Life's Journey

I was just playing a computer game, one I play several times a day. In the game, you can choose different level options. Tonight, I chose to play in "Journey" mode. The journey begins at the Child level. When you have suceeded in completing that, you move on to the Easy level, then Medium, then Hard, and finally Evil. You play and replay the Evil level until you die. It made me wonder, is this really how life's journey goes? It gets progressively harder, until surviving is pure "evil" and if you do manage to defeat evil, it just comes back, over and over, until it finally finishes you? Is there no way to escape evil?

But when I think of it, there has never really been an "easy" level in my life. There certainly have been medium, hard, and evil levels. It just seems that as life progresses, the levels get more difficult. Although I have won against evil, I keep on having to replay it over.

• I am too young to have to or want to fight evil for the many years ahead.
• I am too young to be only a few moves away from being "game over".
• I am too young to constantly watch the meter, praying that the next move will hit the right spot and lower the meter rather than bringing it closer and closer to lowering the ceiling that will crush me.
• I am too young to depend on the game to give me the right ammo.

It would be so much easier if life's journey went the opposite way - beginning at the evil level, while we are young enough, strong enough, to adapt to and assimilate everything; then have things get progressively easier, to finally end at the child level, after fighting and living on the edge, at last be able to relax, have fun, and play... and repeat that level over and over. Or is the evil level supposed to get easier as we gain experience and practice, as we get to be better players? And so I ask myself, does practice really make perfect?