"Improvement and progression are one eternal round"
- If You Could Hie to Kolob, from LDS Hymns
An age-old question lies at the heart of philosophy: what is the purpose of life? We are here to learn and to grow. We are here to improve ourselves until we are perfected, as God is. We have a natural desire to grow, to advance, to become better, to reach our full potential as children of God. God helps us to achieve this while Satan fights against us. Satan is the great imitator. One of his greatest tricks is to make us feel like we are improving, even when we're not. Thus he "lull[s] [us] away into carnal security" (2 Nephi 28:21). Video games can be a tool Satan uses to make us feel like we're improving. Rapid technology advancements over the past twenty years have made games dynamic, realistic, and social. In the virtual world, we can be whatever we like. Our stats are easy to see, to track, and to improve. We accomplish tasks, we make friends, and we feel that we are being productive as our stats improve. In the real world, progress--particularly spiritual progress--is not so easy to improve or to track. Thus we allow our real selves to diminish as our virtual selves improve, and we deceive ourselves into believing that our virtual selves are more real.
Well said, it's really easy to get wrapped up in this, and not very easy to take the sting of realizing that it's worthless.
ReplyDeleteGreat blog! Video games can be used for entertainment but only if that entertainment is wholesome and doesn't take our life away from anything else that is important. I really like what the For the Strength of Youth Manual (page 17) has to say about using entertainment to bring the spirit into our lives rather than allowing violent, immoral, and addictive entertainment to destroy us.
ReplyDeleteThis is why I like elder bednar's talk, because if you are honesty in answering the questions he poses, you will honestly evaluate whether it is damaging your life or not.
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