It is all a chequered board of nights and days,
where destiny with men for pieces plays,
Hither and thither, moves, mates and slays
And one by one in the closet lays.
Rubiat of Omar Khayam translated by Fitzgerald
The opening game of life gives you hardly any options. It is only in the middle game you get some control of your life.
You get to choose your line of attack or defence ;there are gambits, traps, pitfalls, positional play and sacrifices.
All the time, you only have a peripheral view of the end game; after all if you don’t play your middle game well, there would be no end game.
What is good for the middle game may not be good for the end game and vice versa.
As you move on in life, the options get narrowed down, the board is clear enough to see the steps ahead through simple, mathematical calculations. You can take stock of what you have got and what you have lost. The battle has to go on till the last move, probably till you find only the two kings on the entire board. Then there are no calculations to be made, no moves and counter moves; it is total peace. After all a draw is the logical end of a well played game.