Hethwen Resident, the organizer for Metaverse Pageantry, sent out a notecard the other night that I’m still not all the way through yet. This notecard was put together by Dea Mills back in 2009, but her words are no less relevant today. When I say I’m still not all the way through yet, it’s not that it’s insanely long… but I have to stop every time I start crying. She says so many beautiful and relevant things.
One thing she says in her Three Observations about SL is that in Second Life, all you TRULY have, at the end of the day, is a cartoon and your reputation. She’s right, you know. You might say, “But but but I have my friendships too!” When you boil it down, your friendships both have to do with and contribute to your reputation. People who think you’re a bitch aren’t going to want to befriend you… whereas people who think you’re awesome very well may be falling all over themselves and can’t hit the “Add Friend” button fast enough. As far as your friends influencing your reputation… how do you think people are going to look at you if you’re friends with a known copybotter. How would you all view me if I was uber super best friends with Ramonzita??? See what I mean?
I knowing that my cartoon and my reputation are the two things that I have in this pixel world of real people… it’s important to be careful with both of them. And while there are close-minded, or thick-headed, or downright ignorant people who can look at qualities like fierceness, bluntness, genuine honesty no matter the situation, and outspokenness and label me a bitch… for the most part, whether you see it or not, I am VERY careful with my reputation here. I am very selective of the projects I get involved in, even if I’m involved in a lot, because all it takes is for that project to tank, or for it to be corrupt, and suddenly I become “that girl” who was heavily involved in it when its corruption was found out. I’m actually in a bit of a moral crisis over a new opportunity that has come my way recently because of this very reason. On one hand, there is an opportunity to salvage a project that has allowed itself to succumb to much corruption… but on the other hand, if changes cannot be made, then I am seen as CONTRIBUTING to and SUPPORTING that corruption.
I have a very big fear of being made a fool of… in anything.
I get very protective and guarded in situations where there is not a clear plan of how something is going to be accomplished… without a plan, there is a high probability for failure. And while failure in and of itself is perfectly normal and ok, and I’ve failed a lot… to fail in the IMPORTANT things simply due to lack of planning and organization that should have and could have been done beforehand… that is humiliating… and so it’s almost like an Obsessive Compulsive behavior. When I first find out about something, I do my damnedest to start making a plan for it as soon as I can. This gives me time to resort to Plan B, Plan C…. Plan Z… I have time to fail in my own plans without failing in front of god and everybody. *Chuckles*
And I think that’s why this pageant being my first scares me so much… and why I’m so vehemently trying to plan everything in advance… in regards to finding sponsors, finding poses, figuring out what might be a good walk pattern, as they aren’t being defined for us. To plan it now, to start planning it so soon, I have plenty of time to fail and find what works for me.
But I always have the thought in the back of my mind of, “What if?” What if Plan Z doesn’t work… what if I run out of time and still haven’t found a workable solution. What if I end up humiliating myself?
I honestly don’t think I could handle it.
Until Next Time, Pageant Followers,
Tivi Darkfold (Tiviyah Resident)
Miss Metaverse – Greece 2013
Countdown to Pageant: 20 days
