In which my I-can't-cope extends to video games

[ysobel]

So, okay, animal crossing. In theory I am still in love with it. In theory there are so many things I want to do. There's the whole snow thing going on. There's stuff in preparation for Toy Day. There's putting away the Halloween decorations and putting up yuletide-ier things. There's balloon hunting, possibly with time travel, so that I get all the mushroom recipes and all the acorn recipes and all the maple leaf recipes and all the winter stuff. There's terraforming that I want to do (paw print island) and decorating I want to do (flower area). There's the other island, the new one, that needs to get to three stars so I can get KK so I can get terraforming so I can make fun things.

In theory.

And I want to do all this. Or at least I want to want to. But I get little flickers of excitement. And ... and then I go to play and my gut response is ".........there's too much *shuts down*" and I barely do anything.

The summer update that came out, the Halloween update, both these things I remember watching the promo videos and watching other videos talking about it, and I vaguely distantly remember being excited. Turkey day I ... did the stuff on one island but it was kind of slog-like. I know there are videos with what's new in December, and I haven't even looked. I'm almost scared to. The ac discord I'm on, is muted and I haven't looked in ages. The ac thread in one of my rav groups, ditto. I can't play, I can't do anything related to playing, I can't ... I just can't. It's like a weird mental paralysis.

To a very slight extent there is competing interest from my yoshi semi-obsession. I'm not good at yoshi by any means but I keep wanting to play more. But since both yoshi and ac are in cartridge form, and since I can't switch cartridges myself, that means I haven't touched my second island in ... fuck, I don't know. I know I've popped in once since getting yoshi, but only once.

But that doesn't explain the complete anti enthusiasm with the switch lite. It's frustrating because I want to want to play it, and I sometimes get the desire (sometimes at completely wrong times like midnight when I don't have my switch and should be sleeping, but sometimes at good playable times) and then ... it's like I have no fuel. The fire lights but it burns out quickly.

I wish I could enjoy it. Or, second choice by far, if I can't enjoy it I wish I could not care. But I'm trapped and frustrated. And feel oddly guilty every time I play yoshi instead.

Fucking brains.

Comments

[jesse_the_k]

Brains suck sometimes!

Sending you patience to persevere thru the boredom of the moment.

[ysobel]

💜 Thank you.

[darkcedars]

Sometimes I think I'm going to play a game I haven't before, or continue playing one I barely started.

And then I play another 40 hours of Stardew Valley.

Mojo for playing what makes you happiest and you feel like messing with.

[ysobel]

I keep trying to tell myself that I should just enjoy what I enjoy and not fuss about what I "should" be doing. I tend to should at myself way too much. But for some reason I'm feeling super guilty about playing Yoshi over AC? And it doesn't help that in many areas of my life -- AC, writing, cleaning up and organizing, crochet and knitting -- there are things that I want to have accomplished, but either don't have the energy or don't know how to get there or both. So there are things I want my AC island to have, but doing the work is an impossible task. I want to have some organization to my yarns, but I'm terrible at organizing, always have been, and it's worse now. There are stories I want to have written, but writing is a pain both metaphorically and physically. (And then of course I beat myself up for not doing the things, because telling myself how much I suck ~clearly~ is the best way to make progress.)

I just. I don't understand my brain sometimes.

[jesse_the_k]

Some days I have to simply accept that my brain is on vacation (while my anxiety is working overtime). Shit happens. It doesn't mean something about me, the same way catching a cold doesn't mean something.

[darkcedars]

I'm now thinking about organizing other people's yarn stashes so...brains are weird.

I can be terrible about "shoulds." I'm housebound but not bedbound, and will use all my energy scraps to do chores. :/ Trying to treat myself better.