How to leave your friends (aka quit MS)

I’ve been off of Maple Story for majority of the summer and continue to never log on. And look, I haven’t killed myself yet! How do I do it?!
Well, with this special guide, I’ll teach you how to leave your friends and not hate yourself.. too much!

Starting off
[i]Start to make preperations about your leave so the transition to a Maple free Life is clean and smooth. My tips are to be specific so you have a clearer view of what you want. Also, keep your goal in mind! As I always say, “It’s nice to think about changing, but the thinking won’t actually change you. You have to take action.”

Pick a date
In my case, I picked July 23rd, 2006. After that, I swore to take action and severely cut off Maple Story on that day. Have all of your friends know about it in advance so they can keep reminding you about it with their cries of “NUUU UR LEAVN OMG!!1” Also, an unexpected goodbye should be avoided. It’s not only rude, but really. Don’t leave without letting your friends know what’s going on!

Have a party, make use of time
Pretend like you’re dying. Do everything you wanted, have a big blast and party. Make sure that you’ll have no regrets because you want to MAKE SURE that under ANY circumstance do you sign on again. Tie up some loose knots, get closer to friends, make sure that everyone who cares about you knows that you’re going. I actually celebrated my leaving with making a movie and my maple wedding. If you want, it’s reccomended that you even give your things away. I personally did not give out my equipment but I did give out about a total of five million mesos to random strangers who needed help with guilds, funding, et cetera. Giving away items further cements a leave from this game.

Keep contact, but not too much contact
Keep in contact with some of your closest friends, be it via instant messaging, phone calls, forums, et cetera. You don’t want to lose connection over one thing, especially when there are countless ways to communicate to each other. However, do not keep contact with too many people- only with those you would genuinley miss. The more friends you keep, the harder it is to stray away from the game.

Depend on someone
Have someone you can confide your feelings and secrets to. Depend on someone to listen to you. It’s all right to feel depressed, and it’s only right if you tell are able to talk to someone about it.
Also, as a note, make sure you give a reason as to why you’re leaving to all of your friends, otherwise they’ll be unhappy with you.

Do not care about what others think
People will try to stop you, beg, cry, give you sorrowful words. Real or not, you have come to the important decision of quitting due to dire consequences. Do not let them stray you from what you want or what will make you happy(er).

Checklist of Actually Quitting
Before you have signed off for the last time, have you…

~Told everyone you know that you’re quitting?
~Told everyone you know a reason as to why?
~Considered giving away items?
~Considered having a party?
~Made up with lost friends or enemies?
~Recieved contact information of close friends?
~Had a close friend to talk to?
~ever felt unsure about quitting? If you do, rethink it over. You need a strong spirit to get off of Maple Story.

After you quit and how to stay off the drug!
Distract your mind with other hobbies and pertain your strong mindset to pull yourself through any desire or addiction!

Keep the reason in mind
For whatever reason you decided to quit- may it be how time consuming it was or social issues- let those resound in your brains and let Maple Story sound worse with every second. Even though MS is a great game, the worse you think about it, the less you’ll play.

Keep your thoughts off of Maple Story
Actually, in a way, keep them obsessed with Maple Story. Whenever you make a decision or decide to sign on, have your brain think,

“Do I really want this?”
“Am I supposed to be playing Maple Story right now?
“What will happen if I spend time on Maple Story instead of other things?”
“How will my friends react if I play Maple Story again?”

Just stay strong and make sure that under any kind of setting you do NOT go back to Maple Story.

Socialize with your MS friends
This is what worked for me at least.
Start to socialize and get to know the few that you’ve decided to keep in touch with. Hopefully you will get used to talking to them through means besides Maple Story and will rather talk to them, getting the “leveling addiction” out of your system.

Re-prioritize your Life
Start to think about your Life in a different light without Maple Story. What is more important now? Tie this in with your reason and decide what you would, could, and SHOULD be doing rather than spending hours at a time on MS.
Do you want to be healthier? Go work out instead of playing MS.
Want to get better grades? Stop procrastinating and finish that project.
Trying to get closer to that one fellar? Then don’t talk to strangers in Kerning City.

Get new hobbies
Along with priorities of Life, just start to develop other interests. Pick up a club and run for Student Council because.. guess what, you have time to do things now! Go for 1000 paper cranes, sew your dream shirt, learn how to play cricket, or create the ultimate web comic… Something! Although not reccomended, you could even go for another MMORPG. (I moved to Trickster Online for a bit, which explains the Trickster fan art)
Anyways, this is to help distract your mind from the MS addiction.

Stay Strong
Keep talking to that close friend and tell them how hard it is. Open up. Keep the goal in mind.
Stay Strong.

Well, hopefully these will give you pointers for quitting Maple Story if you ever want to. If you follow this guide, hopefully you’ll be able to drift away from the happiness of Maple Story and learn to gain happiness from other things.
Good luck!

By the way, this is my newest video. Happy six month birthday, guild Liminality!