EPTWhy are you writing this instead of practicing, you crazy baffoon!!? Well due to recent, unfortunate circumstances, I had to pack my bags and move back east from the Quantic training facility. Not having the option of moving back in with my parents, I was worrisome and considered all the possible options. I determined that the best decision for my career was to join ROOT Gaming and crash at the girlfriend’s dormitory for the meantime until I was able to save enough for me to lease out a place of my own. Unknowingly then, I soon discovered that the internet was already to be disconnected since she was graduating and moving out by January 1st. So here I am, solitary with idle Starcraft hands on Saint Nick’s day with some Sauvignon scribbling a random assortment of thoughts. If there is positive feedback, I hope to make this a regular affair until the internet is back and order is restored to God’s green Earth.
We, as nerds, don’t actually realize how much our lives depend on the computer and the internet until we are without. Almost driven to insanity by my boredom and frequently contemplating strangling myself with my Razer Orochi mouse cord, I looked to find enjoyment in other mediums outside the online world. I turned to books and found myself commuting to the university library daily. I was always one of those that disliked reading and sometimes even laughed in the face of literacy (LOL). But in times of desperation, I found myself liking books more and more. First delving into fairly light works such as Ender’s Game and The Hobbit, I soon worked myself up to “heavier” works by the likes of Viktor Frankl, Alexander Dumas and Nietzche.
Hey! You half-witted goober, what does this have anything to do with Starcraft II? Hold your horses, you boob-headed dingbat, I’m getting there!
Anyways, becoming mesmerized in these works, my curiosity sparked and I started to draw parallels from these writings, relating them to my own personal day-to-day life with Starcraft. I vividly remember one specific line from Nietzche that struck me the moment I read it: “He who has a why to live for can bear with almost any how.” The quote was so simple yet so profound that it shook me down to the marrow of my bones. Since I first started off in my so-called “career” in e-sports, I unknowingly and subconsciously had this mindset all along deep within. I genuinely believed I would succeed. I would seek to achieve this childhood ambition of mine no matter what. No matter what unfortunate circumstances beset me or whatever shithole I was put forth in, it was actually of no importance. It all falls to the wayside in the grand scheme of things; the bigger picture of what I craved.
I plan to pursue professional gaming and Starcraft II undoubtedly for the next two years. Why two years? That seems like a really arbitrary amount of time to throw out there. I wholeheartedly agree, but I think that the handful of months I lived in the Quantic training facility, where I achieved little to no tangible results, was not enough evidence for me to justify giving up. Two years, I believe, is a suitable and realistic time frame to meet these set goals.
I don’t hope that I’ll succeed. Hope leaves room for us to excuse ourselves to failure. Our future is reliant on our own personal decisions and the sacrifices we make for attaining these goals. Maybe there’s some small luck involved, of course, but it’s not a matter of if I’ll make it. It’s a matter of WHEN I’ll make it. This has always been the case in my mind, delusional or not.
I’m not sure if this is too short of a blog or if I should have jotted down some more. But anyways, thanks for spending some time and reading this. Hopefully if well received, I will write more blogs on other various topics that aren’t so drab and uninteresting. If you have any suggestions on future blogs, I would be happy to oblige. ☺ Anything from my personal relationships and their effect on Starcraft, my personal experiences living in the Quantic training facility, build orders or anything strategy related… I don’t mind!
Oh yeah by the way! I wanted to end on this quote; relevant or not I don’t care. It’s badass
“What would you not have accomplished if you had been free?
Possibly nothing at all; the overflow of my brain would probably, in a state of freedom, have evaporated in a thousand follies; it needs trouble and difficulty and danger to hollow out various mysterious and hidden mines of human intelligence. Pressure is required, you know, to ignite powder: captivity has collected into one single focus all the floating faculties of my mind; they have come into close contact in the narrow space in which they have been wedged; and you are well aware that from the collision of clouds electricity is produced – from electricity comes lightning, from whose flash we have light amidst our greatest darkness.”
-Alexander Dumas from The Count of Monte Cristo
Over and out,
Michael “theognis” McClelland
Twitter: @ROOTheognis
Stream: www.twitch.tv/ROOTheognis
Facebook/youtube: Coming soon!
