By Marrit Koopmans
Is it odd to find truth in works of fiction rather than most news items, documentaries, history and science studies which are claimed to be true?
In fiction, freedom 2 play must be its finest quality. Due to this quality, many books, films, and video games have been created.
Do u also experience such freedom in reality? I know it’s easy to lose sight of that sometimes. Let me share 3 fiction works that magnified my reality.
The Sims (first on pc, later on PlayStation) got me hooked. Sure, it seems to be a very plain game and all, but I gained a lot of wisdom from it. Meanwhile, all those years in school only made me sleepy and hungry, really.
The characters u get to play with are called Sims and they also get hungry and sleepy. It takes patience to let ur Sims live their life at full potential. Thatβs some wisdom for ya. Cheating codes do exist, but they fuck with ur software and rob the player of the journey. And the journey contains all the fun, doesnβt it?
Some details really stuck with me. For instance, ur Sim would be negatively affected by being in a dirty space with cheap furniture or broken devices, while an artwork or nice designer couch would uplift their mood. Feels real? Check. Also, personalities uβd set up, like the build of ur Sim, would naturally go with certain careers. This meant u could not be supreme in all careers. U needed to be specific and choose. I found that to be true too.
I loved diving into the world of Harry Potter, which I found inside books. Storywise it got a lilβ tame for me towards the end, but the world is super comforting if u feel like an outsider. I mean Harry, the doomed, suddenly turns into a superhero because there is more to reality than meets the (muggles) eye..
Recently, I’ve spent 380 hours playing Animal Crossing – New Horizons. This was around me turning 30; internal and external, there was a lot going on. And clearly, looking back, trying on a new life, building it from scratch in a video game was very inspiring, because it was innocent and lighthearted. Sure, escapism can be destructive if you get lost. But it can be constructive if you get to dip into an artwork. I re-discovered lots of animals and nature phenoms, as well as my passion for fashion and interior design.
The moment I felt the game was finished ran in sync with the unfolding of a new chapter for me in real life. It was beautiful.
Humans seem to be easily entranced by details in their everyday lives, so much so that u become a detail urself. Not able to see + feel the depth of reality anymore, u forget all about ur potential as the main character of ur life.
The bottom line of what Iβm trying to say is; fiction can remind u of something more real than what u came to believe = real. Never underestimate the power of fiction, because, in some cases, it comes from a deeper place than all the noise at the surface. That deep place of abstraction and mystery, in essence, we ourselves have been born from that too, you know.
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