Playing Mind Games

I notice I do this with my boss. yet I have in the past prided myself on wearing my heart on my sleeve. Being totally upfront and transparent.
But being transparent seems to attract criticism. making you vulnerable. If people know what you think, they are more able to manipulate you. yeah I been reading Art of War recently too. 
Life is a game and being totally transparent and honest doesn't always seem to pay. That's what I tell myself. As I indulge in mind games. I know my boss is hardly transparent. She loves to have the edge, the upper hand. When I have played eager beaver Yes man with her, she seems to thrive. So if I feign that role, it may pay off in the long run. yet I could end up used and abused too. The yes man who caved in to every demand.
Part of me, says don't worry what others think. Just do your best. be honest. have integrity. let them play the mind games. Let them lose sleep. 
I have some power at work because Ive been there much longer than my current boss. I enjoy that power but she seems to resent it. She is a micro manager whereas our previous boss gave us latitude. I know my job. I don't need micromanaging. So the current boss likes to find little faults to keep us on our toes and reassert her authority.
I feel like a child relating all this. My problems are miniscule. yet I want to know whether mind games can be justified or not. Life is a game after all.

Is that mind games or more office politics?

But I can see if you wear your heart on your sleeve Or being overly transparent some people might use that against you. I can't recall anything personally I might relate to that. My current job my boss that I report to is great and mostly hands off. No games thank goodness. But past jobs I've had managers that were petty and had a high school mentality. Luckily that job was more drone like and I didn't have to deal too much with that person. Just go in and do the job and go home. But there were things he did that revealed their true character and lack of integrity. Definitely didn't have any respect for him.
I guess we can chalk it up to life and that there are people that not gonna have your best interests at heart at all. One of my early jobs was in a meat processing plant. I was one of the butchers on the line. And the red hat, he was like "assistant manager" on the line I guess. But this guy had serious anger issues. Yelling at everyone all the time. No one on the line liked him. I remember making an off handed comment to co-worker I get the feeling this guy beats his wife. Sure enough the coworker mentions yeah he was arrested before for domestic violence. They came to the plant to arrest him. It's a union job so I guess that's how he was able to retain the job. Not sure. But yeah. That was not fun place to work.

thanks panda

I got out of the office politics game. Personally drains my energy way too much for no reason. My boss knows this and knows he can come at me with some cold truths and I'll give him the same right back.
I think making it through life is complicated enough we don't need to play bad games with each other. If it ain't Risk or Monopoly, I don't go there ;-)

I like your style of posts Richard. Fresh and original.