Value vs. Enjoyment

[GraveDigger]

So I made this video a week or so ago, talking about the the value we can get out of playing video games, and other subjects related to that. If you guys have any interest in what I talk about or have any opinions on it, say so in the comments (preferably on the video, as opposed to here, but either way is fine). Thanks <3

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=As7Hj5Pl4Wc

[MajorPayne257]

Good video. As I said in the comments, I got the same feeling you did. Games just kind of diminished in excitement for me and I very often feel extremely guilty when I play them. That giddiness that I used to get when signing onto various MMO's or CS:S and TF2 after school has completely vanished. There's just no time for those marathon game sessions anymore and I truly miss that feeling of not having a care in the world.

I'm currently a senior in college who's graduating this May and am going through the horrid and grueling interview process. Every time I get on a video game I feel this constant guilt as I instead could be studying for class, applying to more jobs, or preparing for interviews, but I choose to use my "free time" in video games. Ever since I moved out of my parent's place, a laundry list of responsibilities constantly runs through my head. Clean the apartment, study, better myself, read, get more involved, volunteer, etc. etc. and it's just this consistent nagging that truly never ends.

So I completely understand where you're coming from. I think it's simply apart of growing up and developing your time management skills. The cliche of 'everything in moderation' starts to come into view. But even in moderation, I still feel guilty playing video games.

[Ingbo]

I think a lot of what u guys are talking about is a phenomenon based on the all ur credits that u need to get accepted into college in the US, and socities way of rating success all over the world as well. the idea that u need to shine the brighest, rise through the ranks so to say in society, but lets be honest here how is that more useful than playing video games? Where do u get the notion that having things to brag about would be worthwhile at all?

What this seems to come down to from what im hearing from u effectively seems to be u letting older generations tell u how to live ur life and to me that seems to be the biggest waste of time there is. If anything what should "value" in life if we truly want to discuss it in terms of optimization should be doing what we think will make us the happiest. If thats getting things to brag about or "achieving" (which i highly doubt) then go for it.

If you change the frame of the word value from socities stereotyped way of viewing it to framing it in a context of actual happiness, ull also change how u view this question overall. I go to college, play tons of video games etc and dont feel bad about it at all, in fact id feel terrible about myself if i was some mindless drone living my life to try and be like every other over achiever in our society. Im not implying that thats what u are at all but at least be critical about these thought processes and where they actually steam from.



How do you want to look back at life? Pursuing what u believed it and what made u happy or pursuing some random societal definition of "value"?

[wolf'j'max]

So, I'm obviously not as far in life as you guys are, but I experience a similar situation multiple times a month. I still live with my mother (duh) and am following an education prior to the technical university I plan to go to. I'm often alone at home because my mother's at her boyfriend's house renovating stuff. those weeks are almost as if I'm living on my own, and I have to take care of the house/my education and make my own decisions. I feel that playing video games is actually part of my life, and something I enjoy. I don't just play videogames with people all over the internet, but with my own friends as well.

I understand that you feel guilty, I experience that as well, but at the same time you have to realise that there's room for entertainment.

[sunshineduck]

i would say the digits on our future paychecks are a lot more important to the avg student than our "position" in society

[Ingbo]

Originally Posted by sunshineduck

i would say the digits on our future paychecks are a lot more important to the avg student than our "position" in society

the digits on ur paycheck is ur position in society bro lol

[sunshineduck]

so hows society dictating our life choices? its just math, if i could say **** you society and just play video games every day without having to pay rent or bills, then i absolutely would and it would make me pretty damn happy. its just not feasible because everything takes $$$$

[Ingbo]

Originally Posted by sunshineduck

so hows society dictating our life choices? its just math, if i could say **** you society and just play video games every day without having to pay rent or bills, then i absolutely would and it would make me pretty damn happy. its just not feasible because everything takes $$$$

ye but his entire argument wasnt about getting a job it was about being useful which is not the same thing clearly im not gona argue that getting a job is a waste of time, i just thought it was kind of a too obvious thing to even have to state
-> The gains for society tho from having people that strive to make as much as possible (not the same) has some pretty clear benefits for every society tho which we have very clear examples of where to look for influences in effecting how we live our lives, bible for instance.

[Tekn0]

Our culture makes a rigid distinction between work and play. You have to work, doing some job, in order to earn enough money to do the things you actually enjoy like going on vacation, playing games, guitar, whatever.

The feeling of guilt that one has is the way of keeping the game of life continuing. You HAVE to struggle in order to relax. You HAVE to work inorder to enjoy. That's the way the mind attuned to society works. You -have- to EARN it.

Our society drills upon you that whatever you do for a living has to be purposeful. Does a flower blossom for a purpose? Does a stream go from place A to place B for a purpose? We can attribute a purpose to it, like we do for every single thing.

Similarly we do the same to our activities. They have to be purposeful in order to satisfy our mind that we are not wasting time. If you imagine that you have to be serious about work, whatever you end up doing as work at some point becomes stale and unpleasant. We seldom think that we are part of nature.

This isn't the same thing as "love your work" or "find a job you love doing and you won't have to work a single day". The problem is a tad deeper than that. It's the distinction itself that is the root of the problem.

[GraveDigger]

First of all, thank you guys for taking an interest in this. Second of all, sort of like Payne said and like I talked about, I wasn't always like this. Purpose used to be of no consequence to me, and so playing video games were unequivocally enjoyable. Ingbo and Wolf, you're both right that one shouldn't let society's obsession with value and stuff get in the way of enjoyment. And I may have exaggerated how much I think video games are a waste of time just to make a point, but even so the meaning is still there. I suppose I just have to learn how to not let society affect me so heavily (like we all do), however hard that is. We'll see.

[GraveDigger]

Originally Posted by Tekn0

Our culture makes a rigid distinction between work and play. You have to work, doing some job, in order to earn enough money to do the things you actually enjoy like going on vacation, playing games, guitar, whatever.

The feeling of guilt that one has is the way of keeping the game of life continuing. You HAVE to struggle in order to relax. You HAVE to work inorder to enjoy. That's the way the mind attuned to society works. You -have- to EARN it.

Our society drills upon you that whatever you do for a living has to be purposeful. Does a flower blossom for a purpose? Does a stream go from place A to place B for a purpose? We can attribute a purpose to it, like we do for every single thing.

Similarly we do the same to our activities. They have to be purposeful in order to satisfy our mind that we are not wasting time. If you imagine that you have to be serious about work, whatever you end up doing as work at some point becomes stale and unpleasant. We seldom think that we are part of nature.

This isn't the same thing as "love your work" or "find a job you love doing and you won't have to work a single day". The problem is a tad deeper than that. It's the distinction itself that is the root of the problem.

Hmm, yeah that's interesting. Although it's obviously grander than this, one reason I sorta imagine I feel this way (inspired by what you said) is that now that I'm in second semester of senior year and work doesn't matter anymore, I don't really have any sort of struggle that validates my playing of video games

[Ingbo]

do ppl actually still believe there are fun jobs?

[Slender]

Just as Wolf and mostly GraveD, I have come to the point where I put myself between the sword and the wall and think about how much more important other things are that I need to do in order to pursue who I want to be. Because in truth, video games are nothing more than entertainment, just like it was said in the video unless you can actually make a living out of it, although this "path" isn't meant for everyone, it brings nothing but temporary enjoyment. Seeing that I'm half way done in senior high school and soon to be a freshman at college, I don't see myself playing video games as much as I used to do 1 or 2 years ago. Hell I can even imagine myself just popping into Alti just once every 6 months or so because one has come to put in place priorities and pleasures.

I admit that now I don't mind either winning or losing in any video game because it has slowly become meaningless to me to the point that (i.e) I stopped chatting in normals in LoL even if my team feeds all around. I just go with it because at the end of the day, it brings nothing useful to my life.

[Ingbo]

aint nobody give a **** about normals

[Slender]

Nor ranked, in this context.

[mikesol]

Throwing out another view point: I am a software developer and have had some pretty awesome opportunities because of the people I met here. Lamster was a one of my references for Amazon and I've met software devs from Google, Microsoft, etc by playing this game.

I've actually learned things and made contacts that helped way more than any real world thing I've done simply by talking with people in the community and diving into various things. Although I never released it - I was mostly done writing a whole ladder system with automated ban lengths, various rankings for people (different levels for admins), etc. I learned a ton about java and jdbc from talking with Lamster and other people in this game that helped prepare me for the real world in some ways. ;P

[MajorPayne257]

Originally Posted by Ingbo

ye but his entire argument wasnt about getting a job it was about being useful which is not the same thing clearly im not gona argue that getting a job is a waste of time, i just thought it was kind of a too obvious thing to even have to state
-> The gains for society tho from having people that strive to make as much as possible (not the same) has some pretty clear benefits for every society tho which we have very clear examples of where to look for influences in effecting how we live our lives, bible for instance.

My entire life revolves around getting a job right now (if you were talking about me). It's mainly my dad who puts the most pressure on me, as compared to society. Before he retired (who's currently looking for a full time job because he can't stand retirement) he was an extremely successful, proactive corporate man. Thus, as any father consciously or subconsciously wants for his son, he wants me to follow in his footsteps. This leads to a whole lot of inner disappointment in myself as I don't see myself succeeding as strongly as he did in that environment. Nor am I a workaholic as he is. And I feel that he shares in this disappointment, which is (in my opinion) the worst thing a son can feel in regards to his dad.

Basically, disappointing my parents leads to a never-ending cycle of feeling guilty about anything that truly doesn't add value to my life. And if I'm being honest with myself, I don't think video games add value. They add entertainment, but I don't think those are one in the same.

But I also don't think video games are completely pointless. I think it more has to do with where I am in my life right now. At this point, I feel as if I'm not working hard enough to DESERVE any time playing video games, alluding to what Tek was talking about. Sure I have a part time job and school which I'm doing well in, but success in school does not correlate to success professionally.

TLDR: I'm not doing enough, and I should use the time spent playing video games to do more. Easier said than done for a procrastinating video gamer.

[Aki1024]

Originally Posted by Ingbo

do ppl actually still believe there are fun jobs?

I've had that job for five years so far.

[Tekn0]

Originally Posted by Ingbo

do ppl actually still believe there are fun jobs?

Only if you consider it as a "job", as in being something you HAVE to do in order to earn money to do something else you love in the meantime.

I've been having my "job" for over a decade (actually even from high school if i think about it), and even now, without a blink of an eye, if I could magically go back in the past, I would -not- be doing anything else. I might actually do more of it. My "job" is what I would do even if I wasn't getting paid to do it, and it was what I was doing even before I got this job. People laughed/passed snide remarks at me for "working" for months on end without getting paid but I wasn't consciously thinking of it as work. I was crafting something beautiful and elegant and most of its beauty will only be known to me and for my own satisfaction - which was why I wasn't really bothered by the pay or lack thereof. It paid off later, when I least expected it, with interest :}

So far, for me, you can call it fun, but I have never really consider it a job at all. I never look at overtime or how long I work, or squeezing out as many vacation days as possible, or circumventing some company policies to slack off... strangely I don't really get those thoughts myself, I see/hear about other people doing it. I just find it surprising that people are willing to pay me for doing something I otherwise would still do. I guess I'm extremely fortunate in this aspect.

[Ingbo]

MJ- i wanst talking about u i was talking about gravediggers original video. everyone gets pressured to get a job from their families towards end of graduation since its the norm within society tho so disconneting it from society demanding it from u is imo an oversimplification, ur dad is still a part of society just like every other mom and dad that put pressure on their kid to get an economy to survive and to pay taxes cause thats whats expected to u IN ADDITION to surviving. what u said about ur dad being hard working i think goes for a lot of kids today, parents being more hardworking, since they grew up during different times and was influenced in other ways than we are/were.
-> i think u need to have a chat with ur dad bro, straight up. what ur describing def doesnt seem like good for ur relationship/ trust in him and i think u should give him a chance to hear u out on it (sounds like its not something u guys have talked about from the way ur typing about it). him demanding u to get a job seems standard and whatnot but having to feel a fkn weight on ur shoulders cause ur not him basically is ****ed up, i wouldnt accept that and neither should u, let him know that ****, might change the way he thinks as well.



touching on something else: clearly success in school correlates to success professionally tho, might not be a causal relation but a correlation? without a doubt, if school is important for u, so will likely work be and discounting random social factors a job might demand (which will still be distributed equally over a random sample of good students and mediocre/bad) i would bet everything i own that u would get a significant correlation between school results and future job salaries but lets not forget that a significant correlation between a) and b) only means that these variables has not occurred together by chance. it doesnt say anything else just like u NOT FINDING a significant correlation doesnt say that they arent correlated. it just says that theres a chance the correlation might have happened by chance. so just cause u look at one study or whatever that didnt find a significant correlation (if thats what u actually done) doesnt mean that the variables arent correlated, if ur professors or whatever have said that, theyre wrong.





tek - well then ur the first person ive ever met who would put quotation marks over what u do as a job since its so much fun

[CmdrNoval]

Originally Posted by Ingbo

do ppl actually still believe there are fun jobs?

I can say that there are "fun" jobs. Since we're talking about gaming... One immediately obvious example would be beta-testing video games... I think most of us would consider that a "fun" job...

For me personally, I turned my hobby into a job... Obviously it isn't all fun, but being able to do what you enjoy AND make a living at it, makes a huge difference...

[classicallad]

Can we sticky this page as 'Ingbo's agony aunt corner' ?

Seriously though, he made excellent points.

I am a first class procrastinator too, i probably spend more time thinking about what i could do than actually doing it. My problem is once i get to a point where i know i can achieve something i get bored of it and don't see it through.

Life is an awesome journey and finding out what really matters to you is the best place to start. Look at things that have impacted you negatively and focus on turning those into positives for the greater good of others as well as the pampering of your being.

What motivates us will be the core of our potential effectiveness within society.

I sometimes think, 'stuff this for a game of soldiers, i'll just go and pitch a tent in the gobi and live off of dried leaves.' But this of course isn't realistic or particularly helpful.

What motivates me is compassion and love, so i work in a nursing home feeding and caring for the elderly. It's not financially rewarding, in fact it's in the lowest pay bracket in the country but my being is content as i am feeding my motivations.

An easy formula to follow really, i always try to make decisions based on what motivates my being, i am human however and make mistakes.

Thanks for listening!

TLDR; im a lover of love and a bit of a dreamer, but im happy

[Tekn0]

Originally Posted by classicallad

Can we sticky this page as 'Ingbo's agony aunt corner' ?

More like awesome Ingbo's dansen corner! <3

[Ingbo]

u2 are 2 kind to me even tho i have no idea what class means <3

[classicallad]

Originally Posted by Ingbo

u2 are 2 kind to me even tho i have no idea what class means <3

Agony aunt's are like those columns in magazines where people write into with their problems ^.^

Closest translation i could find was; subst. rådsmedlem.

[Ingbo]

i doubt u mean to say council member

[classicallad]

Originally Posted by Tekn0

More like awesome Ingbo's dansen corner! <3

Also, i would like to party with these girls, can you introduce me Tek? Thanks.

[classicallad]

Originally Posted by Ingbo

i doubt u mean to say council member

Oh, i typed in councillor to translate but those things can be dodgy at best lol