I'll just play one more level....
[A historical note: I started writing this post over a week ago... and have only now got round to finishing it. Urp!]
I think I mentioned that I’d given up computer games for Lent. I’m not much of a gamer, as gamers go. Spider solitaire and a third-party version of Risk are my favorites. Never got into the MMOGs. But I’ll be honest, those games can waste hours at a time. That’s plural hours. As in, way too many.
So, that’s a big reason I’ve been slowly growing sleep deprived since Easter Sunday. End of day comes, and I think, hey, I’m allowed my games. And next thing I know it’s 1am (or later), and I have to be up for work the next morning.
Run away! Run away!
Sure, I play games to relax. But it often becomes something more than that. It turns into an attempt to escape from my life.
Not that my life is all that rough. But I am, as I’ve said, a lazy man and I resist any intrusion on my comforts. It quickly becomes a matter of principle: if work takes time away from leisure, then play takes time away from sleep.
Sleep, of course, ultimately takes its time back … usually at the least convenient moment.
All of this could have been avoided if only I’d been a little more disciplined, a little more realistic. I just don’t have all the time I’d like to play and relax and make a fool of myself. None of us do. There’s lots of good in life, but some parts of life are just plain tough, and that’s normal.
Penance and parties
I think that’s one of the lessons of Lent: that part of life is hard work, is difficult, even painful. But the penance leads to a celebration: our work bears fruit, and there’s a greater joy than the mere escape of vegging out with a computer game.
So I’m trying to remind myself of the good things that arise from giving up computer games and other distractions – good things like a full night’s sleep and the ability to enjoy life the next day.
And when I restrict my game playing to times when I really have nothing better to do, I find I actually enjoy the game more. Who’d have thought it?
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