Genshin Impact Life Lessons 1.

Genshin Impact is more than a gorgeous open-world fantasy game with deep lore and a stirring soundtrack. In a half-year or so of play, it has taught me...

Fight Worry with Worry

I tend to worry a lot about things over which I have little control: investments, tenants, career (or lack of). The possibility I could have more influence if I invested substantial effort makes it hard to stop feeling guilty for inaction, even as the return on investment is discouraging.

Breathing, yoga, mindfulness, and other exercises to moderate worrying helped ... to a certain extent.

Enter Genshin Impact.

Now my spare brain cycles are occupied with planning character, weapon, and armor/artifact progression - What should I level up? Who should I level up? - instead of catastrophising the effects of vacancies and forex on my income.

Does that mean that I neglect my real-world duties? No. I still respond to emails and do my chores. It does not interfere with my extrinsic life. Obsessing about future outcomes is the only thing that has taken a hit, and that's fine by me.

How? I have a theory.

Calamity Queller

Genshin Impact satisfies my craving to micro-manage. Even offline, planning my next moves in the game world displaces anxiety about what may happen in the real world. It exhausts my rumination like a mental chew toy, after which I have little urge to fret further.

Nevertheless, should it concern me that I place a trivial computer game before more mundane matters? A better question to ask may be, 'Why do I?'

To be continued.