In my first post on this blog back on January 16, 2011, I remarked:
“I find myself a little aimless, but not ready to mothball my ships. To help focus my attention, I plan to blog about goals, thoughts, and observations around the game.”
The blog has subsequently helped direct my play, possibility feeding into my Solo game a similar influence that people’s corporations or alliances might. It worked for a decade.
Over the next 1,180+ posts there have been three other underlying themes which crop up.
The first was that I don’t really enjoy social and competitive online games. I try to play them however to help combat my natural inclination towards being a hermit. The older I have gotten, the harder that is.
The second was that my life is impacted by anxiety, but that EVE offered up a cathartic distraction and downtime for my mind away from Real Life.
And third, hopefully without oversharing, was how Real Life intrinsically impacts on my EVE play. In that way I have tried to mimic the example of other bloggers I have followed over the years – in how they humanize the EVE player and attempt to remind us of the complex nuances behind the actions and behaviours in game.
All EVE players are linked like that – motivations to play, benefits, costs, and an ever-present influence of their real life.
My life is currently far busier than I could have imagined dealing with. This year in particular has belittled my attempts to maintain a semblance of balance. I can’t say I am terribly happy about it, but I have not been overwhelmed, and am managing to maintain a glass half full instead of half empty mindset.
I do however miss EVE. Not so much the game itself – I log in occasionally to spin a ship. I miss its old ability to steal my mind away from the busyness and stress of real life. The escape. I blame CCP in part for this. Their focus on making people play EVE the way their statistics suggest earns them the most money. I have tried replacing the gap it has left – but so far have not found anything.
Evehermit 
”Their focus on making people play EVE the way their statistics suggest earns them the most money. ” This resonated deeply with me, I am a solo player and prefer my Eve escape without the human connection. Over the years this has become increasingly difficult and CCP are determined to force interaction because they believe it is good for us and their bottom line.
I accidently went Alpha again following a few months of Omega fun. I am not in a hurry to re-sub.
Thank you for posting the human side of your Eve life, it reminds me of how lucky I am and how grateful I should be.
I miss you Hermie… and I wish you well and better days ahead.
I wish you saw what I do in my game now… it’s a fine solo game with a, IMHO, good and steadily improving mix of “stuff to do”… and the future is bright. =]
Tur