Posted by I will start this post by stating that I have been playing Pokémon video games since i was 6, and that was almost 20 years ago. I was probably watching the show some time before that, though I really can’t remember. What has made me keep playing this long? I think it’s the combination of strategic fighting and having to collect and train over a hundred creatures. I played third generation around 2005-06. At that point I didn’t have open access to internet, so I tracked in a notebook all the Pokémon I had and their stats.
After all this time, there are a few things I can take from the games and the anime of Pokémon that have made me who I am today. Here is a list of what I’ve learned from Pokémon in the past 20 years.
Use the Right Tools
All Pokémon have types, which is like their natural attribute. Some of those types are fire, water, electric, normal, dark, fairy, and the list goes on. There are a lot, and they are not just to determine the type of abilities you are going to get. What your Pokémon are good or bad against is also defined by their type, e. g. a water attack is better on a fire-type Pokémon than on a grass-type Pokémon. There’s a whole chart for this. The thing is, that when you are going to walk into a zone where Pokémon tend to be of a specific type, or when you are going to a gym, which usually train a main type, you have to choose which of your Pokémon is best against them and which you shouldn’t use under no circumstances.
As I grew up, my family decided that I was the one who will do the minor repairs on the house. Because of this, I have noticed this perfectly applies to life too. You can certainly use a rock to hammer a nail into a piece of wood, but using an actual hammer makes your life so much easier. Electric screwdrivers are a forearm savior, you can drive a hundred screws and still use your hands the next day.
When programming I also noticed this applies very closely. You are going to start a project and you pick a language. Some languages are better for websites, some are better for mobile apps and some just suck. If you choose the wrong one, you will probably end up fighting more with the language than actually coding. Might even never finish the project. I think you get the idea. Think ahead of what you will need for a task and get your tools in order before you start. Your future self will thank you.
Persistence
Finishing a Pokémon game is not that hard, some people have done it in hours. But if you are like me, you want to have a complete Pokédex. It’s probably going to take a while. To illustrate this, let’s say that some Pokémon are very easy to catch. You walk through any grass patch and they will show up.
But the Pokémon games are pretty much based on a lot of statistics. There are a few of the beasts that have an appearance rate of 1%. Let that sink a minute… Yes, ONE percent. Some even need special conditions like rain or snow to be present. You will spend hours in the games moving through hordes of wild Pokémon until you are able to find that one percent. Oh yeah, and that is assuming it doesn’t escape or you accidentally defeat it and have to keep searching.
In the Pokémon anime you won’t see this, because it would be boring as hell to watch. What you’ll see is a person going through gyms, region by region, and every year challenging the Pokémon League. Our “hero”, how the series narrator usually calls him, Ash Ketchum had been trying to become a Pokémon Master for 22 years before recently achieving it. In the way, he lost a lot of battles, but he would always train harder, come back and win. He had a clear vision of what he wanted and he knew it wasn’t going to be easy. But he never lost his motivation. He kept catching new Pokémon. He kept going for new gyms. He kept signing up for the League until he succeeded.
Most people that have actually succeeded will tell you that one lucky day, or year, is not enough. To make your dreams come true, you have to keep working. Even when you may not see clearly how this is going to end. It will end, and you will notice that you have come closer to the goal. It’s about doing a little every day and keep trying until you get it.
Adventure
In the world of Pokémon, people who collect and train the little beasts are called Pokémon trainers. There are different types of trainers. Those who simply collect Pokémon of all kinds (probably me). Some who capture two or three to have them as pets. But I’d say most want to compete for the title of Pokémon Master. Ash belongs to the last type. To achieve his dream he had to travel the world capturing all kinds of Pokémon and collecting medals from Pokémon Gyms to be allowed into the Pokémon League championship.
In my life, I have mapped that traveling and those challenges to the road I have ahead of me in pursuit of my dreams. I may not have real Pokémon, or won’t have to beat Gyms in real life. But I have to acquire skills and, certainly, beat challenges to get to where I want to be. To me, my Pokémon might be learning to code or writing (which is what I’m training now). At some point, learning to play the drums was a Pokémon I had to capture. And it helped me through some challenges after I got it.
School, university, finding a good job, those are some of the gyms I have captured so far. I had to find friends to help me through some hard spots. And had to learn a lot of different topics and skills to conquer the different stages. To me, a real life Pokémon Gym is any challenge where you have to improve somehow to conquer it. The gyms are the series of steps that you have to walk to get to your final Pokémon League, or you dream. These Pokémon, gyms or adventure might not be physical, but they are very, very real. And seeing life like that adventure is part of what has helped me overcome the roughest spots and always strive to be the best I can, giving it my all.