I've been doing this roleplaying game thing for quite a long while now. Those of you who have been reading my blogs about earlier posts know about the many epiphanies I've had, the many times my consciousness has expanded, the many times I've learned something entirely new, and seen this beautiful hobby in a new light.
Well, it's happened again. And it's happened through the medium of Big Eyes Small Mouth, which comes as somewhat of a surprise as I'm not that great an anime fan. I've ran anime-themed games before – Parallel Fandango, primarily, and I've participated in Aki, which had the same feeling. Yet, this particular Big Eyes Small Mouth game is truly something new, and it's new in a lot of ways.
For one, it's a lot more interactive than most other games I've ran. And no, I'm not making this up – the game really allows the players more freedom than many of my most sandboxy of sandboxes thus far, because the players are actively expanding on the story, during the game, outside the scope of their own characters. They're adding new countries and continents as needed, they're expanding on the history of the world and of the NPCs, and they're even adding new NPCs on the fly, mid-game. This is a very new experience for me, and rather challenging, but usually well worth the extra effort as it pretty much guarantees player involvement. I don't mean suggestions, either – I mean stuff like flat-out saying to an NPC “Of course, you have heard of the play involving star-crossed lovers, one from Britannia and one from Teutonia...” or in extreme cases like talking to an NPC that has never been mentioned before, but suddenly springs into existence because the player wanted it. I don't know why this hasn't resulted in any horrible trainwrecks – intuition suggests it rather should, and it probably will eventually – but it hasn't.
Second, which may seem counterintuitive given the above point, the game has taught me a lot about structure. If a game can be properly structured, it will almost automatically present a good narrative. This game follows a simple central metaplot that is advancing quite slowly, with one metaplot-related event occurring per session. The actual meat of the story is made up from NPC-driven subplots, though, chiefly fueled by the characters' interaction with them as the metaplot progresses. This gives the game a very TV-series feel, similar to Star Trek: Voyager, in which the ship's progress is combined with intra-crew conflict. This meshes well with the freedom, because the subplots are unimportant and can be cut short, added, or edited on the fly as needed, without impacting the metaplot. With such a structure, the story continues on ahead while simultaneously allowing the players to do pretty much whatever they want. As long as the story goals of the session are fulfilled, the story is still going somewhere despite very little time actually being devoted to it.
Third, there is the anime aspect. Anime, for all its other faults, does have one chief defining artistic quality which is hard to find elsewhere – its unique blend of comedy, drama, romance and tragedy, which allows for deeply serious stories about abuse and abandonment to run parallel with silly rom-com elements such as spilled love potions, misinterpreted flirting, and overacted reactions. Channeling this feeling in a roleplaying game is surprisingly easy, but it requires players to take a step back from their characters and switch between immersion and collective storytelling, as the players will often have their characters behave in obviously idiotic fashions for the sake of the story, but will have to immerse deeply in their character for the drama and tragedy elements to really hit home.
Overall, it's a new experience to me because it breaks the classical definition of role-playing game and starts to blur more into the territory of improvisational theater. It's almost entirely intrigue-driven, with perhaps 10-20 die rolls taking place during an entire session. The key, the thing that makes this sort of game unique, is – I think – the switch between immersion and storytelling on everyones' behalf. On the one hand, you want to think like your character. On the other hand, you want to consciously make sure that your character commits mistakes where appropriate, to drive the story onwards.
Even though I've been playing for over a decade, and I have played similar games as this before, I have to say that it's an entirely new experience – it's like the intrigue-driven plots of Aki meet the wild-card player-driven solutions of Mage: The Awakening, and fuse together into a coherent whole where players shape the world to fuel the intrigues surrounding them, yet are still beholden to a single, central story. If D&D-style RPGs are like water flowing through a pipe, and improvisational theater is like water flowing freely all over the floor, this style of play is more like water flowing in a stream on the floor – there aren't really any constraints on it, yet it keeps moving on ahead, and doesn't run out all over the place. It requires a lot of consensus between players and GM, obviously – if everyone isn't on the same page, you risk just winding up with a wet floor.
Of course, just because I've discovered a new way of playing doesn't mean it's the best way. It's not even necessarily better than more classical approaches. But it's something I've never done before, and I'm talking about it because, even after over ten years of doing this RPG thing, I keep getting surprised. It's stuff like this which makes me wanna never give up on gaming. Just when you think you've got it all figured out, that strange magic strikes again, and suddenly it's just like that first realization that hey, NPCs can have personalities, and that is awesome.
fredag 14 januari 2011
onsdag 5 januari 2011
2006: Arcana Evolved
Since I've already explained much of the set-up for this game in an earlier post, I'm pretty much going to dive straight into the action of the story of Arcana Evolved. Before I do so, though, I should explain who actually participated in this game, and who their characters were.
The Arcana Unearthed game ended with the group splitting up, each going their separate ways. Arcana Evolved begins five years later (one year later in real-time) when three of the heroes from the last story re-unite on a tiny island in the middle of the ocean, joined by two more extraordinary adventurers. The actual configuration of the group included Bob, Drake, Kennedy, Luke, and Jason. Bob and Drake still had essentially the same characters as before – Beo and Ree – whereas Nasef had over time developed into a ghost, driven by the power of the Requiem, a mysterious evil sword. Luke and Jason made new characters, each with suitably epic backstories; Luke re-created Aust, making him a priest from an ancient civilization who had slept through the ages, and Jason created the Cat Lords' Chosen, an avatar of cats who literally possessed nine lives, but is stalked by a strange demon for inexplicable reasons. Jasons character didn't actually have a name for much of the game, until he was randomly named Freddy because we needed a way to refer to him.
The story itself was very long, and rather complicated. It was initially divided up into ten chapters, each named in some meaningful fashion. I have since lost the complete list of chapters, unfortunately, so I can only write about those I remember. I'm also not entirely clear on the chronology; some of the details below may contradict each other. I really should have taken better notes about the game, but I was a little pressed for time, as it was played during my final year at the IB.
Here be Dragons was the first chapter, an introductory story of a sort. The five characters met on a tiny island, and learned of ancient sorcery from a lost civilization called Praetur, which had once been destroyed by the Dragons. It was here Freddy accidentally poisoned Beo, and it was here Beo learned of the ancient civilizations' hatred for Xethar Ar'Nuade, the dragon whose soul he carried inside him. The ruins of the island were thoroughly explored, but they needed a password to delve to the heart of the strange fortress, and had to seek out an akashic who supposedly knew the answer.
The next two chapters have names I can't recall. The akashic needed by the heroes was trapped in an Imperial Fortress, protected by a young man called the Mirror Master, who could prevent all sorts of magic being worked within the fortress. Aust and Freddy insisted on killing him, and so they did, drawing the ire of the Inquisition after them. Beo also met with a woman who wanted to become a mojh, and Ree briefly met with his apprentice, a young Litorian mathematician. There was some running around on the ocean involved, among other things a magical island on which Nasef tried to kill himself by separating himself from the Requiem, the introduction of Sojiro Naraku – Kennedy's replacement character, a sorcerer with some ties to the Demons of the setting – and the characters also returned to the island with the ruins to confront a lich, who managed to hurt Aust badly enough to seemingly kill him. It's all a bit of a blur what happened here, though. I know that in the same scene that Aust “died”, Nasef returned. These two chapters spanned quite a lot of playing time, I know that much.
A Pirate is Free was a chapter which gave Freddy the spotlight. He had once sailed the seas as a feared pirate captain, and was now re-united with his old crew. A Pirate is Free dealt with questions of responsibility, and was rife with moral choices. Do you condone revenge, even if it's carried out as rape? Will you stop a righteous crusade to indulge in your own selfish need for vengeance? Ultimately, it asked this question: Even if you are free from all authority, mortal and divine, does that mean you're also free of responsibility? Or is it perhaps the reverse? A Pirate is Free also introduced Timothy Luvenhay, Luke's replacement character instead of Aust.
Searching For Demons was a strange chapter, perhaps the most muddled and unclear one. I can't recall the details of it very well, but it was during this chapter that the entire group got lost in the desert for no good reason, and also pulled off a joint-stunt impersonating a giant. It included one of the few recurring NPCs, Tirek Fleshripper, and revolved around the demons who had once broken into the Netherworld to come upon the Tree of Life. The heroes learned that they must search for the Key to Hell, which was later revealed to be Beo – the Key to Free Will, which is Hell from the point of view of those in favor of Destiny.
Chapter Six: Consequences (the only chapter whose name and numbering I have actually written down) was the chapter dealing with past sins, and dealt particularly with the question of how our past defines us. It was the chapter in which Freddy learned that the Cat Lord had chosen him to be a scapegoat, not an avatar – the demon stalking Freddy was collecting a debt from the Cat Lord, which Freddy had unwittingly agreed to pay in his stead. It was also the chapter that explored the past of Ban-Lam, Austs' homeland – which they arrived in to find his entire civilization has been gone for hundreds of years, lost despite the great sacrifice he made for their sake. The chapter was named Consequences because it asked not only how our past defines us, but also how the consequences of our choices define us. While at least two characters were brought to utter despair, they managed to find new hope – of a sort. Freddy freed himself from the Cat Lord, and Aust abandoned his old ways to begin seeking a path to true divinity.
The Key to Hell featured the invasion of the Land of the Tiger, where in the past Ban-Lam had been located, to free it from the demons currently controlling it and to learn of the nature of the Key to Hell. Aust returned after having “died” earlier on, and alongside him the heroes would plunge into the Netherworld, after having driven back the demonic hordes possessing the Land of the Tiger. Freddy, also, became the new King of the Tigers, and rose to a kind of divinity himself, after having (probably) destroyed the Cat Lord.
Reedeemer took place in the Netherworld, a strange world-between-worlds, the labyrinth that connects all places to another. It's the place of everything that is lost, and also the location of the Tree of Life, the strange focal point of Destiny that held the answer to Rees mysterious equation. Reedeemer was the most thoroughly bizarre and otherwordly chapter, which started out with the characters losing their memories entirely, and moved on to reveal that Ree solving the equation would make him literally become Destiny. It was the chapter in which Ree truly ascended to godhood, and also the chapter in which Nasef restored his lost humanity.
Requiem for a God revolved around Nasef putting a stop to the Mad God-King of Galdersrike, the wizard responsible for the creation of the Requiem and also the one who held the key to its undoing. The spirit of death trapped in the evil weapon was meant for the King, and only after his death could the weapon be destroyed. A memorable, if short, chapter, that involved a crazy chess-match between two super-geniuses who could both predict the future – Aust vs. the King.
Breath of the Ancestors ended the story, confronting the heroes with the Dragons, and finally ended with Ree resolving their debate by killing himself, choosing freedom for the world, because of how inspired he had been by Beo. The death of Ree marked the end of Destiny, and the end of an era – no longer was humanity shackled by the divine. Freedom reigned in the world, but at a price, as the spiteful Eternals among the dragons had already begun the process of destroying the world. Our four remaining heroes would have to set out and stop them – particularly Beo, whose fault it was that the Dragon Scions were once more unleashed upon the world. Thus begins a story not yet told, a story where divinity and heroism are synonymous, a story of a world where Destiny no longer holds sway. Thus begins a new story, and thus ends the Gods' Tale.
Arcana Unearthed Gaiden:
Rather than talk about specific characters or specific moments in the chronicle-at-large, I'm here going to mention the Gaiden, the small story that took place in the same world but was otherwise entirely unrelated. It was played right before Arcana Evolved, and circled around a crazy runethane seeking immortality. The set-up of the game was interesting, as each player was instructed to write a detailed backstory for their character, and then tell that story around the campfire as the heroes made camp on their journey. Thus, the actual chronicle became a sort of Canterbury Tales, a frame-story for the Dead Mans' Tale, the Sorcerers' Tale, the Soldiers' Tale, the Merchants' Tale and so forth. It featured Honest Sid, a minor character from Arcana Unearthed, as a central protagonist NPC, and a few other NPCs who also told their tales.
Most of the story took place in a jungle, but the final bit was a confrontation in one of the largest cities of the world – a conscious decision, as cities were largely avoided in the other two chronicles. It was an interesting story, much shorter than the chronicle at large and played only over three long sessions – the first two in a jungle colony, the last one in the capitol leading up to the showdown with the runethane.
Next Up:
2007: Berlin, the most MMO-like RPG I have ever ran, in which players come and go without any real pattern, and the setting grows ridiculously contrived and complicated, growing by leaps and bounds into the most rich setting I have designed to date. Some earth-shattering changes in my life occur, and my gaming life also becomes radically different, with the d20 system becoming almost entirely absent, not to return until 2010.
The Arcana Unearthed game ended with the group splitting up, each going their separate ways. Arcana Evolved begins five years later (one year later in real-time) when three of the heroes from the last story re-unite on a tiny island in the middle of the ocean, joined by two more extraordinary adventurers. The actual configuration of the group included Bob, Drake, Kennedy, Luke, and Jason. Bob and Drake still had essentially the same characters as before – Beo and Ree – whereas Nasef had over time developed into a ghost, driven by the power of the Requiem, a mysterious evil sword. Luke and Jason made new characters, each with suitably epic backstories; Luke re-created Aust, making him a priest from an ancient civilization who had slept through the ages, and Jason created the Cat Lords' Chosen, an avatar of cats who literally possessed nine lives, but is stalked by a strange demon for inexplicable reasons. Jasons character didn't actually have a name for much of the game, until he was randomly named Freddy because we needed a way to refer to him.
The story itself was very long, and rather complicated. It was initially divided up into ten chapters, each named in some meaningful fashion. I have since lost the complete list of chapters, unfortunately, so I can only write about those I remember. I'm also not entirely clear on the chronology; some of the details below may contradict each other. I really should have taken better notes about the game, but I was a little pressed for time, as it was played during my final year at the IB.
Here be Dragons was the first chapter, an introductory story of a sort. The five characters met on a tiny island, and learned of ancient sorcery from a lost civilization called Praetur, which had once been destroyed by the Dragons. It was here Freddy accidentally poisoned Beo, and it was here Beo learned of the ancient civilizations' hatred for Xethar Ar'Nuade, the dragon whose soul he carried inside him. The ruins of the island were thoroughly explored, but they needed a password to delve to the heart of the strange fortress, and had to seek out an akashic who supposedly knew the answer.
The next two chapters have names I can't recall. The akashic needed by the heroes was trapped in an Imperial Fortress, protected by a young man called the Mirror Master, who could prevent all sorts of magic being worked within the fortress. Aust and Freddy insisted on killing him, and so they did, drawing the ire of the Inquisition after them. Beo also met with a woman who wanted to become a mojh, and Ree briefly met with his apprentice, a young Litorian mathematician. There was some running around on the ocean involved, among other things a magical island on which Nasef tried to kill himself by separating himself from the Requiem, the introduction of Sojiro Naraku – Kennedy's replacement character, a sorcerer with some ties to the Demons of the setting – and the characters also returned to the island with the ruins to confront a lich, who managed to hurt Aust badly enough to seemingly kill him. It's all a bit of a blur what happened here, though. I know that in the same scene that Aust “died”, Nasef returned. These two chapters spanned quite a lot of playing time, I know that much.
A Pirate is Free was a chapter which gave Freddy the spotlight. He had once sailed the seas as a feared pirate captain, and was now re-united with his old crew. A Pirate is Free dealt with questions of responsibility, and was rife with moral choices. Do you condone revenge, even if it's carried out as rape? Will you stop a righteous crusade to indulge in your own selfish need for vengeance? Ultimately, it asked this question: Even if you are free from all authority, mortal and divine, does that mean you're also free of responsibility? Or is it perhaps the reverse? A Pirate is Free also introduced Timothy Luvenhay, Luke's replacement character instead of Aust.
Searching For Demons was a strange chapter, perhaps the most muddled and unclear one. I can't recall the details of it very well, but it was during this chapter that the entire group got lost in the desert for no good reason, and also pulled off a joint-stunt impersonating a giant. It included one of the few recurring NPCs, Tirek Fleshripper, and revolved around the demons who had once broken into the Netherworld to come upon the Tree of Life. The heroes learned that they must search for the Key to Hell, which was later revealed to be Beo – the Key to Free Will, which is Hell from the point of view of those in favor of Destiny.
Chapter Six: Consequences (the only chapter whose name and numbering I have actually written down) was the chapter dealing with past sins, and dealt particularly with the question of how our past defines us. It was the chapter in which Freddy learned that the Cat Lord had chosen him to be a scapegoat, not an avatar – the demon stalking Freddy was collecting a debt from the Cat Lord, which Freddy had unwittingly agreed to pay in his stead. It was also the chapter that explored the past of Ban-Lam, Austs' homeland – which they arrived in to find his entire civilization has been gone for hundreds of years, lost despite the great sacrifice he made for their sake. The chapter was named Consequences because it asked not only how our past defines us, but also how the consequences of our choices define us. While at least two characters were brought to utter despair, they managed to find new hope – of a sort. Freddy freed himself from the Cat Lord, and Aust abandoned his old ways to begin seeking a path to true divinity.
The Key to Hell featured the invasion of the Land of the Tiger, where in the past Ban-Lam had been located, to free it from the demons currently controlling it and to learn of the nature of the Key to Hell. Aust returned after having “died” earlier on, and alongside him the heroes would plunge into the Netherworld, after having driven back the demonic hordes possessing the Land of the Tiger. Freddy, also, became the new King of the Tigers, and rose to a kind of divinity himself, after having (probably) destroyed the Cat Lord.
Reedeemer took place in the Netherworld, a strange world-between-worlds, the labyrinth that connects all places to another. It's the place of everything that is lost, and also the location of the Tree of Life, the strange focal point of Destiny that held the answer to Rees mysterious equation. Reedeemer was the most thoroughly bizarre and otherwordly chapter, which started out with the characters losing their memories entirely, and moved on to reveal that Ree solving the equation would make him literally become Destiny. It was the chapter in which Ree truly ascended to godhood, and also the chapter in which Nasef restored his lost humanity.
Requiem for a God revolved around Nasef putting a stop to the Mad God-King of Galdersrike, the wizard responsible for the creation of the Requiem and also the one who held the key to its undoing. The spirit of death trapped in the evil weapon was meant for the King, and only after his death could the weapon be destroyed. A memorable, if short, chapter, that involved a crazy chess-match between two super-geniuses who could both predict the future – Aust vs. the King.
Breath of the Ancestors ended the story, confronting the heroes with the Dragons, and finally ended with Ree resolving their debate by killing himself, choosing freedom for the world, because of how inspired he had been by Beo. The death of Ree marked the end of Destiny, and the end of an era – no longer was humanity shackled by the divine. Freedom reigned in the world, but at a price, as the spiteful Eternals among the dragons had already begun the process of destroying the world. Our four remaining heroes would have to set out and stop them – particularly Beo, whose fault it was that the Dragon Scions were once more unleashed upon the world. Thus begins a story not yet told, a story where divinity and heroism are synonymous, a story of a world where Destiny no longer holds sway. Thus begins a new story, and thus ends the Gods' Tale.
Arcana Unearthed Gaiden:
Rather than talk about specific characters or specific moments in the chronicle-at-large, I'm here going to mention the Gaiden, the small story that took place in the same world but was otherwise entirely unrelated. It was played right before Arcana Evolved, and circled around a crazy runethane seeking immortality. The set-up of the game was interesting, as each player was instructed to write a detailed backstory for their character, and then tell that story around the campfire as the heroes made camp on their journey. Thus, the actual chronicle became a sort of Canterbury Tales, a frame-story for the Dead Mans' Tale, the Sorcerers' Tale, the Soldiers' Tale, the Merchants' Tale and so forth. It featured Honest Sid, a minor character from Arcana Unearthed, as a central protagonist NPC, and a few other NPCs who also told their tales.
Most of the story took place in a jungle, but the final bit was a confrontation in one of the largest cities of the world – a conscious decision, as cities were largely avoided in the other two chronicles. It was an interesting story, much shorter than the chronicle at large and played only over three long sessions – the first two in a jungle colony, the last one in the capitol leading up to the showdown with the runethane.
Next Up:
2007: Berlin, the most MMO-like RPG I have ever ran, in which players come and go without any real pattern, and the setting grows ridiculously contrived and complicated, growing by leaps and bounds into the most rich setting I have designed to date. Some earth-shattering changes in my life occur, and my gaming life also becomes radically different, with the d20 system becoming almost entirely absent, not to return until 2010.
lördag 25 december 2010
1 Corinthians 13
"If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails."
I just came back from church. It was a pretty okay sermon, although I couldn't hear much, being seated a little too far away. The hymns were also somewhat weirdly chosen, but the finale was great. The above passage wasn't really mentioned, and has little to do with Christmas really, but it's a nice passage, one of my favorites. And the message is not a bad one.
I had a good Christmas eve. I spent the day with my family, eating food, fighting with my brothers, and holding conversation. I also received communion from the hands of a real Bishop. Oh, and we solved anagrams together, the whole family. Me and my brother won, having solved them the fastest.
What did you do?
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails."
I just came back from church. It was a pretty okay sermon, although I couldn't hear much, being seated a little too far away. The hymns were also somewhat weirdly chosen, but the finale was great. The above passage wasn't really mentioned, and has little to do with Christmas really, but it's a nice passage, one of my favorites. And the message is not a bad one.
I had a good Christmas eve. I spent the day with my family, eating food, fighting with my brothers, and holding conversation. I also received communion from the hands of a real Bishop. Oh, and we solved anagrams together, the whole family. Me and my brother won, having solved them the fastest.
What did you do?
torsdag 16 december 2010
Dark Kent
Tonight I had a bizarre nightmare. I dreamt I was Superman.
It was not the scariest nightmare I've ever had as such, but the ending comes close, and the whole thing was really damn unpleasant. Why? Well, the flying, the superpowers, all of that was of course nice, but it was painful and frightening because, I realized, I think a lot like Clark Kent. And thinking like Clark Kent is pretty self-destructive.
So I was hanging around in a community in a forest, somewhere in Canada I think. I was there to do some reporting on a really old festival the locals celebrated. It was a kinda small job for star reporter Clark Kent, but whatever.
I don't remember the beginning of the dream, exactly - but I remember I stayed in town for a while, making friends and really starting to feel at home there. Real friendship, and it happening two to three times in a single day. It rocked. Then, a disaster of some kind struck on a mountain, and off I go, just in time to miss the festival itself and to disappear from a friend I had promised to help practising crossbow-shooting for some competition, and just bail out on some old people who had really wanted to meet me. Feeling really bad about letting everyone down, I fly off to the mountain and meet another superhero - a superheroine, rather; and promptly fall in love. This woman doesn't bother with secret identities, she just kinda saves people from afar, using various distance-based powers like controlling gravity. She's much more free and less worried than stuck-up Superman, who feels responsible for everyone, everything, all the time - and worse, she doesn't need the affirmation of peoples' thanks and admiration, in that empty, hollow way I do myself; as if a medal or a statue to my commemoration could somehow fill that empty hole inside. Nope, she just saves people if she happens to stumble across a problem, and lives a normal life - irresponsible, and without any need for affirmation from the media or the like. Nobody's even heard of her, it's just thanks to my super-senses that I discover her at all.
Not only do I fall in love with this woman on first sight, I also envy her. And the envy turns almost to hatred, because someone can be so free, so happy - someone born to the same responsibilities as me, but who can just carelessly ignore it and don't feel even a twinge of guilt. No longer needed at the mountain, I fly back to the community -
- to find that nobody wants to talk to me any longer, because everyone's all excited that Superman was seen over a nearby mountain, and that's so awesome. I go on with my day, crossbow-practising and all, thinking about this superheroine I've met. It distracts me so much that I don't even notice I've been careless, and a family in the town start suspecting I might be Superman. Strongly.
So they let loose a circus bear, hoping that I'll slip up and reveal my identity to them (this plot is probably straight out of the comic books, actually). So sure are they of this theory, that the mother in the family locks herself with me in a small flimsy trailer close to the bear, so that I'll have to make a mistake - I can't leave the trailer, because I'm supposed to be timid Clark Kent, who would never go outside to face a bear. Normally, Superman can deal with this. Just use one of your myriads of undetectable powers, or blow a curtain in the woman's face for a few seconds, or something - but I'm distracted, frustrated and frightened, so I just punch the bear in the face and kill it. The woman triumphantly goes "A-ha! You're Superman!"
...and it's this part of the dream I remember most vividly, because it was terrifying. In this dream, about Superman - and I know how utterly stupid and ridiculous this sounds - I went through a register of emotions so powerful that I have never experienced anything near it in real life. It was the guilt-and-self-loathing version of running and running and never getting anywhere, and waking up sweat-soaked and panicking. On the one hand, I don't want to hurt anyone. On the other hand, I'm really really angry and frustrated with the superheroine I met earlier in the day, who I both lust after and really hate (and, mind, I was still actually dating Lois Lane in this version of the dream, so there was guilt attached to that too). Also, I've realized just how much I need Clark Kent, because he's the only version of me that can actually make real friends, that can actually have functioning relationships of any kind. Superman is a god, and I don't want to be a god. And here is this woman who's basically threatening to kill Clark Kent.
So I hurt her. I hurt her bad. Holding back on most of my infinite strength, I manage not to kill her, but only barely. My dreams are normally not very graphic, but this one was. Snap. Crunch. You get the idea. And then, when I regain control of myself, I realize I can't. For all my anger, for all my despair, that's making me want to throw up, I can't bring myself to kill her. She's crippled, crying, reduced to a wreck of a human being, and it would really be the merciful thing to just end her life. But I can't.
This is the point where I woke up, flailing around, powerless against my own neurotic hangups. Power enough to smash moons to pieces, and I can't kill one woman to save my own sanity. It took me several minutes just to wind down, and remind myself that it was all just a dream. I hope it was all just a dream. If there's any dream I really don't want to be meaningful, it's this one.
(Also, please don't take it as such. If you take this dream to be deeply meaningful, it makes me seem utterly fucking nuts. I don't want you guys to think I am nuts. That would be unpleasant.)
It was not the scariest nightmare I've ever had as such, but the ending comes close, and the whole thing was really damn unpleasant. Why? Well, the flying, the superpowers, all of that was of course nice, but it was painful and frightening because, I realized, I think a lot like Clark Kent. And thinking like Clark Kent is pretty self-destructive.
So I was hanging around in a community in a forest, somewhere in Canada I think. I was there to do some reporting on a really old festival the locals celebrated. It was a kinda small job for star reporter Clark Kent, but whatever.
I don't remember the beginning of the dream, exactly - but I remember I stayed in town for a while, making friends and really starting to feel at home there. Real friendship, and it happening two to three times in a single day. It rocked. Then, a disaster of some kind struck on a mountain, and off I go, just in time to miss the festival itself and to disappear from a friend I had promised to help practising crossbow-shooting for some competition, and just bail out on some old people who had really wanted to meet me. Feeling really bad about letting everyone down, I fly off to the mountain and meet another superhero - a superheroine, rather; and promptly fall in love. This woman doesn't bother with secret identities, she just kinda saves people from afar, using various distance-based powers like controlling gravity. She's much more free and less worried than stuck-up Superman, who feels responsible for everyone, everything, all the time - and worse, she doesn't need the affirmation of peoples' thanks and admiration, in that empty, hollow way I do myself; as if a medal or a statue to my commemoration could somehow fill that empty hole inside. Nope, she just saves people if she happens to stumble across a problem, and lives a normal life - irresponsible, and without any need for affirmation from the media or the like. Nobody's even heard of her, it's just thanks to my super-senses that I discover her at all.
Not only do I fall in love with this woman on first sight, I also envy her. And the envy turns almost to hatred, because someone can be so free, so happy - someone born to the same responsibilities as me, but who can just carelessly ignore it and don't feel even a twinge of guilt. No longer needed at the mountain, I fly back to the community -
- to find that nobody wants to talk to me any longer, because everyone's all excited that Superman was seen over a nearby mountain, and that's so awesome. I go on with my day, crossbow-practising and all, thinking about this superheroine I've met. It distracts me so much that I don't even notice I've been careless, and a family in the town start suspecting I might be Superman. Strongly.
So they let loose a circus bear, hoping that I'll slip up and reveal my identity to them (this plot is probably straight out of the comic books, actually). So sure are they of this theory, that the mother in the family locks herself with me in a small flimsy trailer close to the bear, so that I'll have to make a mistake - I can't leave the trailer, because I'm supposed to be timid Clark Kent, who would never go outside to face a bear. Normally, Superman can deal with this. Just use one of your myriads of undetectable powers, or blow a curtain in the woman's face for a few seconds, or something - but I'm distracted, frustrated and frightened, so I just punch the bear in the face and kill it. The woman triumphantly goes "A-ha! You're Superman!"
...and it's this part of the dream I remember most vividly, because it was terrifying. In this dream, about Superman - and I know how utterly stupid and ridiculous this sounds - I went through a register of emotions so powerful that I have never experienced anything near it in real life. It was the guilt-and-self-loathing version of running and running and never getting anywhere, and waking up sweat-soaked and panicking. On the one hand, I don't want to hurt anyone. On the other hand, I'm really really angry and frustrated with the superheroine I met earlier in the day, who I both lust after and really hate (and, mind, I was still actually dating Lois Lane in this version of the dream, so there was guilt attached to that too). Also, I've realized just how much I need Clark Kent, because he's the only version of me that can actually make real friends, that can actually have functioning relationships of any kind. Superman is a god, and I don't want to be a god. And here is this woman who's basically threatening to kill Clark Kent.
So I hurt her. I hurt her bad. Holding back on most of my infinite strength, I manage not to kill her, but only barely. My dreams are normally not very graphic, but this one was. Snap. Crunch. You get the idea. And then, when I regain control of myself, I realize I can't. For all my anger, for all my despair, that's making me want to throw up, I can't bring myself to kill her. She's crippled, crying, reduced to a wreck of a human being, and it would really be the merciful thing to just end her life. But I can't.
This is the point where I woke up, flailing around, powerless against my own neurotic hangups. Power enough to smash moons to pieces, and I can't kill one woman to save my own sanity. It took me several minutes just to wind down, and remind myself that it was all just a dream. I hope it was all just a dream. If there's any dream I really don't want to be meaningful, it's this one.
(Also, please don't take it as such. If you take this dream to be deeply meaningful, it makes me seem utterly fucking nuts. I don't want you guys to think I am nuts. That would be unpleasant.)
söndag 12 december 2010
Angry
I should stop reading newspapers. At least, I should stop reading the letters that are printed in them. I am angry.
Not just irritated, actually angry. If I had the writer of the letter before me, I'd probably not punch them, but maybe spit them in the face. Let me explain.
When I was very little, I read a story. It has left a profound impact on me, and may, indeed, be a big reason why I still consider myself – at least in part – Christian. I think I found it in my grandmothers' old schoolbooks. It's about an ox. The ox begins every day by thanking God. He thanks God for the grass he eats, for the sun that rises, for the wind on his face. He's a goddamn ox, a castrated, miserable creature who spends all his time hauling around carts and will eventually end up in a soup. But he's grateful for his lot in life; he's grateful that he's alive. I took this story to heart. Being grateful to God, specifically, is perhaps not really important. But being grateful? Absolutely. Appreciating what you have is, to me, the absolutely most important aspect of being a decent human being.
Maybe I would think differently if I wasn't actually privileged. Which I am. I have more food than I could possibly eat. Assuming the welfare state of Sweden continues to exist in the way it does, I will probably never seriously starve. Now, I'm not morally perfect, I realize that. I don't donate money to charities. I don't contribute to society. I don't really even educate myself to become anything particularly helpful, like a teacher or a doctor. But at least, at the very least, I'm grateful for what I have. Which brings me to that letter.
I read it in the most recent student magazine, and it made me angrier than I have been in a very long time. These people, these wretched, wretched people, are actually delusional enough to believe that they, as students in the Swedish university system, deserve pity. They have the sheer arrogance to demand that they get something better. They are dissatisfied. Even worse, they are ungrateful. They are given an education, free of charge, and beneficial loans to give them an education. An education which, they claim, is no longer an advantage in modern society. Maybe so. Maybe it will do no good, and you'll end up owing the state money for the rest of your life. Money which the state will use to buy you medicine, to pay policemen, to keep you alive in case you lose your job.
Don't get me wrong – of course one can be miserable in a modern welfare society. One can be lost, depressed, lonely, confused. One can be homeless, yes, even starving. But this is not what they are complaining about. The people who wrote this letter believe that they are being exploited, and that they are somehow eating and living badly.
No.
No, you are not poor. You have a home. You have food. You can bleach your brains in alcohol every Friday and still have money left for peanuts to go with it. Society demands work and study from you so that you – and other citizens of our country – can continue to lead decent lives. This is not exploitation.
There are few things in life I can't tolerate in another person, but more than anything else, this is it. This is what makes me positively want to puke with revulsion. When other people make an effort for your sake, you do not complain. You can criticize, you can refuse the help, you can accept it but tell them how they might do it better – but you do not. Fucking. Complain. You thank them. I think this is something everyone should adhere to. You may not believe in a God, so you have nobody to thank for the sunshine and the grass, but what the hell, be thankful for it anyway. Appreciate it. When the zombie apocalypse comes, you may no longer be able to.
Not just irritated, actually angry. If I had the writer of the letter before me, I'd probably not punch them, but maybe spit them in the face. Let me explain.
When I was very little, I read a story. It has left a profound impact on me, and may, indeed, be a big reason why I still consider myself – at least in part – Christian. I think I found it in my grandmothers' old schoolbooks. It's about an ox. The ox begins every day by thanking God. He thanks God for the grass he eats, for the sun that rises, for the wind on his face. He's a goddamn ox, a castrated, miserable creature who spends all his time hauling around carts and will eventually end up in a soup. But he's grateful for his lot in life; he's grateful that he's alive. I took this story to heart. Being grateful to God, specifically, is perhaps not really important. But being grateful? Absolutely. Appreciating what you have is, to me, the absolutely most important aspect of being a decent human being.
Maybe I would think differently if I wasn't actually privileged. Which I am. I have more food than I could possibly eat. Assuming the welfare state of Sweden continues to exist in the way it does, I will probably never seriously starve. Now, I'm not morally perfect, I realize that. I don't donate money to charities. I don't contribute to society. I don't really even educate myself to become anything particularly helpful, like a teacher or a doctor. But at least, at the very least, I'm grateful for what I have. Which brings me to that letter.
I read it in the most recent student magazine, and it made me angrier than I have been in a very long time. These people, these wretched, wretched people, are actually delusional enough to believe that they, as students in the Swedish university system, deserve pity. They have the sheer arrogance to demand that they get something better. They are dissatisfied. Even worse, they are ungrateful. They are given an education, free of charge, and beneficial loans to give them an education. An education which, they claim, is no longer an advantage in modern society. Maybe so. Maybe it will do no good, and you'll end up owing the state money for the rest of your life. Money which the state will use to buy you medicine, to pay policemen, to keep you alive in case you lose your job.
Don't get me wrong – of course one can be miserable in a modern welfare society. One can be lost, depressed, lonely, confused. One can be homeless, yes, even starving. But this is not what they are complaining about. The people who wrote this letter believe that they are being exploited, and that they are somehow eating and living badly.
No.
No, you are not poor. You have a home. You have food. You can bleach your brains in alcohol every Friday and still have money left for peanuts to go with it. Society demands work and study from you so that you – and other citizens of our country – can continue to lead decent lives. This is not exploitation.
There are few things in life I can't tolerate in another person, but more than anything else, this is it. This is what makes me positively want to puke with revulsion. When other people make an effort for your sake, you do not complain. You can criticize, you can refuse the help, you can accept it but tell them how they might do it better – but you do not. Fucking. Complain. You thank them. I think this is something everyone should adhere to. You may not believe in a God, so you have nobody to thank for the sunshine and the grass, but what the hell, be thankful for it anyway. Appreciate it. When the zombie apocalypse comes, you may no longer be able to.
onsdag 8 december 2010
2005: Survival in Moscow
Long time since I wrote one of these now, sorry about that. Anyway, I'm not yet done with my anthology of past adventures, and since I for once have nothing particularly important to do, here goes another one...
With the disappearance of Drake and Bob, as they departed to faraway lands, the group underwent a major change. The only player left from last years' group was Kennedy, and since Luke had been playing with us during the summer, he jumped on board the group as well. That left me with two players, since Solomon and Alastair quit the group. However, during my first (very busy) year at the new school, I had been meeting a lot of new people, and as fate would have it, two of these would come to join the new group.
I will explain their identities shortly. But before I do so, it should be pointed out that 2005 was an interesting year for me personally, because it was a year of broadened horizons. I had been dabbling in some other games earlier, with previous groups - Mage: The Ascension, Aki, GURPS, and so forth - but this year would be marked as a year of experimentation. All in all, the new group of four players participated in four different games, using four different systems: Survival in Moscow, a Vampire game - Trigonometry Fandango, a spiritual sequel to Parallel Fandango, which was a rule-less free-form game - Winter Death, a highly unsuccessful AE game, and Angels, using a weird hybrid of d20 rules. Previously, I had always regarded the d20 system as the "default" system, the one I would always be coming back to - but this year, I started exploring the world of RPGs to discover the vast array of strange games that can be found out there. I was already familiar with the idea of playing games that deviate from their mechanics - of running political intrigues in systems chiefly designed for bashing in heads, of running mysteries in systems chiefly designed for bashing in heads, even of running romance stories in systems chiefly designed for bashing in heads - but I had never really reflected on the idea that a rules system could be designed around a particular style of play.
Let me address this point for a moment. Of course any kind of story can be told in any system (or with no system at all). But the existence of game systems explicitly designed for a given type of story allows, I believe, a much better venue for exploring that kind of story. A game system should never be more complicated than it has to be, yet at the same time, if it isn't complex enough in certain areas, you get a needless amount of gloss-over. It isn't very interesting to play a swashbuckling adventure in a game system where all the rules come down to "Roll dice. You rolled the highest. Therefore, you win." Of course, one can always elaborate using ones' imagination, but that takes away the exciting element of gambling and taking chances, which is - for me, anyway - one of the greater kicks in playing RPGs, as opposed to just writing a story. So, a game system needs to be complex in just the right places. This is why I obsess so over new game systems - because they encourage you to think in a certain fashion, which may be different from how you've been thinking before. If the game system makes combat very deadly, that will reflect upon the players' decisions. If the game system is geared towards social interactions, that will cause the GM to consider NPCs differently - if Joe has "resistance to Seduction" or "vulnerability to Flattery", what does that say about Joe?
Apologies for the brief essay there. Back to the topic at hand: The new group, and the new games.
Two new people joined my group this year, Dakota and Jason. They were friends from since before, and already had some experience playing RPGs together. Jason I didn't know very well when we started to game, as I had gotten to know him through the Japanese classes, but we quickly became friends. Dakota I had been having drama classes together with for over a year, so we were quite familiar.
As mentioned above, this group of four played in four separate games, with varying degrees of success. The one I spent the most effort on, and the one that (to me) stands out as the "main" game, was the Vampire: The Requiem game. Survival in Moscow revolved around a group of three vampires and a mage (Take a guess who played the mage), trying to, well, survive in Moscow. I don't remember the particularities of the plot very well, but chiefly it revolved around the Sheriff of the local vampires going insane and crucifying himself in a warehouse. This triggered a long chain of strange intrigue, made all the more complex when the Sheriff returned from the dead after three days. The game was spectacularly bloody, and although no player characters died, there was a lot of backstabbing and misery involved. In the end, Kennedy and Jasons characters had both lost everything they held dear, whereas Dakota and Luke managed to come out much more prosperous than they had been at the start. The game essentially ended because the group tore itself apart.
The other game of note, would be Trigonometry Fandango. It was a spiritual sequel to Parallel Fandango (and, as it turned out, an actual sequel as well), which I had been playing with Kennedy and Bob the year before, while Drake was in Spanish class. Both games were entirely free-form and ruleless, something I had been itching to try but never really done before these games. They took place in a Weird West-sort of setting, with cowboys, ninjas, and Arabic cities dropped smack-damn into the desert for no apparent reason. The first game revolved around the escort of a Japanese princess, the second about a hilariously complex scheme of techno-magicians who had been messing with every single player character in ridiculously convoluted ways. The two games were unrelated storywise, but there was a slight narrative connection as it turned out Jasons character in the latter game was actually the son of Kennedys character in the former - under a fake name.
This is getting really, really long now, so I'm going to wrap it up. The other two games were a brief AE game set in a forest, which ended because the PCs killed each other, and a hybrid game revolving around angels hanging around on Earth and trying to solve a mystery led by a villain who was invisible to God and all of the angels. A memorable chase scene involving a web camera and a mortal friend halfway across the world shouting instructions was involved.
Notable Characters: Remembering all these characters is a little blurry for me, but I should at least mention Kennedys' "Angel of the Internet" from the Angels game (he was the one responsible for the webcam stunt - his angelic power involved getting a flawless Internet connection, anywhere), Lukes Fat Black Ninja from Trigonometry Fandango (A ninja who behaved more like an overweight rapper) and Dakotas "Angel of Healing, Also of Missing Everything and Being Totally Maimed By Enemies". Seriously. She had the worst luck ever in that game.
Actually I think the Angels game may have had the most interesting characters overall, even though the story wasn't very interesting. I also fondly remember Jasons' "Angel of Pigeons and Weird-Ass Weaponry", which actually was a purview suggested by the corebook, although Jason sort of twisted it to his designs.
Crowning Moment of Awesome: The ending of Trigonometry Fandango was pretty massive, as every single character suddenly came to confront their past in the same place at the same time. It ended with Kennedy and Dakotas characters both reverting from monsters into humans, and recognizing each other as past lovers - which was a bit of a shocker - and it also involved Jasons character coming to terms with his daddy issues. And, of course, it's not over until the fat man sneaks.
Next Up: 2006: Arcana Evolved, in which I will discuss the main storyline of Arcana Evolved, and, if I have time, I'll also explore what Bob named the "Arcana Evolved Doujinshi", an epic tale taking place in the same world, but with radically different themes and characters.
With the disappearance of Drake and Bob, as they departed to faraway lands, the group underwent a major change. The only player left from last years' group was Kennedy, and since Luke had been playing with us during the summer, he jumped on board the group as well. That left me with two players, since Solomon and Alastair quit the group. However, during my first (very busy) year at the new school, I had been meeting a lot of new people, and as fate would have it, two of these would come to join the new group.
I will explain their identities shortly. But before I do so, it should be pointed out that 2005 was an interesting year for me personally, because it was a year of broadened horizons. I had been dabbling in some other games earlier, with previous groups - Mage: The Ascension, Aki, GURPS, and so forth - but this year would be marked as a year of experimentation. All in all, the new group of four players participated in four different games, using four different systems: Survival in Moscow, a Vampire game - Trigonometry Fandango, a spiritual sequel to Parallel Fandango, which was a rule-less free-form game - Winter Death, a highly unsuccessful AE game, and Angels, using a weird hybrid of d20 rules. Previously, I had always regarded the d20 system as the "default" system, the one I would always be coming back to - but this year, I started exploring the world of RPGs to discover the vast array of strange games that can be found out there. I was already familiar with the idea of playing games that deviate from their mechanics - of running political intrigues in systems chiefly designed for bashing in heads, of running mysteries in systems chiefly designed for bashing in heads, even of running romance stories in systems chiefly designed for bashing in heads - but I had never really reflected on the idea that a rules system could be designed around a particular style of play.
Let me address this point for a moment. Of course any kind of story can be told in any system (or with no system at all). But the existence of game systems explicitly designed for a given type of story allows, I believe, a much better venue for exploring that kind of story. A game system should never be more complicated than it has to be, yet at the same time, if it isn't complex enough in certain areas, you get a needless amount of gloss-over. It isn't very interesting to play a swashbuckling adventure in a game system where all the rules come down to "Roll dice. You rolled the highest. Therefore, you win." Of course, one can always elaborate using ones' imagination, but that takes away the exciting element of gambling and taking chances, which is - for me, anyway - one of the greater kicks in playing RPGs, as opposed to just writing a story. So, a game system needs to be complex in just the right places. This is why I obsess so over new game systems - because they encourage you to think in a certain fashion, which may be different from how you've been thinking before. If the game system makes combat very deadly, that will reflect upon the players' decisions. If the game system is geared towards social interactions, that will cause the GM to consider NPCs differently - if Joe has "resistance to Seduction" or "vulnerability to Flattery", what does that say about Joe?
Apologies for the brief essay there. Back to the topic at hand: The new group, and the new games.
Two new people joined my group this year, Dakota and Jason. They were friends from since before, and already had some experience playing RPGs together. Jason I didn't know very well when we started to game, as I had gotten to know him through the Japanese classes, but we quickly became friends. Dakota I had been having drama classes together with for over a year, so we were quite familiar.
As mentioned above, this group of four played in four separate games, with varying degrees of success. The one I spent the most effort on, and the one that (to me) stands out as the "main" game, was the Vampire: The Requiem game. Survival in Moscow revolved around a group of three vampires and a mage (Take a guess who played the mage), trying to, well, survive in Moscow. I don't remember the particularities of the plot very well, but chiefly it revolved around the Sheriff of the local vampires going insane and crucifying himself in a warehouse. This triggered a long chain of strange intrigue, made all the more complex when the Sheriff returned from the dead after three days. The game was spectacularly bloody, and although no player characters died, there was a lot of backstabbing and misery involved. In the end, Kennedy and Jasons characters had both lost everything they held dear, whereas Dakota and Luke managed to come out much more prosperous than they had been at the start. The game essentially ended because the group tore itself apart.
The other game of note, would be Trigonometry Fandango. It was a spiritual sequel to Parallel Fandango (and, as it turned out, an actual sequel as well), which I had been playing with Kennedy and Bob the year before, while Drake was in Spanish class. Both games were entirely free-form and ruleless, something I had been itching to try but never really done before these games. They took place in a Weird West-sort of setting, with cowboys, ninjas, and Arabic cities dropped smack-damn into the desert for no apparent reason. The first game revolved around the escort of a Japanese princess, the second about a hilariously complex scheme of techno-magicians who had been messing with every single player character in ridiculously convoluted ways. The two games were unrelated storywise, but there was a slight narrative connection as it turned out Jasons character in the latter game was actually the son of Kennedys character in the former - under a fake name.
This is getting really, really long now, so I'm going to wrap it up. The other two games were a brief AE game set in a forest, which ended because the PCs killed each other, and a hybrid game revolving around angels hanging around on Earth and trying to solve a mystery led by a villain who was invisible to God and all of the angels. A memorable chase scene involving a web camera and a mortal friend halfway across the world shouting instructions was involved.
Notable Characters: Remembering all these characters is a little blurry for me, but I should at least mention Kennedys' "Angel of the Internet" from the Angels game (he was the one responsible for the webcam stunt - his angelic power involved getting a flawless Internet connection, anywhere), Lukes Fat Black Ninja from Trigonometry Fandango (A ninja who behaved more like an overweight rapper) and Dakotas "Angel of Healing, Also of Missing Everything and Being Totally Maimed By Enemies". Seriously. She had the worst luck ever in that game.
Actually I think the Angels game may have had the most interesting characters overall, even though the story wasn't very interesting. I also fondly remember Jasons' "Angel of Pigeons and Weird-Ass Weaponry", which actually was a purview suggested by the corebook, although Jason sort of twisted it to his designs.
Crowning Moment of Awesome: The ending of Trigonometry Fandango was pretty massive, as every single character suddenly came to confront their past in the same place at the same time. It ended with Kennedy and Dakotas characters both reverting from monsters into humans, and recognizing each other as past lovers - which was a bit of a shocker - and it also involved Jasons character coming to terms with his daddy issues. And, of course, it's not over until the fat man sneaks.
Next Up: 2006: Arcana Evolved, in which I will discuss the main storyline of Arcana Evolved, and, if I have time, I'll also explore what Bob named the "Arcana Evolved Doujinshi", an epic tale taking place in the same world, but with radically different themes and characters.
torsdag 11 november 2010
Wanting and Fearing
Desire is a strange thing. On the one hand, as the Buddhists say, desire invites unhappiness; we can never have the things we want, and even if we do, the act of receiving extinguishes the desire we felt and leaves us empty and suffering. On the other hand, desire keeps us going. Desire is what makes us get up in the morning; I want food, I want to read, I want to learn, I want to sleep.
Way back somewhere on this blog, I quote Ray Bradbury when he talks of wanting - of wanting a donkey, of wanting jewels, of wanting a woman, and, finally, wanting sleep. Sometimes, I think, all of us desire that final sleep. But then we snap out of it and recognize this desire as a vain and foolish desire. Why? Because it interferes with our other desires. A dead man can't eat or read. We're further kept away from death by the twin of desire - fear.
Sigmund Freud thought people were motivated by two forces: Eros and Thanatos. How to interpret these forces varies from person to person, but one possible way to interpret them is as desire and fear. We want, and we fear. Without desire, without fear, we would come to a standstill. The only reason why we keep going when our desires are fulfilled is that they invite fear of losing what we have found. The only reason why we keep going when our fears come to pass is that they invite a desire to undo that fearful, undesirable event.
There are many who say one should live ones' life according to ones' desires. Do what you wish shall be the whole of the law. I do not object to this philosophy - it is a good thing that people are allowed to pursue their desires. But why is it so, that fear is seen as inferior to its twin, desire? Why do we see the pursuit of happiness as more important than the escape from unhappiness? They are not necessarily the same thing.
Desire is no longer shameful, as it once were; if I want to love a man, it is nothing I should be ashamed of. If I want to stay home and play video games, it may be shameful in certain circles, but overall, society is tolerant of most desires so long as they don't bring harm to others. Fear, on the other hand, is deeply shameful. It is true that fear can limit people, even cripple them - but this is also true with desire. Greed is just as dangerous a shackle as is cowardice.
They key with desire, of course, is to desire in moderation. Your life will be unfulfilled if your only desire is alcohol. It is shameful and unhealthy to be addicted. A man who sleeps with other men is healthy in society's eyes, but a homosexual man who is addicted to sex is unhealthy, because it ultimately hurts him. Could it not be so with fear, as well? Fearing insects is not bad; fearing them so much that you can't sleep for fear of a single mosquito is bad, because it hurts you - it deprives you of sleep.
Wanting and fearing, it seems to me, are yin and yang of human behaviour. Why, then, am I ashamed of my fears?
Way back somewhere on this blog, I quote Ray Bradbury when he talks of wanting - of wanting a donkey, of wanting jewels, of wanting a woman, and, finally, wanting sleep. Sometimes, I think, all of us desire that final sleep. But then we snap out of it and recognize this desire as a vain and foolish desire. Why? Because it interferes with our other desires. A dead man can't eat or read. We're further kept away from death by the twin of desire - fear.
Sigmund Freud thought people were motivated by two forces: Eros and Thanatos. How to interpret these forces varies from person to person, but one possible way to interpret them is as desire and fear. We want, and we fear. Without desire, without fear, we would come to a standstill. The only reason why we keep going when our desires are fulfilled is that they invite fear of losing what we have found. The only reason why we keep going when our fears come to pass is that they invite a desire to undo that fearful, undesirable event.
There are many who say one should live ones' life according to ones' desires. Do what you wish shall be the whole of the law. I do not object to this philosophy - it is a good thing that people are allowed to pursue their desires. But why is it so, that fear is seen as inferior to its twin, desire? Why do we see the pursuit of happiness as more important than the escape from unhappiness? They are not necessarily the same thing.
Desire is no longer shameful, as it once were; if I want to love a man, it is nothing I should be ashamed of. If I want to stay home and play video games, it may be shameful in certain circles, but overall, society is tolerant of most desires so long as they don't bring harm to others. Fear, on the other hand, is deeply shameful. It is true that fear can limit people, even cripple them - but this is also true with desire. Greed is just as dangerous a shackle as is cowardice.
They key with desire, of course, is to desire in moderation. Your life will be unfulfilled if your only desire is alcohol. It is shameful and unhealthy to be addicted. A man who sleeps with other men is healthy in society's eyes, but a homosexual man who is addicted to sex is unhealthy, because it ultimately hurts him. Could it not be so with fear, as well? Fearing insects is not bad; fearing them so much that you can't sleep for fear of a single mosquito is bad, because it hurts you - it deprives you of sleep.
Wanting and fearing, it seems to me, are yin and yang of human behaviour. Why, then, am I ashamed of my fears?
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