When Did You Come Of Age In Second Life, And How?

By Cheyenne Palisade's reckoning, maturity in the metaverse is less about growing up, than growing into.  In her definition, she writes, "We come of age [in Second Life] by finding, whether by plan or happenstance, our true second selves and achieving a harmony and stability of existence here on the grid."

Some Residents have a general idea of what they want to do and be in SL, she observes, before even creating an avatar:  "My friend Bramblelberry was building before he was a week in world and had a store open in his first month. My friend AngelMarie came into world knowing she wanted to be an exotic dancer; she was dancing within a week."  Others need to feel around for their place, often trying on many identities, before settling on one. As it happens, "Coming of Age in Second Life" is also the title of an acclaimed anthropological study of SL, but Chey offers a fascinating way of looking at avatar identity also worth some thought -- read it all here.  Friday's question for readers is: when did you find your true second self, and how?

Comments

[CyFishy Traveler]

I still have a picture of it. It shows up on my screen each time I log in with my entry point set to Home. Me in my cybergoth pants, a homemade shirt and the Deviant Kitties hair that Miles gave me the Lindenage to buy, standing in the patch of snow that I'd just bought and claimed for myself.

Suddenly, a tiny slice of this virtual world was mine to do with as I wished. Mine to build on, set boundaries, stream music, and make my own. I'd made the transition from vagabond to landowner, and I've never looked back.

[Ann Otoole]

All I know is that a year in Second Life is like many actual years in real life. That is if you spend a lot of time in the immersion. The last 2 years feel like 10. It is hard to think only 2 years have gone by. Sadly those days are coming to an end I think. The more the Lab meddles in and with Second Life the less appealing it is for most of the people I know.

[Arwyn Quandry]

I ended up writing a bit too much, so I put it here:

http://arwynquandry.wordpress.com/2009/03/27/coming-of-age/

[M]

It took a good 6-12 months of regular use before I was really a mature user, I think. It took a while to develop an aesthetic, a sense of the market (when I was new, 300L for hair or clothes seemed light years beyond my reach), and to learn how to find and make the most of resources -- both in-world (places to go, different communities) and out of it (Twitter/Plurk, developing a core list of SL blogs that are worth reading regularly). I've evolved as a user, even had an SL adolescence of sorts. It's been fascinating, and it's all led me to my "true" second self... or the current version, anyway. ;)

[Doubledown Tandino]

My coming of age was about a month after I started SL.... once all my newb lofty grand delusions of ideas were squashed... once I started focusing on practical small projects, and was successful, that was my coming of age.

Also, the day I got my first $1000L tip was a big moment. I dunno why, but for me, seeing that $1000L tip showed me how much people crave good live music.

So, basically, given that i spent every day in SL since I started, I began to of age about 30 days in, and left my newbness behind after about 2 months in.

The next coming of age was when I began taking on high-level, or important projects... which came about starting 7-8 months in.

[Adz Childs]

In one respect I found my SL self instantly when I joined in April 2006, the moment I mastered the body shape sliders. In another respect, I'm still a kid in SL,
-Adz Childs

[Tom Boellstorff]

That's a great use of "Coming of Age in Second Life," I quite agree! There's a part in my book where I talk about "the life course" for folks in sl and I think this is one thing Cheyenne is talking about. For myself, I think I "came of age" in sl very quickly, in the sense that it made sense to me, and that it didn't take long for it to become clear that (1) I could do anthropological research in sl and (2) I could have a lot of fun in sl at the same time. For me, one unexpected way I felt I "came of age" quickly was discovering that I loved building. No background as an architect or anything like that, so that was a pleasant surprise. Maybe a holdover from my childhood love of Legos, but above all for me it was the idea of creating a home, a place to share with others that was a rooted place for me. And the fact that such a rooted place was composed of pixels in a virtual world was one early clue that I should really think about how virtual worlds are places!