Cutstuff Sanctuary

[Laggy Blazko]

Sometimes when I chat, I'm about to say something but then I'm not sure if I really want to say it or if it's the best way to do so, and I end up saying nothing, which feels awkward.

The worse part is... That's been happening much more often recently.

[Kapus]

It's a bit hard for me to pinpoint why exactly, but I've felt very uncomfortable amongst most of the cutstuff community in recent times. I don't really like being around as much as I used to. It's kind of foggy in my head and I'm not sure exactly why I don't feel comfortable, but it's caused me to leave a few of the community's groups and be a little less active. I've been thinking a lot lately as to why I feel this way and I'm still not sure what the root cause is. I don't think it's entirely a personal issue--I don't really seem to have any serious beef with the people in this community individually, but when it comes to some parts of the community as a whole, I just do not feel good. Then again, there are a few people (I don't like to name names) that I've ended up doing my best to avoid as a result of this, so maybe it is a bit personal..?? I dunno.

This is all really fuzzy to me still and I'm having an awful time expressing this, but I think another part of it might have to do with my identity. I'm not sure what it is about it exactly, but I guess I don't feel happy being known as I am in cutstuff. I don't like how I'm currently seen. I'm not comfortable with my "reputation", whatever it may be. I think this is why I've been aliasing a lot when playing MM8BDM--an attempt to get away from my identity and reputation, and away from the eyes of a few people. I kinda realized that if I played the game without people immediately knowing who I was, I didn't feel as bad. Once again it's hard to pinpoint why exactly it is this way for me.


Ironically, I feel like I could have better explained and expressed this issue in myself if...I didn't feel so uncomfortable, haha. I feel like this post is kinda messy and poorly worded (which is kinda how it feels in my head), but I'm not sure what else to say.


yeah.

[Bikdark]

Considering Cutstuff has been relatively lifeless for the past 3 months, uncomfortableness and confusion is very understandable. Many people here probably feel out of place due to very little communication. Trust me, it isn't specific to you.  

Regarding your statement regarding your reputation here, why is that? You've committed no reprehensible actions, and have had nothing but a positive impact on the community.

[Ceridran]

Then again, there are a few people (I don't like to name names) that I've ended up doing my best to avoid as a result of this, so maybe it is a bit personal..?? I dunno.

surely it's me[/size]

I think this is why I've been aliasing a lot when playing MM8BDM--an attempt to get away from my identity and reputation, and away from the eyes of a few people. I kinda realized that if I played the game without people immediately knowing who I was, I didn't feel as bad.

Unfortunately, most people who recognize you will still call you Kapus and not by the alias.

Regarding your statement regarding your reputation here, why is that? You've committed no reprehensible actions, and have had nothing but a positive impact on the community.

I think that's exactly why. The high amount of attention recieved from positive impact on the community and other things could be too much to handle.

[Emmanuelf06]

As bikdark said, you have never done something wrong here and you are a very nice guy (who draw a lot of cute characters x3 ) anyways', so i dont understand the problem....maybe you are just anxious? I don't know...Maybe, it will pass with time

[Kapus]

Considering Cutstuff has been relatively lifeless for the past 3 months, uncomfortableness and confusion is very understandable. Many people here probably feel out of place due to very little communication. Trust me, it isn't specific to you.  

Thank you, but I don't think that actually has anything to do with why I feel bad. When I say "cutstuff community", I really mean the community as a whole, even outside the forum. The message board may be really slow, but there are still many active groups around skype and such where people of the community mingle. People also hang out in the servers nearly every day.

That's my fault though, I've been very bad at explaining my issue.

Regarding your statement regarding your reputation here, why is that? You've committed no reprehensible actions, and have had nothing but a positive impact on the community.

Well...I'm not quite sure, haha. That's kind of the problem. It's a very strange feeling that I'm not sure how to put into words. I might know how to express it slightly, but I feel kind of uncomfortable elaborating further than I already have, I guess. I suppose I'll try since someone told me to be more confident in myself.

It's not so much that I feel guilty about anything regarding my reputation. But I guess I feel that...the majority of the community doesn't know me past the surface of my reputation and identity. I feel like there's a lot more to me than what most people know (and what most people do know probably isn't fully true anyway), but I don't feel comfortable showing much more of myself than I have. Like, I've been subtly suppressing myself a great deal and not being fully honest or true to myself as I would like. Part of that I think is because I feel that it clashes with my reputation--the surface that people do know of me--as it stands now? I guess? I'm confusing myself just trying to explain it.

When I go onto MM8BDM servers using an alias, I generally feel more comfortable because I feel like I can be myself as much as I want to be without being tied to my original identity or reputation and the things that go along with it.

Unfortunately, most people who recognize you will still call you Kapus and not by the alias.

Well, yeah, of course. And it doesn't help.

you are a very nice guy

Thank you but please don't call me guy.

[Emmanuelf06]

Ah oook, i see, sorry ^^
I want say, be yourself and see but some people will tell you better than me.... [english fail]

[Shinryu]

Oh hey, I'm still alive.

So then, I'm not really sure how to put this, but I really want to get out a few things that have been on my mind. Lately there's been a lot of up's and down's in my life (which has contributed to my absence in a lot of different communities). While I'm glad to have finally finished with my education and gotten my degree, there's also been a lot of other pressures going on in the background as well. Over the past winter, my house got hit hard with water damage due to the excessive amounts of snow. This basically lead to us having to strip down large portions of the walls due to water leaks that ruined the paint (and subsequently having to redo decent portions of rooms as well). Insurance should be able to cover it, but it was still a pretty bad experience overall. Even though I'm not with my family often, I still feel it's my responsibility to help out in times like that, and I've always been fearful that something bad might happen if I don't contribute (through finances or otherwise).

Through out all of this, I've also been slogging through my hobbies with making videos. Sometimes I turn to that as sort of a release where I can get my thoughts out when things are troubling me, but recently it seems like it hasn't been helping much (not to mention that I haven't gotten the chance to do much of it lately). While things might be looking up soon thanks to new position opportunities at my disposal, right now it feels like things have been lingering in a state of limbo, so to speak.

[Nostalgia]

(click to show/hide)

You know how people complain about senioritis? Well, I guess I've got "junioritis" or something because I have completely lost all motivation to do anything school related as of right now. It's not even like a mental health thing; in fact, I'd wager I'm feeling better about myself now than I have in the past 4 or 5 years. What happens is that every day coming home from school, I just instantly forget about everything I did that day, like I am literally just watching my grades go down the drain and seeing my future approach and I'm completely apathetic about it when I should be freaking the fuck out.

I had more stuff to write here but it escapes me at the moment, might edit the post if it comes back to me

[Max]

Don't really feel like being here any more, I only come back to check the offtopic discussion and I don't really know why I bother
People say that this is more a community of friends than it is about the game, yeah well I love the game and I don't really have many friends here so I guess there's no purpose in staying
I mean that sounds melodramatic doesn't it? I left before, I only came back to work on XSP and then that stopped because nobody did some stupid pumpkin and I got too tired, moved out into other mods, went back to classes, worked on a fangame, all of those sort of burned out bar the last one which is just what I do in my spare time now really, and I don't even have any way to work on the actual coding I'm just a useless spriter
I'm very grateful for the two or three people I talk to very on-off and incredibly grateful to Mendez but he barely visits either and just idk, feels like I don't belong when there's barely anything going on with the actual game which is why I'm here
I still love to play classes TLMS but nothing else, no purpose in duel and I hate deathmatch and anything justified classes or unholy
So it's not a sad post really, just one of indifference
inspire certainly didn't help

tl;dr - feel really unwelcome and lonely (probably because i'm such an ass), no point being here

[CDRom11_2007]

I just... I just don't know what to say... I mean, another one of the big people is planning to leave. This feeling is kinda how I felt when Uki left, or when Ivory left. I felt like the 8BDM community/game couldn't exist without them; like the game was a part of them. "They can't leave, they just can't" I used to say to myself, but yet it happened. To me, it felt like someone like Korby left, or Kapus left, or heck, I felt like friggin' CutmanMike left. Yet, I still think to myself "They can't leave, they just can't" even thought I know very well that we all will have to move on one day, including me (and how I loath the day that will happen).

If it makes you feel any better, I always looked up to the coders in the community. They live a dream I can only, well, dream of doing: being able to code whatever you want, almost whenever you want. I always had this this high idea of coders where "Coders are the greatest problem solvers this world has, and it's these same people that have the power to move the world into a new, brighter future; a new future of technology and freedom". Of course, that made me always want to be a coder, more specifically a game coder when I grow up. Sadly, the last chance of that ever happening is lost, and now I'm stuck on the path my parents choose for of becoming a Doctor, the last thing I ever want to be. The worst part is that I now refuse to learn coding (Or at least continue from my basic knowledge of coding) because I know I will never have time for it in the future anyways. When you come from a family of pretty much only Doctors, you realize how much hell it is to become one, and after you become one, and trust me when I say it's a LOT of hell.

Sorry for gushing like that. Bottom line, I want you to know that at least I want to make you feel welcome. Not just that, but I look up to Max, not just for being a coder, but because of the whole 'Coming out about being a girl" thing. That took a lot of strength, strength I know a guy like me can only wish to have..

[Laggy Blazko]

I think you'll always be wecome here, Maxine. Just don't forget mm8bdm exists and you can play if you really feel like it.

[LlamaHombre]

I will personally always welcome you regardless of whether you're here or not. You really are a great person and I feel if a couple of others would be more willing to peel past a couple of perspective layers, you'd probably feel less the way you do.

That said if you ever feel like talking to me a little more, please don't be shy! I always like our little chats here and there.

[Magnet Dood]

I don't enjoy being here anymore.

This isn't a reaction to my rather poor start in the duel tournament, as that would be awfully melodramatic and pretty stupid. It's been going on for the last couple of months or so, and my current skill in the game is only one part of a pretty large conglomeration of issues that I've had with myself and my current presence here (a large part of it, to be sure, but not the only one). When I first got here, this was more or less the only place where I really felt like I fit in- my junior high years were pretty terrible and traumatic, so this was a sort of sanctuary that I could retreat to where people liked me, and I could like myself.

Nowadays the second part isn't true. I find that I'm constantly beating myself up for my shortcomings when it comes to pretty much everything I've tried or done around here. For all intents and purposes, my Cutstuff career can be summed up as a failure. I have presided over countless failed projects, large and small, I've ignored or refused to help others around here when I'm perfectly capable of doing so, I'm unable to improve my MM8BDM skills against good competition, etc. To be honest I can only think of one thing that I actually finished my entire time I've been here, which was a map for the Finish That Map 2 competition (a map that ended up in the middle of the pack, but that's somewhat ancillary). It's all part of a crippling inferiority complex that I've suffered from ever since those aforementioned junior years, where I believed that wasn't good enough for everyone else. This thinking only makes me angry and depressed to the point where I detest certain members of the community; not because of any action that has come at my expense, but simply because they remind me of something that I believe I will never be able to reach while I'm here. I'm a rather mediocre, middle-of-the-road person, with no real fit inside of this community. I like to think that I don't hurt Cutstuff's well-being by staying here, but I'm almost certain that I don't help it, and that it wouldn't suffer any drastic blow if I was to leave, unlike other members of the community who have shown that they are proficient and useful through their success.

If I'm being perfectly honest, the entire situation is of my own fault, as I was constantly dabbling in new things that the community had to offer without having much of an intention to focus on one thing. All of my half-baked efforts were simply a product of my endless ambition and dwindling motivation as time wears on. I've tried everything and haven't succeeded in anything, tried to fit in everywhere and eventually finding that I don't fit in anywhere. Frankly, I don't relish the idea of severing ties with Cutstuff very much; I've met plenty of great people here that I can credit with being true friends during a long, dark time a few years ago. If I were to stay, then I'd probably just forget about the entire reason why I'm upset in a few days or a week and continue with my normal existence here. But I don't want these ideas to resurface later when I hit a similar low point, nor do I want my anger to continue to reach unhealthy levels as they are right now. I'd leave right now, but that would only make me shirk a number of commitments which would make me even more of a failure than I already am (CSA2, commentating, duel tournament, etc.), which wouldn't make me any happier.

I just don't see the purpose of me staying here anymore, and as hard as all this is to say, it's not something I can keep in for very long. I'm unimportant and unskilled, and have most likely overstayed my welcome- as a result, my presence here is tenuous. As I said, I don't enjoy the thought of leaving, but I've noticed that my former sanctuary for escaping my dark thoughts only seems to be a place where they can return.

[Rui]

I've ignored or refused to help others around here when I'm perfectly capable of doing so, I'm unable to improve my MM8BDM skills against good competition, etc. To be honest I can only think of one thing that I actually finished my entire time I've been here, which was a map for the Finish That Map 2 competition (a map that ended up in the middle of the pack, but that's somewhat ancillary).

I don't think that says anything about you as a person. Even if you were capable of helping others, you probably weren't in the mood to do so or were busy, which is alright. Even though you are under no obligation to help others (not saying you shouldn't since it is a very nice gesture), you can always redirect them to someone who can help in your place.

Not finishing things doesn't mean you're bad or anything. I'm pretty sure a lot of us started our own stuff but never finished on them. Starting things and finishing them is something that requires practice. You probably won't finish it the first time, or the second time, or the third time. That doesn't mean that it won't ever be done, though. There are plenty of chances to continue things, and you learn to manage it better the more you do it.

It's all part of a crippling inferiority complex that I've suffered from ever since those aforementioned junior years, where I believed that wasn't good enough for everyone else. This thinking only makes me angry and depressed to the point where I detest certain members of the community; not because of any action that has come at my expense, but simply because they remind me of something that I believe I will never be able to reach while I'm here. I'm a rather mediocre, middle-of-the-road person, with no real fit inside of this community.

You don't really need to prove yourself to anyone. If you have fun mapping or creating projects, then I say go do it anyway. I refuse to see you as mediocre. I can't really speak as far as 8BDM projects go (since I am guilty of never going anywhere beyond Anything Goes and thus I am totally unaware of plenty of stuff that has to do with the game), but I always loved reading your writing and your roleplaying is absolutely fantastic.

I like to think that I don't hurt Cutstuff's well-being by staying here, but I'm almost certain that I don't help it, and that it wouldn't suffer any drastic blow if I was to leave, unlike other members of the community who have shown that they are proficient and useful through their success.

As for myself, I can say for sure that if you left I would indeed miss you. However, once again, you don't really need to prove yourself to anyone. I'm positive people here enjoy your company.

I'm unimportant and unskilled

I highly disagree. I'd say you are skilled (especially in the writing field) and that you do hold importance to a number of people around here.

I'm sorry if my advice isn't as helpful (I haven't written advice for a long time and I kinda feel bad for that.), but one thing I know is that you don't give yourself enough credit, Dood. I'm positive your talents will mean something to someone.

I definitely think you're a great person, personally.