I officially stopped playing video games on May 19th. Not sure how I feel about it honestly. Gaming is the reason I made some friends in college that I still talk to to this day. It helped me start to learn about how business operate through keeping up with gaming news and the like, and likely pushed me more into tech, which is what I currently am working on making a career out of.
I got sick and tired of the complaints that all I did was game, didn’t take care of my responsibilities and nothing else, and out of relative anger, told my family that I’d just delete my library, which I did on May 19th. I’d lost my emulation and non steam game library before unintentionally, but this time I just deleted it myself and packed up my PS4. Haven’t touched my gaming PC or PS4 since. It makes me a bit angry, moreso because of the time I put into the saves and the emulator setup and what not, but besides that, it’s not terrible.
I’m not completely blameless in this scenario, I’ve made a lot of stupid mistakes, so I’m trying to get to a point where I can fully take care of myself…
I watch a lot of youtube anyway so I just do that and try to focus on making a career and being a functioning adult. I may just lack a proper outlet, I use to have games and other things to let it out, but now, I don’t really do all that much except keep up with tech. I keep mostly to myself as well, which fucks me over socially. Lose-lose scenario I guess…
I’m finding myself getting quite frustrated with my life. Maybe I need to just become a digital nomad of sorts, get rid of all the clutter and try to sell most of the things I have and just move from this country. I don’t think I’d even survive doing that anyway. I already don’t see myself owning a proper house, or having a wife and kids. I see no point in grinding my life away for money, riches mean nothing to me. If I can just made enough to support myself and get myself out of debt, and contribute to my parents and family somehow, then I’ll do that, but I don’t know where to even start. There’s so much I’d have to do to even get to my baseline.
This is why I keep so to myself. Because I’m like this. Why do I even try to appear normal in work settings and with the people I talk to? I’m a mess as it is.
8 comments
“Maybe I need to just become a digital nomad of sorts, get rid of all the clutter and try to sell most of the things I have and just move from this country. ”
>I think that’s a good idea actually, but I don’t think you want to leave the US and expat. I think you should try it out. As long as you’re in the US, you’re stuck in the rat race. Wages just aren’t high enough to offset the cost of housing, car, groceries, etc, unless you get lucky and get paid well. Since you can work anywhere, why not try visiting a country for a few months and work online? You’ll actually be able to save up that way. Other ppl who can’t work remotely don’t have a choice. You can. I think this may be the only way, or one of the very few ways, for you to save up money. If you’re making a normal USD salary but paying 3rd world prices for housing/food/bills/etc, you can save up a lot very quickly. And you can can back whenever you want. It’s not like you have to leave the US forever if you don’t want to. OFC housing is going to cost a lot when you do come back.
“I already don’t see myself owning a proper house, or having a wife and kids.”
>You can do digital nomad for a year, save up money. no need to buy a house ever if you don’t want to. Kids are expensive af so many are opting to not have any, and there’s nothing wrong with not having kids. Personally, I think it’s better ppl don’t, with the world being overcrowded and all. Who knows, maybe you’ll even meet a nice woman in another country?
For context, I wasn’t born in the continental US. I have family not from the US as well.
I’m still in entry level with this career path that I’m on as it is, so I lack the leverage to do fully remote work and completely move away, but I’m just thinking about it (doing hybrid work atm). There are one or two places I do need to at least visit before I’m 40 for reasons, but I’d need to get rid of furniture and stuff I’ve accumulated and simplify a few things.
I have no real savings as is, so I’m needing another job and will likely be on my own in 10 months so I’m working to get that setup.
I just hate this feeling that I just don’t have a lot of good options at this point to get myself in better financial shape mainly.
for some reason i assumed you lived in the USA. well my original post still makes sense- most 1st world countries are getting too expensive to live. but hey, expatting it was just a suggestion.
I do live in the US, just wanted you to understand my position. I do appreciate it, Eternal. Thanks.
“I just hate this feeling that I just don’t have a lot of good options at this point to get myself in better financial shape mainly.”
>same here :'(
I have this friend who is wrestling with whether he will let himself play games, he’s also wrestling with his parents exploiting him and it’s linked so it’s a whole mess….
I can’t say my relationship with gaming is any less complicated. I backed off a bit, not intentionally, just because life happened this past month, now I’m drifting back towards and it’s an interesting thing reassessing the whole THING.
I play games because I need a quick dissassociation. It’s good for that, better than drugs. You want three hours of disconnection? I can name three or four games that’ll do that for me. Mind hole, for me to crawl into and hide. Books still are sometimes that good. I don’t seem to get into the ones that others are into though so…. maybe my experience is different.
There are some bits I could cut. The easy to reconnect ones. I like obscure stuff though, stuff from dead companies, decades old often times. Many times I’m one of a few people even keeping it alive. I couldn’t cut that under any situation. It’s impossible.
It doesn’t seem to be hurting me financially though. That I know of anyway. I work because it helps keep all my plates spinning, keeps my life working, keeps my heart calm. If my heart aint calm, I can’t play. So I play more now that I’m working than I did before when I was unemployed… or my play time is more productive and meaningful.
but we’re at different points in our careers, different kinds of careers possibly too. I’ve gamified my career. My job right now is to clear errors, there are side tasks to that, but mostly it’s clearing errors. The amount of computer game-i-ness to that is…… astounding. It isn’t a very GOOD game. But it feeds people, literally.
Then I get home and play games that make me happy. So maybe there’s something out there like that for you. I don’t think you should have to deny yourself something you like, you should be able to find a healthy relationship with it. That is, unless it’s killing people or something similarly awful.
Thanks for the insight. Honestly it wasn’t going to work as long as I have help in some capacity. Until I’m at a point where I’m 100% taking care of things monetarily, I just have to deal with certain things.
Basically at a point where I’m just going to probably not bother with it anymore. I’d lost saves before, this was the first time I intentionally deleted everything though. Anyway, the only reason I’m irritated at this point is that part of me feels I should’ve just backed up my saves at the very least. It just feels like with me just deleting all my progress, it’s years of configuring Emulators and game saves just gone that I can never get back again. I’m just tired of it. I’m already not into a lot of the things I used to enjoy like wrestling, music, and hell a lot of games weren’t rely doing much but helping me chill out. Now I just feel like nothing I do is getting me anywhere.
I’m fed up with having to explain my goals all the time, constantly having to hear the same shit over and over. That I’m a ***** and not a man, that I need to grow up and figure out my life, etc. It’s infuriating and I can’t bring up anything because then I have to hear about how x person went through worse and how good I have it in comparison, or how I’m still getting help from parents, for example.
Sorry, went a bit off tangent. I’m just trying to not give up at this point.