game.

What it looks like:

• The goal isn't to "beat" the competition—it's to serve customers excellently
• Success isn't quarterly profits—it's staying in business for generations
• Employees aren't resources to extract value from—they're partners in building something lasting
• You don't cut corners for short-term gain—you build quality that creates reputation
• You don't exploit customers—you over-deliver to create loyalty

The result:

• Customer loyalty that lasts decades
• Employees who stay and invest in the mission
• Reputation that compounds
• A business that survives market shifts because it's built on principles, not tactics
• Legacy instead of quick cash

Why it works: Business is an infinite game. The companies that last—Victorinox, Patagonia, The Container Store, Costco—understand this, and that's why I do business with these organizations.

They're not trying to maximize this quarter's profit. They're trying to stay in business while living their values.

The Do Mindset in Personal Development

This is where the martial arts do philosophy truly shines.

What it looks like:

• You're not trying to "beat" anyone—you're trying to be better than you were yesterday
• There's no finish line—black belt isn't the end, it's the beginning (one of my hapkido senior instructors, Eric Friske, told me that getting a 1st dan was basically like graduating high school and after that the real learning begins)
• Failure isn't losing—it's information for improvement
• Other practitioners aren't competitors—they're training partners who help you grow
• The journey never ends—there's always another level of mastery

The result:

• Continuous growth over decades
• No burnout from trying to "win"
• Fulfillment from the process itself
• Community instead of competition
• A life of deepening mastery

Why it works: Personal development is an infinite game. You never "finish" becoming a better person. There's no endpoint where you declare victory and retire. When you embrace this, the pressure to "arrive" disappears, and the joy of the journey emerges.

The Questions That Reveal Your Mindset

Most people don't consciously choose which mindset they're using. They default to whatever they learned growing up or absorbed from culture.

Here are the questions that reveal which game you're playing:

In Your Marriage or Relationship:

Finite mindset questions:

• Who's winning this argument?
• Am I doing more than they are?
• What did I get in return for what I gave?
• How can I prove I'm right?

Infinite mindset questions:

• How can we both understand each other better?
• What would make our relationship stronger?
• How can I contribute without keeping score?
• What does my partner need from me right now?

In Your Business or Career:

Finite mindset questions:

• How do I beat the competition?
• How do I maximize this quarter's numbers?
• How much can I extract from this customer?
• How do I win this negotiation?

Infinite mindset questions:

• How do I create more value for customers?
• How do I build something that lasts?
• How do I develop a team that thrives?
• How do I stay true to our values while growing?

In Your Friendships:

Finite mindset questions:

• What have they done for me lately?
• Am I giving more than I'm getting?
• What will I get if I help them?

Infinite mindset questions:

• How can I add value to their life?
• What do they need that I can provide?
• How can we both grow from this friendship?

In Your Personal Development:

Finite mindset questions:

• Am I better than others?
• When will I be "done" improving?
• Did I win or lose today?

Infinite mindset questions:

• Am I better than I was yesterday?
• What can I learn from this experience?
• How can I continue growing?

The questions you ask reveal the game you're playing.

The Cost of Playing the Wrong Game

When you use finite thinking for infinite games, you set yourself up for failure, frustration, and suffering.

In Relationships:

You can't "win" at marriage. There's no trophy. There's no finish line. There's no scoreboard that declares you the victor.

If you're trying to win arguments, keep score, or prove you're right, you're destroying the actual game—which is building a life together that continues to deepen and improve.

The result: Broken relationships, divorce, loneliness, the feeling that "relationships just don't work for me."

The truth: Relationships do work—but only when you play the infinite game they actually are.

In Business:

You can't "win" at business. There's no final victory. Markets change. Competition evolves. Customer needs shift.

If you're playing to "beat" competitors or maximize short-term profit, you might win quarters or even years. But you'll eventually collapse because you're not built for the long game.

The result: Businesses that burn bright and die fast. Entrepreneurs who succeed once and can't sustain it. Companies that sacrifice their values for growth and lose their soul.

The truth: Business works—but only when you build for longevity, not just victory.

In Personal Development:

You can't "win" at becoming a better person. There's no endpoint where you're "done."

If you're measuring yourself against others or trying to reach some imaginary finish line, you'll either burn out from the pressure or achieve your goal and feel empty because the journey was the point all along.

The result: Burnout, disillusionment, the feeling that "I achieved what I wanted and I still don't feel fulfilled."

The truth: Growth works—but only when you embrace that the journey never ends and that's what makes it meaningful.

How to Shift from Finite to Infinite Thinking

If you recognize yourself playing finite games in infinite contexts, here's how to shift:

1. Identify Which Game You're Actually In

Ask: Is this situation finite or infinite?

• Does it have a clear endpoint and winner? (Finite)
• Or is it ongoing with the goal of continuing? (Infinite)

Most of life—marriage, parenting, business, friendship, personal development—is infinite.

2. Change Your Success Metrics

Finite metrics:

• Who won?
• What's the score?
• Did I beat them?

Infinite metrics:

• Are we still playing?
• Is it getting better over time?
• Am I contributing to the continuation of the game?

3. Stop Keeping Score

In infinite games, scorekeeping destroys the game.

Instead of: "I did this, so you owe me that"
​Think: "How can I contribute to making this better?"

Instead of: "Am I ahead or behind?"
​Think: "Are we both growing?"

4. Focus on the Long Game

Ask: What decision serves the long-term health of this relationship/business/practice?

Short-term wins that damage long-term health are actually losses in infinite games.

5. Shift from "Me vs. You" to "Us vs. The Problem"

In infinite games, your "opponent" is actually your partner.

In marriage: You're not fighting each other—you're both fighting against whatever threatens the relationship.

In business: You're not competing against customers—you're both trying to solve their problem.

In friendship: You're not extracting value from each other—you're both investing in mutual growth.

Conclusion: Are You in This for the Long Haul?

The question that determines everything is this:

Are you in this for the long haul?

If the answer is yes—if you're building a marriage meant to last, a business meant to endure, friendships meant to deepen over decades, a practice of self-improvement that continues for life—then you must adopt the infinite mindset.

And if so, the key is to keep playing the game, not necessarily to win it.

Because can you really win at marriage? What does winning in business look like? For how long? When do you declare victory in personal development and stop growing?

You can't.

These aren't games you win. They're games you play as long as you can, as well as you can, with the goal of continuing to play.

Stop setting yourself up for failure by finite thinking.

Stop trying to "win" your marriage. Stop keeping score with your partner. Stop measuring your business by whether you "beat" the competition. Stop judging your friendships by tit-for-tat transactions.

Start asking the infinite questions:

• How do we keep this going?
• How do we make this better over time?
• How do I contribute without keeping score?
• What serves the long-term health of what we're building?

The martial arts lesson is this:

Jutsu has its place—when you're actually fighting for survival.

Sport has its place—when you're actually in defined competition.

But do—the way of continuous improvement, the infinite game of mastery—that's what life requires.

Choose the right game. Play it well. And commit to playing as long as you can.

That's how you win at infinite games—by never trying to win, but by staying in the game and making it better every day.