The Time I Got Too Competitive During a White Elephant Gift Exchange.

If you’ve ever played board or card games with me, you know that I can be competitive. Especially if the games involve some kind of strategy. In fact, there are special rules in place when I play Rummikub with my best friend and her parents because of how long I take during my turn. (I have confirmed that these rules only exist when I play.) 

Granted, there are some games that are just fun to play, and I don’t necessarily want to win. But most other times, winning is my goal. I want to play the game the very best. 

However, when it comes to board games, I know my strengths. I know which games I’m good at, and which ones I’m not. If I’m playing a game that I know isn’t a strength, I am completely fine with losing. Even though I’m competitive, nothing is worse than a sore loser, and I strive not to be that person.

Occasionally, something comes along that isn’t exactly a game, but there is enough of a strategy that I want to win. Does anyone else really care about winning? No, because it’s not really that kind of game. Do I? Absolutely. 

In December 2023, I participated in the most chaotic White Elephant gift exchange I’ve ever experienced. For starters, it was over two hours long. Usually these gift exchanges have steal limits–for example, if a gift gets stolen three times, it’s considered dead and that person doesn’t have to worry about it being stolen again. The only limit this game had was that a gift couldn’t be stolen more than once per round, but other than that, there were unlimited steals. Every gift opened was still in play during the last round.

The gifts were just as chaotic, ranging from alcohol to gift cards to random stuff to homemade ribs. So there was a mix of highly sought-after gifts, gag gifts, and everything in between. For some people, once they opened a gift, they had to sit there and watch because there was no way someone was stealing from them. All of the good gifts were passed around by the same 10 people each round. Hence why it took forever.  

For me, I opened a good gift–that naturally immediately got stolen–and then the next gift I opened was pajamas. Not a bad gift by any means, but not one that was going to get stolen. I had drawn a pretty low number, so I was out of the game early on. 

After watching the rest of the White Elephant exchange unfold, I strategized for next year. From what I could tell there were two strategies that would let me play the game better. 

1) I could go after some of the nicer gifts (the alcohol, the gift cards, the ribs, etc) and bide my time. Then in the last round, I would have options.

2) I could go last. If I had the last number, then I’d be able to sit back, watch, and wait. When it was my turn, I’d have my pick of the lot. 

“But Britnie,” you may be asking, “how could you draw the last number? Isn’t that left up to chance?”

Well you see, I left out key information. 

In addition to the gift exchange, there was a holiday sweater contest, and the winner of the contest (as voted on by everyone participating) received the last number. 

For me, it wasn’t so much about winning per se; it was about making the game more fun for myself. Sitting there, watching everyone else open presents, without being able to really contribute, was frankly, boring. The exchange took forever to get through (especially with around 40 people participating), and I really was not having fun with it. 

Fast forward to this past December as I began preparing for the next White Elephant, and I reviewed my two strategies. I finally decided that I was going to try my best to win the sweater contest, and if that didn’t work, I’d fall back on the first. 

I scoured Pinterest to find ideas for a homemade sweater that would be fairly easy for me to make, and here is what I ended up making:

Not only did I win the sweater contest and ended up with arguably the best gift (homemade ribs that were incredible), I was correct in my assumption that this time around, the gift exchange was way more fun. Now, this could have been because I knew what to expect and knew how to set my expectations. It could be because not only was I riding the high of winning the contest, I had my pick of the gifts, and my competitiveness had paid off. 

It also could have been my mindset. Did those other things help? Definitely. But my goal this time was to have fun with it–regardless of which gift I got. It was hilarious to sit there and watch everyone else steal gifts and laugh at some of the more ridiculous ones (like bacon toothpaste or shots of pickle vodka) as they tried to barter those off. 

Ultimately, was my goal to win? Yes. But it was also to figure out how to make such a long gift exchange more fun, and it’s safe to say that I succeeded there. 

Now you may be asking yourself what this has to do with writing? Or did I just share this story with you to brag about how I got overly competitive at a White Elephant gift exchange and it paid off?

Listen. Two things can be true.

At the end of last year, I was really discouraged by the business side of writing. Querying agents and receiving rejection after rejection was disheartening. It was like sitting through that 2023 gift exchange, watching everyone else have a much better time than I was having. But one of the things that makes me competitive is determination and persistence.

Two qualities that I need if I’m going to publish books traditionally. 

Let me be clear. I’m not trying to win at writing. That’s impossible. But one of my goals for 2025 is to have more fun with it. I can still do my best and make the hard work fun. As much as I want Veritas to be published, I don’t want to let the rejections impact my love of that story and its characters. I don’t want to resent this story for not being perfect yet. I also don’t want to let those negative emotions take over as I’m revising my fantasy novel. 

Even if the outcome is the publishing equivalent of bacon toothpaste, being a writer brings me joy–and that joy is what I’m chasing in 2025.