Mission ... Accomplished? featuring Bitsy, Destroyer of Worlds

2 Nephi 25:23 - "... for we know that it is by grace that we are saved, after all we can do."

Last day to participate in this week's thinkjoust! Be sure to add your voice to the poll, just below the ad on the right-hand side of the screen.

This last week, I created something beautiful. I created something marvelous. I created ART.

BEHOLD BITSY, DESTROYER OF WORLDS

All right, all right, fair, fair, that's just a picture of a picture of a potentially miserable cat. I say 'potentially,' because I honestly can't read this guy's expression. Do you like being a frog, Bitsy? What secrets do you hold?

What I actually did was put a puzzle together with my coworker and friend. We'd been assigned to produce an inventory of a board game closet and determine if any of the games were missing any vital organs.

As we figured out which chess sets had separated monarchies and how many metal shoes had walked away from the Monopoly boards, we discovered a hundred piece jigsaw puzzle featuring our friend Bitsy. After some thought, we decided we just HAD to figure out if any pieces were missing. Counting could only be inconclusive. No, there was only one way to determine that this puzzle was whole.

We had to put it together.

This was, of course, foolish.

As you may have noticed, every single one of the edge pieces are white. Every. Single. ONE. I quickly learned that Bitsy, here, was nothing more than a cute and cuddly trap set by demonic eldritch marketers wanting to put my friend and I into a white-edged hell. For minutes we slaved, just randomly picking up random pieces to randomly attempt to see if they randomly fit.

Finally, when all hope was lost ... Bitsy finally emerged. Whole. Alive. His expression still ambiguous.

The war was over.

We had won.

It is important to point out, however, that when we found a thousand piece puzzle, we just assumed it had all the pieces and chucked it as far back into the closet as we could.

There was something satisfying about finishing that stupid puzzle, for what it was worth. A certain level of righteous pride filled me up as I contemplated just what my friend and I had accomplished. Though it wasn't much, it was something.

Of course that got me thinking. I soon realized just how many times I "finish" something, and yet don't feel as accomplished as when we tackled the puzzle. Beating a flash game usually fails to satisfy me. The same goes for finishing a YouTube video, or a TV show or movie, or even a meal or a snack.

I wonder why that is? My personal theory is that some things are accomplished because of our active participation in them. If we don't participate, then we haven't really done anything, and therefore we fail to feel accomplished. Passively watching someone else accomplish something, or simply keeping ourselves alive, doesn't seem to invoke the same level of pride.

At the same time, I think my theory is flawed, because some people feel great levels of accomplishment when, say, their favorite sports team takes home a win. And some people genuinely feel powerful when they finish binge-watching, say, Doctor Who on Netflix.

Maybe I don't know what I'm talking about. What is your theory? Be sure to comment below! I love hearing from you, especially when I need it!