Taking Time Out: Platypus Nostalgia
My brother and I were talking the other day and he mentioned that he'd gotten into playing Evony. He said the nice thing about it was that no matter what else was going on in his day, he could spend a few minutes in a world where everything is just for fun. No matter how many times you die or fail you can always get up and try again. That put me in mind of something a family friend said once. He was out on the mission filed at the time and said that the fun of playing a video game was that it offered you thirty minutes of control no matter how out-of-control the rest of your life was.
That got me thinking. What is the proper roll of control in our lives? Our impulse is often to say that seeking control is bad. However, there are types of control that are vital to daily living: self-control, control over vehicles, control over our budgets, control over the materials that we use to do our jobs. Psychologists tell us that when we lose control in one area of our lives, we often seek to make up for it by tightening our control of others. This can lead to the destructive side of control which we rightly castigate. However, can hobbies and pastimes be a way to channel this desire for control down a path where it becomes less harmful or even beneficial? If so, then the above examples hint that video games may not be a waste of time after all.
Comments
Good stuff to think about, James!