"When I grow up I want to be..."
I never 'wanted to be' anything when I was a kid. I wanted things. Safety. Comfort. Books. Food. I was willing to do what was needed for those things which ment work. However, I didn't have a future goal for myself that I followed or failed at. Later, I started to develop interests and those interests led to things I wanted to pursue, do, and experience, but I've never had a title for what I wanted to be when I grow up.
Eve is much the same way. I was chatting with Psinah the other day and he commented on how he enjoyed having mercenary contracts. They gave him goals for when he logged in and helped him set up what he wanted to do. It made me realize that I don't have a goal in Eve. The closest I have come is wanting to make lots of ISK. I can't call that a goal. It is more a desire. I've done so little to support it. Hell, I dropped ISK making outside of TCS once I joined the CSM.
Perhaps it is why I have done such a poor job of integrating myself into a group in the game. While I am not directionless, I do not start with goals I develop them. I tend to want to be productive and effective at what I do. What I do however, meanders about as things catch my interest. I may want to try something but it is up in the air if my path will wander in the right direction for me to do so. I'm very curious about things but my curiosity is broad and I cannot do everything that might tempt me. I say, "I would like to try," instead of "I want to be."
In Eve, I can indulge myself in this behavior. I'm serious about what I do but I also know that I'm playing a game. For me, that involves indulging my personality. I wander, I sample, I get distracted and I very much enjoy all of that because I cannot behave in that manner in my every day life.
I'm not sure where that puts me in a game full of created goals. It is why I cannot anchor myself to some behaviors. Killboards, min/maxing, being a great fleet commander, or what have you. I have wandered into so many things. Piracy, markets, internet spaceship politics. I'm happy where I am and I do the best with what I get myself into but I don't have goals other than, "Do this thing I like or believe in well." And I mean well. I'm not a perfect person. I'm a creature of flaws, failures, and successes. Some things I cannot do and other's I can. I won't know until I try and I'm not going to be the best at everything but when I am doing it I will put all of my energy into it. But, not being driven by the desire to win, be at the top of a thing, or be better then someone else who may be doing something similar leads me in an odd place.
It may be that my goal is to not have a goal. To indulge in bohemianism. Every day, when I wake up, I have to be mature and make good choices. I've always considered myself to rational to be a starving artist but not enough to do the right things in society. In Eve, I can exist and indulge my random whims even if that whim is not to be productive at all. Yet, I'm to intense about what I do like to consider myself casual in my play.
For now I will leave it that I do not start with a goal. I find one along the way.
I never 'wanted to be' anything when I was a kid. I wanted things. Safety. Comfort. Books. Food. I was willing to do what was needed for those things which ment work. However, I didn't have a future goal for myself that I followed or failed at. Later, I started to develop interests and those interests led to things I wanted to pursue, do, and experience, but I've never had a title for what I wanted to be when I grow up.
Eve is much the same way. I was chatting with Psinah the other day and he commented on how he enjoyed having mercenary contracts. They gave him goals for when he logged in and helped him set up what he wanted to do. It made me realize that I don't have a goal in Eve. The closest I have come is wanting to make lots of ISK. I can't call that a goal. It is more a desire. I've done so little to support it. Hell, I dropped ISK making outside of TCS once I joined the CSM.
Perhaps it is why I have done such a poor job of integrating myself into a group in the game. While I am not directionless, I do not start with goals I develop them. I tend to want to be productive and effective at what I do. What I do however, meanders about as things catch my interest. I may want to try something but it is up in the air if my path will wander in the right direction for me to do so. I'm very curious about things but my curiosity is broad and I cannot do everything that might tempt me. I say, "I would like to try," instead of "I want to be."
In Eve, I can indulge myself in this behavior. I'm serious about what I do but I also know that I'm playing a game. For me, that involves indulging my personality. I wander, I sample, I get distracted and I very much enjoy all of that because I cannot behave in that manner in my every day life.
I'm not sure where that puts me in a game full of created goals. It is why I cannot anchor myself to some behaviors. Killboards, min/maxing, being a great fleet commander, or what have you. I have wandered into so many things. Piracy, markets, internet spaceship politics. I'm happy where I am and I do the best with what I get myself into but I don't have goals other than, "Do this thing I like or believe in well." And I mean well. I'm not a perfect person. I'm a creature of flaws, failures, and successes. Some things I cannot do and other's I can. I won't know until I try and I'm not going to be the best at everything but when I am doing it I will put all of my energy into it. But, not being driven by the desire to win, be at the top of a thing, or be better then someone else who may be doing something similar leads me in an odd place.
It may be that my goal is to not have a goal. To indulge in bohemianism. Every day, when I wake up, I have to be mature and make good choices. I've always considered myself to rational to be a starving artist but not enough to do the right things in society. In Eve, I can exist and indulge my random whims even if that whim is not to be productive at all. Yet, I'm to intense about what I do like to consider myself casual in my play.
For now I will leave it that I do not start with a goal. I find one along the way.
Eve's a big place. I suspect there's room for Bohemian Capsuleers. If unconventionaling Eve is what you want to try I see no reason you can't do so well. The game will accommodate and it's pilots, well we'll just have to accommodate too.
ReplyDeleteOK, one, I believe that EVE, not being actually Real Life, is what we make of it... and that, unlike Real Life, we are truly free to explore a life, albeit a virtual one, that we simply cannot explore IRL...
ReplyDeleteand two... gods, what a good song huh? I don't care how many time I hear it it just rips through me...
I have to agree with Turamarth Elrandir on this and in fact have a lot of the same feelings, which i have discussed on my own blog. I write and do what I feel in game and really dont like the preferred game play over another game play arguments either. Eve is flawed but also so perfect too.
ReplyDeleteAs Bruce Lee would say - "Be water, my friend."
That was beautiful.
ReplyDeleteI have a wallpaper I feel is related, that has this message :
"When I was 5 years old, my mother always told me that happiness was the key to life. When I went to school, they asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I wrote down 'happy.' They told me I didn't understand the assignment, and I told them they didn't understand life." - John Lennon (The Beatles)
I'd much rather be happy too.