Building a healthy relationship with Elma

[kuchitsu]

I find it difficult to build a healthy relationship with Elma. When I get excited about it, it occupies a huge portion of my mind and becomes almost like an obsession. After some time in that state I naturally become sick of the game and can get rather emotional about that temporary disappointment. So I try to get out of it. Then at some point I get excited again, come back, and the circle repeats. I find it hard to treat Elma as just some side activity, instead I have to either dive into it 100% or completely abstain from it.

Not sure if that's due to the nature of the game or maybe some ridiculous rules I made up in my head that I don't even know about. It's strange. Maybe I just don't have enough things in my life and that's what causes me to take what little I have too seriously. I guess if I had like 30 hobbies and shuffled them around all the time, I wouldn't have to obsess over just one of them so much. And I probably should be trying new things in life more often instead of sticking to the old ones all the time and expecting them to always remain fresh and exciting.

So yeah, just rambling here... If you have some relevant thoughts to share, please do.)

[pawq]

Elma is addictive.

Yeah, I have the same thing. Since my comeback I sometimes find it hard to do anything else than play at home, which upsets my gf. I really think it's just due to its addictiveness. Once you start playing it's so AWESOME that you just don't want to stop, because why on earth would you?? And that would explain why 90% of elmans are socially awkward addicts ;)

[Chris]

I'm mostly chilling while elmaing, browsing web, ircing, talking with people, eating, drawing levs, watching tv and sometimes I actually wroom but that's rare xdd

[kuchitsu]

On some days when I open EOL I'm not even sure if I do it because I truly want to play/make levs at the moment, or if I'm just mindlessly following a habit. It's comfortable to just turn off my brain and do the usual stuff instead of thinking how I could spend my day in a more interesting productive way. Like, I still have some fun in EOL I guess, but then I end up feeling kinda empty, as in I wasted a lot of time on something that perhaps was unnecessary. I feel like maybe I should spend some time away from the game and think what exactly it means to me. I don't know. This game is evil lol.

[Ruben]

On some days when I open EOL I'm not even sure if I do it because I truly want to play/make levs at the moment, or if I'm just mindlessly following a habit. It's comfortable to just turn off my brain and do the usual stuff instead of thinking how I could spend my day in a more interesting productive way. Like, I still have some fun in EOL I guess, but then I end up feeling kinda empty, as in I wasted a lot of time on something that perhaps was unnecessary. I feel like maybe I should spend some time away from the game and think what exactly it means to me. I don't know. This game is evil lol.

I don't think it's wasted just because it's not productive. You did something you thought was fun, and that's a good thing. To quote comic book guy: "I've spent my entire life doing nothing but collecting comic books... Life well spent!"

[gimp]

Elma is only a problem if you perceive it to be. The only thing that matters is whether at the end of your day you are happy with the choices you made, elma or no elma. It seems that since you have made this topic you are not happy with your self.