PERSONAL

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565

Pursuit, Pressure, Personality

7 months ago1,476 words

I've been working on Dreamons, slowly! My blood pressure measurements are very variable! And I did a test meant to suggest careers for my personality, which told me nothing new but was interesting nonetheless!

For the past few weeks, I've been working away at Dreamons, my current game project, hoping to get to a point where I can show a video demo similar to this one I made for Belief - the project that indirectly led to this one - years ago:



I've included that in a bunch of posts over the years, and I don't know if anyone else has ever watched the whole thing - it is a bit much, and watching the gameplay is far less interesting than being in control - but I've probably watched it dozens of times myself, and it generally helps to rekindle at least some motivation to work on manifesting something similar.

Getting to the same point with Dreamons feels like a personal milestone I'd like to reach rather than something that'd have any tangible benefits outside my own mind (though it'd be nice if anyone else found interest in it too, of course).




A week or two (or three?) ago, I made a short test/demo area in Dreamons, filled it with battles, and recorded myself playing through it. The whole process only took a couple of days, and I could have just posted that, but I kept thinking of little things I should improve first so then I wouldn't keep releasing videos of barely-different iterations nobody - myself included - would bother to watch.

I've been working through implementing those little tweaks, and have got through most of them, but distracting things keep coming up and getting in the way. It's annoying! I am annoyed by it. Them. The things.

Hopefully, hopefully, I'll have something ready by next week, for my own satisfaction if nothing else. But I thought that last week, and two weeks ago, and probably earlier than that too. Ugh.

(I have included gameplay videos of early iterations of this project in posts a while back, though I'd like something that shows off the current - and hopefully close to final - state of things.)



Literally fainting out of the blue - ∞ as I wrote about a few days ago ∞ - messed me up for a couple of days. After reflecting a bit on when I've fainted in the past, I suspect anxiety is the likely culprit (I fainted when the neurosurgeon told my brain 'cyst' was actually a tumour, for example).

Still, maybe it's heart-related?? I now own a blood pressure monitor, but the results I've been getting have been so varied. The doctor told me to measure twice each day, and each time to take three measurements then take the average.



I've learned a bit about the basics of blood pressure measurement. Two numbers are measured: the pressure in the arteries when the heart beats (systolic), and the pressure when the heart rests between beats (diastolic). This chart shows the normal range.

Yesterday morning, I got an average of 120/83, which is just on the border between ideal and pre hypertension. That evening, I got 138/83, which is much higher, though I think I also had the thing on too tight. I tried again this morning, and got 127/83... though I noticed there was a more than 10-point difference in the top number depending on whether I sat up in my chair or lay back (132 vs 120).

Makes me wonder how accurate measurements taken by the average non-trained layman are ever going to be.

I also have an upcoming ECG... tomorrow?? Didn't realise it'd be that soon. Then I'll have my blood drawn and analysed a week later.

My main hope from it all is that I'll discover some obvious vitamin deficiency I can specifically target. Much easier than vaguely attempting 'lifestyle changes', which I know I should do, but... well, easier said than done, especially with no clear direction.

I should also go for more walks, but I've been meaning to do that for ages anyway.



I saw a post on Reddit about some website set up by a neuroscientist to help people decide on careers based on their personality psychology, preferences, and skills, called ∞ career-basecamp.com ∞. Which I found interesting, since I've been wondering for a while what - if anything - I could do as a career instead of whatever I'm doing now.

(I'm getting some deja vu; maybe I did something like this before, not all that long ago?)

I took the free test, which measures the Big Five personality traits that I'm somewhat obsessed with (I keep meaning to write and pin a post specifically about them, though I've mentioned them in passing plenty of times before). The results I got match with what I already understand my traits to be, so they seem valid. None of the information I got at the end was new to me, really, though I always like things like this so I'll include them here:







Or I think you might be able to view my results ∞ here ∞?

You have to pay to get all the career recommendations, which is annoying, though fair enough (they need to make money somehow). You're shown three for free, with mine basically being nerdy Programmer or eccentric Artist. Who ever would have guessed??




I found these Job Satisfaction quadrants most interesting, since it underlined how I actually do love what I do in a creative sense, but feel deeply unsatisfied with the money aspects (since I earn next to none) and the social ones (I'm painfully isolated).

In many ways, I feel that what I'm doing now probably is ideal for someone with my weirdly extreme temperamental traits (four of my Big Five traits are in extreme percentiles; only my Conscientiousness is 'normal'). I just wish I knew how to address the money and social aspects.

Hmm, how many successful online creators do you know who are single? In my experience, they invariably mention their partners, which I'm sure has an enormously powerful influence on their ability to persevere through the hard times and do what they must to actually make a living out of their craft.



I'm supposed to be going to a Mindfulness thing on Wednesday, but my parents are going away on yet another of their days-long holidays on that exact same day, which has me concerned since I fainted the other day. I get anxious a lot about my body failing me, and nobody being there to rescue me. So I worry that the worry itself might lead to some panic attack while alone on a bus or collapsing in the street or something, with nobody to call to come and pick me up.

I'll go out for a walk today to see how frail or able I feel, I suppose, but even if I miss that one, there should be three more.

[Actually, I decided to go out for a walk before posting this. I felt fine. Good.]

I hate how helpless I feel due to a lifetime of pandering parenting. But then again, had it not been for my enabling parents, maybe I would have turned out even worse. I see so many darker stories in the mental health communities on Reddit. People forced into lives they're unable to deal with, and not coping at all.

But anyway. I want to get back to Dreamons. I should also start on promotional efforts sooner rather than later.



Oh, also, I played a game called Viewfinder recently (apparently it was in my Steam wishlist; I think I added it after seeing a YouTuber playing it, ages ago?), which a screenshot can't do justice, so here's what seems to be a brief official gameplay demo:



I'd say it falls into a category with other similar mind-bending - or I've seen the term 'non-Euclidian' - games I've seen and regarded with curiosity but never actually played myself. The mechinics involve taking photos of the environment, then 'pasting' those photos into the world to dramatically alter whatever meshes lie beneath. How it all works on a technical level is equal parts fascinating and baffling to me (especially how the UV maps of textures for cut sides are generated). I find it so impressive how people are capable of not just coming up with such ideas, but executing them as well as this.