Art of Quietly Leaving

My Happy Place

Events over the last few days have made me realize how happy my world generally is.  I’ve managed to curate and carve up social media into being a place where mostly I find friendly faces staring back at me.  That does not mean that we always agree or always get along swimmingly, but as I said yesterday it is a place that causes me much more joy than it does frustration.  What has lead me to this realization is watching a small bit of strife happening…  but as an echo.  That is to say I am not actually seeing it in my own thread, but instead hinted at in the comments and tweets of the friends who do frequent mine.

First off… it sucks when someone or something is making you unhappy.  That said I would like to remind everyone this morning that social media exists for our own personal enjoyment.  Just because someone wants to interact with you, doesn’t mean you have an obligation to interact back especially if that person is trying to bait you into a larger fight.  While I wish the block button was a more powerful tool, with its continued use folks eventually get the message that you are not going to play in their games.  I’ve seen the adverse effect of a lot of “Sea-Lioning” and sooner or later said folks get tired of creating puppet twitter accounts only to be blocked.  I hate when I have to block someone, but ultimately my social bubble is about my happiness and not your enjoyment, and I feel if more people understood that the “twitters” would be a happier place.

Art of Quietly Leaving

A good chunk of the most recent strife that I have seen in echo.. is that a number of high profile individuals are leaving World of Warcraft, and in theory trying to burn down the house on their way out.  The “I don’t enjoy this, so I will make sure no one else does” instinct runs deep in human beings, and god knows I have been guilty of this so many times.  It is something you have to struggle with.  This blog has been devoted to so many posts that have a shared theme that could be summed up as “WoW Failed Me”.  Over the last year and a half since I started the daily blogging challenge thing…  I have worked on trying to make myself into a much more positive human being.  Part of this has involved letting go of the emotion out of my choices, and trying to present a much more amiable view of the world.  Sure games have frustrated me, and I have been disappointed so many times…  but I try my best to post my critique in a far less ranty manner than I might have the desire to.

Burning down the house on the way out, only serves to cause chaos and strife in your community… and makes sure that it is going to be much harder to eat crow later when you return.  I have said I was done with World of Warcraft so many times at this point.  I seriously could not count the number of times but the most recent was mere weeks before I started playing Warlords of Draenor (though at this moment I am struggling to find the reference).  The heart wants what it wants, and you never know when it is going to drag you kicking and screaming in a direction you have no intent of going.  I was doing perfectly fine until I watched the damned Blizzard World of Warcraft anniversary documentary.  I was assaulted with a sneak attack of feels and wound up saying “I would play only to see molten core” and that wound up turning into “I guess I am back now” before I realized it.  Even for the first few weeks of playing Warlords I was adamant that I “was not back” to the point of refusing to take back the crown to the guild I started back in 2004.

Put Joy in Enjoyment

The problem with World of Warcraft is for many of us it is like a relationship in itself.  It is the bad breakup or the ex that betrayed us.  We are bitter and confused as to why things changed and are left asking ourselves “was it me?”.  Please take the advise of someone who has quit and restarted various MMO games more times than I can count.  Yes it very much is you.  Sure the game is in a constant state of flux, but so are we.  The situation that leads us to play changes over time.  Years ago I started guild and raid leadership because I really felt like I had no control over my own life.  I was in a pretty horrible job, with the most petty boss I have ever experienced.  I felt like I had no control over my own fate, and as such built my own realm where I was the one in control.  I had an awesome guild and it was everything that my job was not.  When I left that job and found a happier one, all of the reasons why I needed to be the leader melted away, leaving me only with the stress and burden of being the one everyone looked up to.

My situation had changed, and as a result the way I related to the game had changed.  Chances are if you are leaving Draenor for this or that reason…  your situation has changed as well.  These sort of things happen without us realizing it, and in ways that surprise us.  I’ve changed the way I approach these games, and while I still love the community aspect and I love raiding as part of a team.  I am also willing to walk away when something isn’t as enjoyable as it once was to me.  There is no reason to keep playing a game you are not enjoying.  The best revenge of the “game that wronged you” is going off and finding one that does bring you happiness.  Yes everything I am saying sounds suspiciously like relationship advise…  but in truth it is because for some of us this game has been a ten year long relationship.  Whatever you do…  don’t break everything you can on your way out the door.  Be the adult in this relationship and leave quietly and on good terms, because as evidenced by my revolving door of video games..  you never know when you are going to want to come back.