***

Competition is fun, but...

I usually don't compete. At a young age, not having friends hindered my socialization skills, but it's also a good thing because I paid little attention to competitions. My family generally didn't care about me trying to climb to the top. Whether out of doubts that I would literally never climb to the top, or to my mental health, I don't know. In recent years I joined a few gaming communities, and most of them focus a lot on metagaming. Fortunately for me, there were also newbies willing to learn, so we got along well. Fast forward 2 years later, almost everyone became experts at metagaming, and I fell behind due to university work. Everyone I knew shifted their mindset to competitive gaming, which spawned circles I couldn't possibly fit in.

What did I do then? Probably tried to be funny, something I do best. I had fun making the Touhou Supervillain list, among other things, as a testament of how I could fit in without joining exhaustive gameplays. But even that came to pass, and everyone kept on talking. It was a matter of time before what I did became a novelty, or at least that's how I feel. There are also smaller circles which I found myself in lately, namely the "Lower difficulty" competition. It generally doesn't make sense at first, but people had fun doing them, so there's no need to question it.

There's no need to downplay their fun.

If you remember the "EASY MODO" meme spawning in Touhou circles, these types of behaviors were a tumor in the community for a while, before they learned to grow past it. Of course there were moments when these behaviors catalyzed in the big 25, it's good to be reminded of why it's bad. Being a Touhou player means you can take on any challenges outside the status quo as long as you're having fun. It's great to share these experiences with the community, and there's no need to overwhelm yourself with difficult challenges to feel equal with others. That sort of mindset only makes your own life harder and less satisfying, and anyone who says otherwise is not worth your time.

My own corrected mindset

The only corrected mindset when I join a community and tell everyone why I came there, is to have fun. I didn't come to lament about how the world is being cruel to me and needing a place to forget about it, or wanting to show off. I come to communities to learn, to be kind even if people are cruel, to make my own enjoyment to gaming, to making websites, to talk and to share. The world sucks and I get it, but doing things out of spite only drags you down in the process, and makes your motivations unoriginal instead of creative and fun. Your own mindset is yours, not whatever depresses you.

Honestly, most of this isn't original advice, but it's something so scarce it needs to be said more often than not. Hopefully people can understand - I don't expect them to change right away. You can respond, you can rebuke my points at any time. So, let's get in touch.