Perfectionism is usually a glorified time sink, not a virtue. Nobody is without fail. The greatest genius who ever lives will begin her rise somewhere in the realm of "sub-par-at-everything." Even at her peak, the world's best genius will probably specialize to the point where she does only one or a few things spectacularly. Like the rest of us, she'll be bad at doing all the things outside her expertise.
It is normal and acceptable to fail a lot. Especially at games. We play to learn, we play for fun, and a few lucky people play for their living. But unless you're a professional gamer, playing to be the best can defeat the purpose of playing at all. When winning is all-important, the game itself loses value.
Failure puts gaming -- like other important areas of life -- into perspective. It reminds us that injured pride isn't so bad. That, whether against ourselves or others, competition isn't all that's good. All the sore losers and completist gamers out there could benefit from being reminded more often that we are better defined by what we persist at than what we succeed at.
Getting good at being bad at something is an asset in many areas of failure: Work, sport, romance, etc. Messing-up is the best opportunity we have to learn how to respond appropriately to failure. And as parents, we can't model good responses to bad outcomes if we never let our kids see us fail.
The same is true of problem solving. If at first we don't win a game, we can try again, but play it differently. Losing often and well frees us to think creatively. To attempt things we might otherwise shy away from. Just like in science, where failure indicates where more experimentation is needed. Researchers pursue failure. They seek flaws and weaknesses in their own ideas and they put the screws to them until their theories crack. Finding a theory that won't break is GAME OVER for scientists.
Fortunately, failure can be as hilarious as it is frustrating. For a perfect example, watch Hank and Katherine Green play Super Mario Brothers Wii with their friends. Just keep your eyes on Mario...
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnyZsooQ-Qc[/youtube]
