Real Life v Second Life, Skills brought into and skills taken out of

[Marigold Devin]

I'm curious, not at college or school, not doing a survey or anything, just curious. As a resident of Second Life since 2007, every week seemed to have a different theme. Some of those themes overlapped, and one theme even became an inworld paid job for me for a brief spell. 

In real life I had absolutely no interest in computers, even when some friends had them, and when I left school, I either wanted to be a speech therapist, or a social worker, but wasn't allowed to go to college, so pursued jobs as an office worker for the first few years. By the time I was 20, I had done pretty well, got to the top of the career I had chosen to pursue that was within my limited educational abilities, but none of it involved computers in any shape or form. One of the offices I worked in even produced pages for a newspaper, and it was all done by hand, planned on A3 paper, and sent to a printworks. I was never one for video arcade games, and was probably the last person in the UK to play Space Invaders and Pacman (which I admit I quite enjoyed).
(Edited to take a lot of waffle out.)

For some reason though, Second Life hooked me after the first couple of weeks of what I found to be a steep learning curve. I used my real life office background in my inworld job, and I brought my real life moral values in with me.

Second Life though has taught me a lot.

But it has made me wonder how many of us residents have lives that resemble our real life more than we realised, or are totally the opposite. In real life I have lived by the sea but am back inland living in my home town. In Second Life I would also flit between living by the sea and ended up living in a really ugly part of the mainland, in a quite ugly basic utilitarian low prim house, but it was home to me. 

If it's tl;dr, that's fine. Just move along. 

And if you want to add a favourite recipe for the hot weather days, compare potato salads, that's fine too, but don't forget, some of your posts MUST be Second Life related  

Edited September 7, 2023 by Marigold Devin

[Love Zhaoying]

Skill brought in:  Programming => Scripting

Skill brought out: Social skills

 

[Nalates Urriah]

...I've learned lots of fun new ways to handle bad come-on lines...

[Marigold Devin]

23 minutes ago, Nalates Urriah said:

...I've learned lots of fun new ways to handle bad come-on lines...

I know that you have always liked to soak up information like a sponge, would attend the user group meetings, and have the blog.

Are you like that in real life also? Does your real life job relate at all to your Second Life? 

[Hymn Celestia]

I liked Second Life so much when I arrived in 2007 that I found myself, over the course of subsequent years, removing bit by bit everything that I didn't like about my RL experience and replacing those things with what I liked best about my SL experience.  Better living; better contributions to the world; better amenities; more meaningful relationships; health; properly directed attention; properly re-directed attention.  Weirdly, through the inauthenticity of avatar-relations I slowly learned how to live authentically.

Crap brought in: inauthenticity, insecurity, wounds. 

Gold taken out:  authenticity, security, playfulness.

Gold brought back in:  still working on it.

[elleevelyn]

57 minutes ago, Marigold Devin said:

I brought my real life moral values in with me.

i am more virtuous in my SL than I am in my RL. Probably because is way easier to be all loose online, and If I don't discipline myself then I can easy end up going down the rabbit hole expecting hoping to find a squirrel where there is no squirrel

[Ayashe Ninetails]

1 hour ago, Marigold Devin said:

I am wondering though, how many of us residents have lives that resemble our real life more than we realised, or whether we learnt new skills from Second Life that have helped us in real life.

I'm pretty much the same person both in and out of SL. There are a couple of minor differences, but nothing overly significant.

Outside of SL:

• Goth
• Love avant-garde fashion (everything from Rick Owens to Afrofuturism - though I still have no earthly idea what Kanye is wearing half the time - what in the...)
• Artsy/craftsy and love everything fantasy
• Love learning and find any excuse to do it
• Way too curious for my own good
• Listen to all types of music from all over the world but minimal dubstep, industrial, and power noise are favored
• Fluctuate between wanting to talk to everyone everywhere and the desire to spend whole days by myself
• Love dancing and find any excuse to do it

 Inside SL:

• Goth
• Love avant-garde fashion and wear it often
• Artsy/craftsy and love everything fantasy
• Love learning and find any excuse to do it
• Way too curious for my own good
• In-world music always off/Spotify, YouTube, or Twitch always on. In-world sound only on by demand.
• Fluctuate between wanting to talk to everyone everywhere and the desire to spend whole days by myself
• Love dancing and find any excuse to do it

Skills in or out:

In RL, I have no concept of space and can't decorate worth a hot damn. In SL, I spend a good chunk of time decorating spaces for myself and others. SL has not helped much on this front (no skills brought out). I actually think with something like this, I gain more skills from something like The Sims 4, where I can actually build individual rooms and whole homes and decorate with a birds eye view to get a better feel for floor plans.

In RL, I CAN cook and bake, but doing so might result in setting the kitchen on fire because I'm absolute disaster with zero domestic skills.😂In SL, I'm obsessed with food and often decorate with it - and none of it's burned. No skills brought out (nothing can burn here anyway!).

I use my RL design skills for SL photography and used to use them when creating product ads, logos, and displays for my stores.

I did learn how to animate here, though I have zero intention of doing that outside of SL. I much prefer the look and feel of mocap, but have no desire to get into that field. I did once want to work in film and/or games after design proved to be a bust, but in the sound design/scoring arena.

I have RL music/audio production/engineering/foley skills (self-taught and college), but never needed those in SL.

[Marigold Devin]

1 hour ago, Ayashe Ninetails said:

I'm pretty much the same person both in and out of SL. There are a couple of minor differences, but nothing overly significant.

Outside of SL:

• Goth
• Love avant-garde fashion (everything from Rick Owens to Afrofuturism - though I still have no earthly idea what Kanye is wearing half the time - what in the...)
• Artsy/craftsy and love everything fantasy
• Love learning and find any excuse to do it
• Way too curious for my own good
• Listen to all types of music from all over the world but minimal dubstep, industrial, and power noise are favored
• Fluctuate between wanting to talk to everyone everywhere and the desire to spend whole days by myself
• Love dancing and find any excuse to do it

 Inside SL:

• Goth
• Love avant-garde fashion and wear it often
• Artsy/craftsy and love everything fantasy
• Love learning and find any excuse to do it
• Way too curious for my own good
• In-world music always off/Spotify, YouTube, or Twitch always on. In-world sound only on by demand.
• Fluctuate between wanting to talk to everyone everywhere and the desire to spend whole days by myself
• Love dancing and find any excuse to do it

Skills in or out:

In RL, I have no concept of space and can't decorate worth a hot damn. In SL, I spend a good chunk of time decorating spaces for myself and others. SL has not helped much on this front (no skills brought out). I actually think with something like this, I gain more skills from something like The Sims 4, where I can actually build individual rooms and whole homes and decorate with a birds eye view to get a better feel for floor plans.

In RL, I CAN cook and bake, but doing so might result in setting the kitchen on fire because I'm absolute disaster with zero domestic skills.😂In SL, I'm obsessed with food and often decorate with it - and none of it's burned. No skills brought out (nothing can burn here anyway!).

I use my RL design skills for SL photography and used to use them when creating product ads, logos, and displays for my stores.

I did learn how to animate here, though I have zero intention of doing that outside of SL. I much prefer the look and feel of mocap, but have no desire to get into that field. I did once want to work in film and/or games after design proved to be a bust, but in the sound design/scoring arena.

I have RL music/audio production/engineering/foley skills (self-taught and college), but never needed those in SL.

Superbly interesting.

Your avatar is always beautifully made, and I enjoy your photos. I imagine the person behind them to be very avant-garde too and it seems you are. 

You are very creative. I admire creativity. I am not very creative at all.  

[Ingrid Ingersoll]

Not sure about skills brought in but...

 

skills brought out: decorating, appreciation of architecture

[Sid Nagy]

My RL isn't really exciting during the last years, neither is my SL.
I'm a bit of a loner in both worlds.
That's me, and I don't mind. I'm pretty good in entertaining myself.

Edited September 7, 2023 by Sid Nagy

[Marigold Devin]

Just now, Sid Nagy said:

My RL isn't really exciting, neither is my SL.
I'm a loner in both worlds.
That's me, and I don't mind. I'm pretty good in entertaining myself.

Well, whether you know it or not, to some of us, you are very important here on the forums. You provide balance and humour, and interesting opinions. Life doesn't have to be exciting. Excitement is overrated. 

[Sid Nagy]

10 minutes ago, Marigold Devin said:

Well, whether you know it or not, to some of us, you are very important here on the forums. You provide balance and humour, and interesting opinions. Life doesn't have to be exciting. Excitement is overrated. 

I wasn't complaining. I just was describing my life. If I didn't like my current lifestyle, I would change it.
I have enough organizing and creativity skills to go into both worlds to organize things, be the center of attention. I did that many times for the schools I worked for and the football club where I trained the youth as a hobby in the past. But I prefer my life how it is now, quiet and with a certain distance.
90%+ of the time at least.

Edited September 7, 2023 by Sid Nagy

[Marigold Devin]

8 minutes ago, Sid Nagy said:

I wasn't complaining. I just was describing my life. If I didn't like my current lifestyle, I would change it.
I have enough organizing and creativity skills to go into both worlds to organize things, be the center of attention. I did that many times for the schools I worked for and the football club where I trained the youth as a hobby in the past. But I prefer my life how it is now, quiet and with a certain distance.
90%+ of the time at least.

As I have got older, I have appreciated my own need for solitude and peace. 

In both worlds! 

I think this is why I like to be in the forums, because we can dip in and out at will, feel no pressure to respond if we don't want to, can just read and be entertained. 

 

Edited September 7, 2023 by Marigold Devin

[BillFletcher]

I was an art major in college but when it came close to time to graduate and actually earn a living doing something i chickened out, changed my major to business administration and then spent a couple decades struggling to be successful at something I had no real skill for, I tried to be a teacher and that fell through and eventually ended up doing building maintenance. SL let me be creative and artistic which I should have done from the start. 

Edited September 7, 2023 by BillFletcher

[Luna Bliss]

2 minutes ago, BillFletcher said:

I was an art major in college but when it came close to time to graduate and actually earn a living doing something i chickened out, changed my major to business administration and then spent a couple decades struggling to be successful at something I had no real skill for, I tried to be a teacher and that fell through and eventually ended up doing building maintenance. SL let me be creative and artistic which I should have done from the start. 

Lovely for you to get to be who you are!  And what a great ad for SL too  

[Marigold Devin]

Just now, BillFletcher said:

I was a art major in college but when it came close to time to graduate and actually earn a living doing something i chickened out, changed my major to business administration and then spent a couple decades struggling to be successful at something I had no real skill for, I tried to be a teacher and that fell through and eventually ended up doing building maintenance. SL let me be creative and artistic which I should have done from the start. 

I love this, when you can find your real self in Second Life. I think a lot of people have done so. It can undo the doubts that some of us have had because of real life situations not working out so well. 

If you enjoy building maintenance more than being a teacher, then you will get the same satisfaction from that as others who started out in building maintenance but who ended up as teachers may have now. Sometimes I think we were too young in our late-teens and 20s to truly know what we wanted to be, and Second Life bring out that inner teen, and that enthusiasm we used to have back then too, to maybe try new things. 

And this is what I do love about Second Life. 

 

[Sid Nagy]

RL deals you the cards where you have to play with.
SL lets you deal the hand yourself. So you can get the cards that you always liked to have.

 

Edit to add: Of course I'm not talking about the social casino here. 😋

Edited September 7, 2023 by Sid Nagy

[BillFletcher]

8 minutes ago, Marigold Devin said:

If you enjoy building maintenance more than being a teacher,

This isn't necessarily true, as Sid said RL deals you the cards and you have to play them. The teaching job was at a Christian school and a local television station ran a week long special report on allegations of abuse at the school, the alligations were unfounded but that didn't get as much airplay as the alligations themselves. This station had done this to another organization in the past, and the timing of the special report on the school I was at just happened to coincide with a bill pending in the legislature that would have increased state oversight over religious schools. The TV station was in favor of this bill and wanted a story to support the need for the bill. The announced that they were done with the story and held a poll to get people's feelings about the bill, saying they would report anything new if it came up. The poll didn't go the way they wanted and the next day they reported on rumors they were known to have known before that poll was done. After being forced to leave there I started delivering pizza full time while I figured out what i wanted to do, a friend offered to give me a job as a supervisor for his landscape company, and then eventually I was offered a job as the maintenance man at my kids Christian School. When that school close two years later due to running out of money. I ended up doing maintenance first for a condo association and eventually an apartment complex/

[Nando Yip]

I rarely talk about RL in SL, I've been here since 2007, and even my name is the same, and it's very easy to find me in RL, but I live in the Brazilian Amazon, and very few people from my city got to know SL at some point time. What is certain is that I did and still do in SL here much of what I do in RL, because I am a performer, I design scenography for music shows and theater shows, in addition to working at the secretary of culture in my city in the department of curatorship and setting up of exhibitions of art. In SL I already had a private island dedicated to fashion and decoration, in addition of course to clubs and housing rentals, there was a moment around 2012, when all this had become almost a third day of work, because I had to manage the conflicts of island residents, shopkeepers, and regulars; so I did what was most logical, closed the island and sold it. And then I went back to just having fun, I have a small gallery where I set up and dismantle exhibitions without any kind of commitment, or involvement from other people, and I do it just for the pleasure of torturing the prims. I have a house in Bellisseria where I decorate and redecorate whenever I feel like it, I occasionally go to parties, and I chat informally with people without expecting or creating any expectations. I love the freedom of meeting people very different from me and somehow interacting with them, even when we don't speak the same language and the conversation turns into a surrealist text. What is certain is that SL is an activity that is part of my daily life and that has always brought me incredible experiences.

[Arwyn Quandry]

I credit my experience running roleplay sims with getting me a job. In the personal hobbies section of my resume, I mentioned being a manager for a roleplay group. Someone in an interview asked about it so I explained how I ran their application process and oversaw a team of application processors and what the job entailed (checking apps against game canon, marking problems, replying to applicants, processing changes, dealing with issues on the sim). They were pretty impressed that I did all that in my free time for fun and I really believe it helped me seal the deal. Roleplay has also made me a much better writer and a faster typist.

[Scylla Rhiadra]

My SL is in most regards so close to my RL that it's difficult to distinguish between what has been brought in and what I've taken out. I think most of my RL has been expressed in SL at one point or another, ranging from, at one extreme, my sexuality to, at another, my love of teaching. (And writing. And talking. Won't someone shut me up, already?)

I think for me it's been a kind of feedback loop, with my SL benefitting, on the one hand, from my RL skills and preoccupations, and, on the other, providing new and often interesting insights into those things. An example might be my Photoshop / photography skills. I had a bit of these coming into SL, but SL has prompted me to expand and improve them, which is in turn being increasingly reflected in how I use those tools in RL.

I suppose if I had to name the one most valuable thing I've taken out of SL, it would have to be my experience of new and different perspectives on lots of stuff. It's easier to move outside of one's own personal "filter bubble" here than it is in RL, and I've benefitted enormously from the experience, and learned from it, in both worlds.

[Love Zhaoying]

4 hours ago, Sid Nagy said:

RL deals you the cards where you have to play with.
SL lets you deal the hand yourself. So you can get the cards that you always liked to have.

 

Edit to add: Of course I'm not talking about the social casino here. 😋

In the words of a wise man:

You have to know when to hold 'em,

Know when to fold 'em,

Know when to walk away,

And know when to run.

You never count your money,

When you're sitting at the table.

There'll be time enough for counting,

When the dealing's done.

[Persephone Emerald]

None of my RL work skills come into SL - basic lab work, GMP production, documentation, following compliance & safety rules. Social skills go both ways, but I think I've learned more self-confidence from my SL interactions. Most of my witchy skills are more useful in RL, because I can't make teas or use essential oils in SL, but I find it interesting when I can translate spellwork or using runes into SL and it works in SL.

[Phil Deakins]

I'm not aware of anything about SL that has changed or modified anything in my RL, or vice versa. That's probably because I am identical in both worlds (apart from the apparent age of my avatar  ).

RL: programmer since the 80s
SL: programming a lot

RL: sometime creator
SL: sometime creator

RL: sometime entrepreneur
SL: sometime entrepreneur

RL: prefer to be on my own and occupied most, but not all, of the time
SL: prefer to be on my own and occupied most, but not all, of the time

I other words, the SL me parallels the RL me. If you get to know me in SL, you get to know the RL me. Even my RL and SL first names are the same. So, if you think that the SL me would benefit from a present or two, PM or IM me for my RL address

Edited September 8, 2023 by Phil Deakins

[Rat Luv]

4 hours ago, Persephone Emerald said:

I find it interesting when I can translate spellwork or using runes into SL and it works in SL.

Do you have any examples?