It’s been a rough week. A few days ago, my wife found out that she matched for her neonatology fellowship in St. Louis, MO. She’s excited, because she really likes the program and it’s a great opportunity. Unfortunately, St. Louis isn’t the ideal city for us. I’m fairly certain that emergency medicine is what I want to do with the rest of my life, and there are no osteopathic (D.O.) emergency medicine residencies in Missouri. There are a couple allopathic (M.D.) programs, but I would need to do a traditional rotating internship (TRI) year first to strengthen my application. There is one TRI program in St. Louis, but it’s a risky proposition for a number of reasons that I won’t get into here. Suffice it to say, I’ve been feeling very helpless. It seems like no matter what I do, or how much I want to succeed, whatever happens ultimately isn’t even up to me or Emily. It’s very unsettling.
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People often ask me why I play so many video games. Granted, I used to play much more than I do now, but I still turn on my DS or PSP for at least a few minutes each night before I go to sleep. Growing up, I used video games as my escape. If life was getting stressful or if I just wanted to procrastinate for a little while, I’d pop in a Zelda game and suddenly be a million miles away in Hyrule, swinging a sword or playing an ocarina.
But video games are more than escapism. During the most tumultuous times of my life, video games have been therapy. When I feel like I have no control over the things that matter most, video games offer a place where I can feel helpful. Useful. Needed. I’m saving a princess from captivity, a species from annihilation, or world from destruction. The helplessness I felt before is gone and I feel empowered to do something good. Even if that good is for fictional characters, it resonates. When I’m done playing, the feeling of empowerment stays, even if only for a week. A few days. A moment. It builds confidence. It battles depression. It inspires.
Sony just launched a new ad campaign called LongLivePlay. The video below sums up the feeling I’ve tried to convey here. It’s more effective if you’re familiar with the characters, but it gets the point across either way.
I am sorry about the rough week.
On a positive note, your site is inspiring me to play more video games. Or at least think about playing more video games. If you had to pick one game available on PC to suggest, what would it be?
That’s a tough one. I don’t usually play PC games because I’ve been using a netbook ever since I spilled coffee all over my real laptop. That was a good day.
Portal 2 is by far one of my favorite games on any console. It’s a first person puzzle game. It’ll run you about 10 hours on your first playthrough. The original Portal is only 3-4 hours (and cheaper) if you wanna try that out first. Also one of the best.