One of my friends posted this article- Playing 'The Sims' Is Better Meditation Than Meditation on Facebook, and it's kind of an interesting take... While it annoys me that the author calls people with my approach to the game "sociopaths" for spending our time building rather than playing (which I would argue is just as meditative, if not more so), it's definitely a point of view that I'm curious to see what other people in the Sims community think of!

Everybody's different and has their own preference of meditation. But yeah, for an unknown number of people The Sims can be better for meditation and mood than meditation. But The Sims can also get the player depressed or angry.

???

I would expect someone to at least say "if you spend all your time killing people instead of playing them you're a sociopath" even if that sounds stupid too

Besides, even though I find Sims fun, it gets stressful to me after awhile :P

I can live with the fact that being a creator makes me an alleged Sociopath. Download my homes but stay safe and away from me, kids!

ETA: I just made a Twitter account to tell her the good news!

Play styles vary from player to player. My houses end up looking gaudy, bland or industrial. I usually commit the Celebrity sin and marry my heroes. I sometimes make anime and game characters for the matrimonial sin I just mention.

It's when I focus on these people, who are basically data rendered into 3D models with a basic AI, that I find my flow and find my control freak issues channeled into stories worth writing home about.

I don't have much control over my life at this point: I can't drive, I can't find a totally suitable job because of not only my distaste for office jobs but that I am clumsy, I have to rely on family to send money whenever a holiday comes around because I am saving for decent glasses as it has been about 11 days since I lost my old rose gold wireframe glasses from 2013, I currently am living paycheck to paycheck on government money, getting by on services provided by the state, even if the county office is located in PA's East border and not in NJ for some off reason.

So, I sometimes take refuge from these heavy thoughts in worlds generated in my PC, playing with my citizens of small worlds.

It's when I care for the people in the simulation that I find a sort of Happiness with the sonder emotion of envisioning great vivid lives for them.