Saturday, February 14, 2009

Who we really are, beneath that daily persona worn to please others, surfaces only in periods of stress and fear.

Dota is a bad form of entertainment. Depending on the degree of competitive urge within a person, playing a 1-hr match would reveal everything you would want to know about him/her - Those with perfectionist tendencies would often act up and start scolding people, becoming very unreasonable and irritable. Such people hate to lose as well. It is very saddening to see how good friends can scold each other or develop negative feelings just over a game. It is, human nature. It happens unconsciously. The other self takes over as we get lost in the game; it's as if the game controls our persona, and our real self emerges to show the true colours. If we could only treat it as a game - to have pure fun and not mechanically aiming to win and be serious every time - then ugly sides wouldn't emerge at all.

It is kind of ironical that we have to mindfully supress our TRUE selves. The perfect person would be one who loses with dignity and learns from it, never blaming a teammate for something, always taking the blame and offering words of encouragement etc; in a sense, to be true and genuine. These are the best people to hang around with. Sadly, I'm nowhere near that level... I still get irritated sometimes by unexpected 'happenings', and I feel bad about it. I guess it's just human to experience emotion; and if directed the right way, this emotion could grow to forge strong bonds between the players.