Are you sure we're playing the same game?

His opponent took both of his knights in one move.

Aka.

His opponent cheated.

But instead of what Chuck would normally do, get furious, attack his opponent, make a show of things, he reframed his view and changed his behavior.

His opponent conceded the game, let them win, shook his hand, and whispered in his ear “I know what you did. I can make your life very miserable, so you’re never going to do that again, what you just did. Your next opponent is that kid right there.”

His opponent thanked him.

He’d won. Not the chess match, but the engagement. That man won’t cheat again.

…we’ll not for the rest of that day, at least.

This was a great scene from the show Billions. There are a lot of mental models I’ll be examining from this show because it's focused on investment, law, and strategy.

Now, back to the chess match. Often we think we’re playing one game, in this case, chess, when, in reality, we’re playing a completely different game, such as, in this scenario, a battle of wits.

Chuck’s chess opponent wasn’t there to play a fair game of chess. His game was to outsmart the man across from him by any means—in this case, cheating and taking two pieces without getting caught.

But Chuck caught it because his typical prey is the smartest cheaters in society: billionaires, murderers, and cartel leaders where maximum punishment is the goal and typical outcome. . What he realized in this instance was that he needed to consider other forms of punishment or reform.

He needed to adapt to the chess hustler’s behavior with corrosion rather than brute force. This worked, so well, in fact, the hustler actually thanked him.

This will likely lead to a behavior change instead of a temporary one.

Chuck isn’t used to using mercy as a tool, but a simple, relatively insignificant game of chess completely reframed his mindset.

What game are you actually playing? What mindsets do you need to reframe to play that game differently?