Following Up

June 8, 2006

Kurt Bruner and I met at “It’s a Grind” last week to go over my first month’s journal entries, and I think that we both came away with a good deal more than previously expected. Kurt provided me with direction toward gleaning more depth from my gaming experience and giving me an understanding of how I can expound upon what I started with the journal. Kurt and I discussed that the 30-day journal was a great free association starting point, but that greater analysis of my experience and feelings could really add a great deal to this exercise. Now, the first 30 days was primarily a way for me to reflect upon my feelings regarding not gaming anymore, what circumstances lead to this decision and my reactions/interactions with Julie during this time. What we discovered was that my attribution to this “cold turkey” attempt to stop gaming was markedly tailored toward Julie’s wishes that I not continue playing, and thus the topic centered on this arrangement. I internalized the whole experience as fulfilling the wishes of my wife and maintaining the status quo, and that was the driving force behind quitting, because Julie had come to a point where she wasn’t sure if we could continue in the pattern and circumstances we were embroiled in. In other words, I interpreted not gaming in context of Julie’s disapproval solely, which means that I quite because she wanted me too, not due to any true feelings that I really needed to. Obviously when things started to become more complicated and heated discussion ensued it became an issue of my role as husband to my wife, but I still quite for and because of Julie and not for myself. The journal thus reads more as the arrangement that Julie and I made for me not playing, but fails to discuss other aspects of this whole process (i.e. the role of a man in marriage, being a man generally, God’s calling of men, etc.).

Kurt mentioned that the journal was written quite well (thanks, Kurt), but found that the very goal he envisioned for me was not met. Kurt’s hope was that I would have come to a point where my reasoning would logically take me beyond Julie’s disapproval and to a profound realization that I was called as a man to certain roles and responsibilities, and that gaming was hindering this. Whereas I viewed Julie as the reason or “why” of my not gaming, Kurt was looking for an internal transformation of mind that would lead me to comprehend that Julie was merely the vessel or tool used by God to pass a message. The only role that Julie really played was creating the environment and situations needed to end my gaming days, but unbeknownst to me was not the reason herself (which is how I internalized her). Now, if she wasn’t (or shouldn’t have been) the reason that I quite, then what other avenues do I need to explore to come to a point where I understand this occurrence as mutually exclusive of her?

I think that I have this natural tendency to discount God’s hand in things such as this, because how could God want to not continue doing something that gives me such fulfillment, happiness and contentment (or perchance a false sense of these attributes)? Kurt took the time to explain this to me, and a good deal of it makes sense to me. I think that he views (I may have read him wrong) my gaming as an attempt to cling firmly to a habit that has lasted me for 20 years of my life and the thought of quitting this habit or hobby is like asking me to stop breathing. Now that I’m a man, there are expectations and responsibilities that come with that, and games cannot reasonably coexist with this calling, because I devote too much time, energy and dedication to them, whereas my energies should be siphoned toward living as a man. In Kurt’s view, games are an outward expression of childishness, wasteful of time, and keep one from truly realizing our potential. Put in a more spiritual sense, God places man on earth for a purpose, and gaming takes time, energy and attention away from fulfilling those things that the Lord calls us toward: to marry and raise a family. I guess that you could say I’ve spent more time in virtual character development than I have in my own character development, which does have some inherent limiting factors. Anyway, I was just trying to explain how I think Kurt feels about gaming, so hopefully I captured that authentically.

I guess what I came away with from our discussion is that I really need to take a look at the fact that I should have quite games for me, that my life should be more than a collection of virtual world conquering, and that the Lord engineered the end of my gaming career with Julie as his messenger. She isn’t to blame for her inability to coexist with gaming, because God probably had it planned that way all along, and while part of me balks at the idea of some divine will and purpose in something as small and insignificant as this, it’s probably a reality. There is a lot to explore in terms of such things as they relate to games, but we will discuss those at a later date.

For the purposes of continuation in my writings, Kurt and Olivia were nice enough to loan Julie and I a copy of their book, Playstation Nation. Last night I read the Preface and Introduction, and I have to say that I’m very interested in not only hearing their personal testimony, but the technical data on addiction and habituation. I will more than likely have a response to each chapter, which will more than likely be supplemented with some personal reflections as well.

One other issue that I would like to discuss here, and which Kurt and I spent a good deal of time discussing, is the issue of whether or not games are a waste of time. The purpose of this topic is simply to honestly look at my feelings at this point, but to also give note to the fact that these feelings could change. Now, after reading the first portion of the book and considering the information presented, and Kurt’s hope that I had reached a point in time where I viewed games more from his perspective, I still don’t know how to feel about games. I mean, for 20 years I was a hardcore gamer and spent innumerable hours interfacing with a RPG, so for me to now turn around and say that I wasted all that time almost feels like a betrayal of both myself and the whole gaming community. However, to say that I would be betraying the gaming community would imply that I was somehow dedicated or bound by ties of loyalty to it, which isn’t the case. Do I really feel like that time I spent having fun working through games was time I can never get back and that could have been used more fruitfully? Honestly the answer to that is no, because I feel like I had so many other things going for me. For example, I still held a 3.6 in my undergraduate studies, worked out 4-5 times per week, interacted regularly with others, and took the time to read and study personal topics of interest. I guess what I’m saying is that I’ve always viewed games as just one more thing that made me a well-rounded, socially diverse and interesting person, because it gave me one more area of commonality with other people. Games only became an issue after I became married and took on the role of a husband, so what then ties Kurt’s statements about being a man and the conflict in gaming with the institution of marriage? Simply this: games became an issue when the Lord imparted upon Julie’s heart and mind that gaming was interfering with our marriage and would more than likely continue once a child came into the picture. Since Kurt mentioned (there is more than likely some scriptural backing to this) that God’s designated role for men is to marry and raise a family, could it then reasonably follow that a lifelong hobby like gaming required direct intervention (through a conduit or messenger like Julie) so that this current and future problematic issue would no longer interfere with that obligation and calling? This will likely become an interesting idea to look into further as we go along, no doubt.

Well, that’s about it for now, but this was a good intro for the next portion of my reflections, and will hopefully pave the way for a collaborative effort in writing a book later. Kurt and I briefly mentioned this before parting at our last meeting, but details and timelines for such a venture would have to be decided upon in the future. Let’s just say that I would like to tackle this soon, since the experience is so fresh in my mind, so perhaps I will have to meet with Kurt at the next convenient time to discuss this further and see if we can begin some sort of outline. In the meantime I might look at some sort of blog page to get some of these things out on the net, and then see how that evolves.

The Harbinger