I was browsing through many games - especially here and on kongregate - and movies, waiting for the “now I am onto something” feeling. A game or movie that makes me feel home.
I could not find it.
Most games evoke tension, aggression or fear. Also, cg-worlds never seem to make you feel home maybe due to what is called the uncanny valley.
I made it a habit to stop playing games the moment I feel bad. I ask myself the question, whether this very game that I am playing makes me feel good or bad. In most cases we don’t listen to our mood - sometimes hoping that it gets better. In my experience, games don’t make me feel calm after some time if they didn’t in the first place.
I started equipping myself with a bigger screen, a virtual reality helmet, I even built a diy-headtracker hoping that this will immerse me more in games and make me feel home but still, it didn’t. I came to the conclusion, that neiter games nor movies can make you be happy but they are better than nothing at all.
Do you have an idea where to find what I am looking for?
PS: 2nd option is “No, please let me explain, why and what does make happy”
It really depends on the human. And I don’t know what you mean by most games. There are a lot of games. GGI Worlds can make you feel at home, that I feel you should speak for your self. Yes the uncanny valley can be factor but it occurs when we she something so human but doesn’t act like it. Like this:
Is she human or isn’t she?
And I think you need to go out and do a thing. Without being philosophical and stuff, you can’t find happiness when you have it already you just have to unlock, you do have the key of course.
Happiness comes from within.
Happiness is unconditional love.
Happiness is not caused by or affected by anything outside of you.
Happiness is always available unless you choose against it.
Happiness doesn’t depend on whether something looks good or bad, because it overlooks all conditionality and sees only itself reflected back.
Happiness is eternal.
Happiness comes from the peace of knowing that only love is real.
Happiness cannot be taken away unless it is conditionally based on certain preferences, judgements, interpretations or other subjective attitudes.
Happiness is outside your awareness if you are acting automatically, unconsciously, or with resistance.
Happiness is freely available and only requires your acceptance of it.
Happiness cannot be caused or or uncaused by anything outside of you, no matter what it looks like.
Happiness is extended through you and is given to what you see, to show you a happy experience, if you allow it.
Happiness is blocked when you give away your power by deciding freely to pretend that something outside of you can choose happiness for you.
Happiness is a spiritual reality and an experience of absolute truth.
Happiness is not caused by a movie or a game or any other fantasy - you just trick yourself into only allowing yourself to be happy when the game or movie says so, so that you can pretend to disown it.
Happiness comes when you let go of all fear.
Happiness is not optional, only unhappiness is optional - happiness is absolute, unhappiness is relative - conditional happiness is not genuine.
This all said, most people, me included, have convinced ourselves that something outside of ourselves chooses for us what we will experience and how we will interpret it and what we will feel when this happens. This is a state of spiritual unconsciousness, asleep at the wheel, letting ourselves be pushed around by gusts of wind and fateful events, hoping to exercise some control over avoiding the so-called bad stuff and getting more of the good stuff. But separating bad and good is a trick that everyone falls for which doesn’t lead to happiness, only to denial and unhappiness, because separation is unhappiness. Happiness is oneness. Happiness is Unity.
I guess it depends on the individual’s ability to imagine themselves as the target character of the movie or game. Relative exposure to virtual environments at younger ages when the brain is developing seems to determine one’s ability to immerse themselves into the portrayed environment/character in adulthood. I consider myself to have hyper-virtual-realism. I find that the more I am interested in a subject the more I can experience senses that are not even directly portrayed in the subject. I find myself sweating or fatigued after watching a movie or playing a game where the main subject is doing a lot of strenuous activity. I sometimes genuinely experience emotions that I logically feel I should be experiencing if I was in the situation that the subject is in. Rescuing a portrayed loved one from deadly situation and briefly feeling elated and happy from the success.
To put it short and simple. I do not believe one can easily learn in adulthood to use a substitution for reality and feel as though it is reality. You either have it or you don’t.
One caveat would be training in meditation and perhaps the acceptance that the reality you perceive to be “real” is merely a construct for experiencing alternate realities. Another one being the use of illicit drugs to make the brain more pliable and accepting of substituted reality.
Of course in 10-20 years, I believe technology will exist that will allow one to experience a virtual reality indistinguishable from actual reality. Perhaps allowing “virtual happiness” to be indistinguishable from “actual happiness”.
If you had a productive fulfilling day then you go play a aaa game – gta 5 you can feel good it’s the cherry on top but if you are depressed kind of lounging around all day it might feel blaise – more of the same. Moderation I guess is the key.
Movies and games used to make me happy, but not anymore. I don’t really care either. Nowdays I just explore the ideas within them, and I don’t mean like game ideas but ideas in more general sense.
The ideas? I guess it’s just the concepts introduced. It can be about anything really but there has to be some real thought behind it. If it makes me think about something I can convince myself the experience wasn’t a waste of time. It can even be fun but that’s not happiness. That’s a different sort of emotion.
Well my wife isn’t there to make me happy, as though she is only there for me to take happiness from her - sometimes it seems that she does encourage happiness in me but sometimes she isn’t happy. When she is not happy it’s up to me to choose whether I am happy and its up to me to extend my happiness to her, ie offer for her to be welcome to join me in my happiness, and to see her in a happy way so that she might remember she has that option. But still happiness comes from within.
“You’ve activated my Spell Card, ‘Back To Square One’”
What you ask seems generally open ended. Happy is a pretty broad term and can be relative for everyone and is often associated with joy and positive emotion. Also you use the term humans as a big generalization. Some ‘humans’ don’t like movies, some don’t like games, some don’t like neither and some love both. So asking that is a bit weird. Plus you say humans like you’re a bot or researching the race or something. I think a better question would be, “Which is more enjoyable, movies or games?” But it answer you question, there wouldn’t be one straight answer answer considering many factors and perspectives. At least I think so.
Happiness isn’t a finite resource to be “taken” until it’s gone and happiness absolutely can come from external sources. To say otherwise is emotionally immature at best.
When applied to the rest of your life, this mantra leads only to hedonism. Let me share two researchers perspectives on happiness.
Dr. Mihalyi Csikszentmihalyi (Flow) - says Flow is one of the most obvious measurements of happiness. Flow requires a balanced difficulty where goals are clear, and feedback is immediate. NOTE - Happiness requires DIFFICULTY.
Dr. Martin Seligman (Flourish) - describes ‘Well-Being’ as resulting from 5 aspects known as PERMA: Positive feelings; Engagement; Relationships; Meaning; and Accomplishment. Of those, all but Positive feelings involve elements of stress, anxiousness, or straight up feeling bad sometimes.
TL;DR; Suck it up, if you want true happiness.
Gigi.
