TA GAMES As we mentioned in our sub-section on Time Structuring, games are differentiated from other groups of transactions by two chief factors.  The transactions themselves are ulterior (with a surface meaning as well as a secret meaning), and, there is always a payoff.  The payoff, usually identified as a feeling (either a ‘good’ feeling or a ‘bad’ feeling), signifies the end of the game.”  As we also mentioned, Eric Berne, the "father" of TA, identified somewhere around thirty different TA games in his famous book Games People Play, which he first published in 1964.  In the decades since Games was published, other TA specialists have identified many more.  Yet to this day, two of the most widely-played games continue to be NIGYSOB (an acronym for “Now I’ve got you, you son of a bitch”), and Kick Me.    NIGYSOB NIGYSOB is perhaps the easier of the two games to spot.  It is an entrapment game, played by people for whom anger is an important, recurring Adapted Child feeling. This anger may be demonstrated in obvious ways, or it may be submerged.  It may build up slowly, or it may build up quickly and violently.  But no matter what its depth, or how quickly it builds up, it is always released when a NIGYSOB player sets up other people to do something that enables him to justify yelling at them, or beating on them, and to thus relieve the anger that he has built up in himself (and to feel “better,” or less frustrated, as a result).  In business, NIGYSOB players tend to select people to play with who are in positions of lesser authority and who have little or no obvious interest in resisting entrapment.  At home, the stronger of the two spouses usually chooses the weaker spouse to play NIGYSOB with, and mothers and fathers usually select their own sons and daughters.   Occasionally, the opening move in a game of NIGYSOB may be one of the traditional “Are you still beating your wife?” or “Isn't it true that…?” variety – the types of questions used so often by hostile lawyers, TV interviewers, and reporters to entrap their witnesses, guests, and the people who they are interviewing.  But more often than not, the opening move in a game of NIGYSOB will be even less obvious – perhaps, for example, some innocuous-sounding statement of fact, like, “I thought you were going to…,” a statement that is equally, if not even more effective, in luring the other person into a trap when he responds “incorrectly.”  Usually, the game starts several steps further back from the “I thought you were going to…” statement, as it does in the following version engaged in by Beth and Tom.    Tom (who was trying to cut back on their electric bill, and didn’t like running the air conditioner more than he thought necessary):  “Boy, it’s starting to get pretty cool in here.” Beth (shrugging her shoulders): “I’m really quite comfortable.” Tom:  “Wonder what the temperature is?”  Beth (absentmindedly, as she concentrated on her reading):  “I dunno.” Tom:  “Go check it, okay?” Beth:  “Okay.”  (She put down her book and got up to glance at the wall thermometer, which was situated closer to her than it was to her husband.)  “It’s sixty-seven degrees.”  Tom (barely containing his anger as he uttered the operative statement): “I thought you were going to set the thermostat at seventy so we wouldn’t use so much electricity!!” Beth:  “I was.  Guess I forgot.”   Tom:  “Dammit Beth!”  (Zap.)  “How many times do I have to tell you we’re not made of money!!”  (Zap.  Zap.)  “If you keep on doing this, you're going to send us both to the poor house!!!”  (Zap.  Zap.  Zap.)  Suddenly, Tom felt much better, having entrapped Beth, relieved his anger, and received his payoff, but Beth felt much worse and ended up bearing a grudge, certain that she was beat on unjustifiably over something of little or no consequence.  In this scenario, as in most NIGYSOB scenarios, Tom’s stern Parent had decided in advance what it “expected” Beth to do, and when its expectations weren’t met, Tom built up his anger so that he could later entrap Beth, “zap” her, relieve the anger he had built up, and then, perhaps in a day or two, start all over again.  Every NIGYSOB player needs a person to play with, and most players need a person with enough skill and experience to help them maintain the forward momentum of the games that they play.  Games are always preprogrammed.  Each move is always followed by a transactionally expected response – a complementary, hoped-for response provided by the next player that challenges or answers the first player in a way that permits the first player to still remain in the game.  Without this sort of unconscious help, the first player would often be at a loss as to what to say or do next.    In their never-ending quest for people to play with, NIGYSOB players often select some of their most skilled partners from among the ranks of the KICK ME players of the world.    KICK ME Kick Me players are people who received so many negative strokes when they were young that the feeling of being rejected, or of being unwanted, has become one of their most important recurring Adapted Child feelings. Structuring time by playing games that offer them an opportunity to recreate such negative feelings as a matter of course has become something at which they've developed considerable skill.  The game of Kick Me serves this purpose ideally.  Kick Me is not quite as sophisticated a game as NIGYSOB, in the sense that it doesn't require as many transactions to lead up to its payoff.  But it is, in its way, equally powerful.  Sometimes a good Kick Me player can simply look dejected, or act inept, or just dress like a loser, and people will kick him.  Consider some of the following kicks:  “Jeez, Fred.  Can’t you dress any better than that?”  “Mary, you’ll never get ahead acting the way that you do.”  “For God’s sake, Jerry, stop looking so foolish!”  “Good grief Marv, that’s a dumb thing to say!”  Of course, Kick Me players don’t undertake projects, either at home, at school, or in the office, in order to do well at them.  (If they did, they would receive no negative payoff for all of their efforts.)  They undertake projects in order to get strokes like: “Betty, this memo has four typos and three incomplete sentences in it.” “Mark, you’ll have to do a lot better than this if you plan to go on to college.” “Damn it, Andy, this report’s an abomination.  Can’t you do anything right?”  “Good grief, Margaret.  You’ll need to wash the dishes better than this!” “Do any more work this poorly, Lou, and you’ll never get that promotion you’ve been hoping for.”  “Keep this up, Jessica, and you’re on your way out of this organization!” Most subtle of all, many of the people who administer these kicks don’t realize they’re doing so.  They experience the kicks not as kicks at all, but rather as Adult statements of fact – statements that set forth the “realistic” implications of what will happen if the other person continues his current behavior.  To many such people, the prospect of not making such statements would be tantamount to lying, and the notion of saying something less direct would be considered a needless form of manipulation (two common Parent justifications for continuing to kick people).  Yet Kick Me players don't experience such statements as Adult statements of fact.  Usually, they've heard these kinds of statements many times in the past, and they experience them as a kick, they feel the impact of the negative stroke, and they use the statements as their negative payoff in a game of Kick Me.  Think of the many times you've heard someone make these kinds of statements, and then visualize what the person receiving the strokes seemed to feel at the time he received them.  How many times a day, or how many times in the course of an average week, does that same person normally set himself up to get the same sort of stroke?  If it happens quite frequently, you have just discovered a Kick Me player.  Normally, Kick Me players choose NIGYSOB players to give them their kicks, as NIGYSOB players are much more inclined to do so than most other people.  For more on NIGYSOB, Kick Me, and on other TA games like Uproar and Why Don't You...Yes, But, and to learn more about how to disengage from TA games, check out Chapter Twelve in Jut Meininger's new book CLARITY.        Time Structuring TA Games Life Scripts Life Positions Parent Drivers Injunctions Self-Actualization      Your Free Tour Continues