When Cosplaying Gets To Your Head

Now this might be a touchy issue here, but oh well I'm going to speak my mind about it. Cosplaying is a wonderful thing that can bring out the absolute best in us... but it can also have a dark side. Now what I mean by this is a little complicated. For many people cosplay could just be for fun, a time to enjoy conventions, hang out with friends, get some awesome pics or even do a funny skit to post on youtube. Sometimes though people take the hobby very seriously. I myself find cosplaying to be a huge part of my life. I never thought that things would be so different after I started cosplaying. It opened up a whole new world.
    
     I take cosplaying pretty seriously, don't get me wrong, but I always remember to have fun in the end. The all nighters pulled with the blood (literally I've pricked my fingers with needles so many times!) sweat and tears weren't so fun though. I think its all worth it so see a fabulous costume I dedicated myself to though. Seeing people at cons is the best to, and then thats your chance to show off your costume! Right?

     Here is the problem though. I have actually lost some pretty good friends because of the big topic of attention. At first when people are new to cosplaying they might not be fully aware of how extreme you can go. Such as like pages, booking photographers, possibly spending hundreds of dollars in costume stuff, etc.

    I will admit, there was a time when I was really absorbed in all the attention I started getting on facebook. The comments like:
"Wow! You look amazing!"
"You're so pretty!"
"Amazing cosplay!"
....kinda got to my head. I've never really been one to think of myself as 'pretty' or anything, I thought of myself as average. Not really the type to have many pictures of myself until cons started up either. Sometimes though, when we don't think as highly about our looks, comments like that really boost our esteem. So we, of course, try to work harder to show people what we've got.

     My head was so full of what compliments I had, I thought I was doing pretty good. For myself, I never let it get to my head so bad that I was ever better than someone else though, or thought I would stop hanging out with people for this reason. I was always happy to have friends, new friends etc since I don't have many cosplay people in upstate NY where I live. Conventions are always a nice getaway for me.

     Now that I have been cosplaying for almost two years now I have come across a wide variety of cosplayers. Tons of them are super nice and fun to be around! I try talking to anyone who notices me as a friend. Not a fan. Fan is just so..... weird to me. I mean, I added them as 'friends' on facebook (my main place for cosplay) so why should I look at them in any other way? Yes, I have a like page, but I still don't consider them fans. I just don't see myself being good enough to have fans! Haha. If they prefer to be fans, then that is okay but it seriously blows me away. Its a very nice thing to say, but I am still very amateur.
 
     I've run into some great friends through cosplay. I've also lost many though the attention they started to get though. I've noticed with most people who stop talking to me, or become 'too busy to talk to me anymore' were people that weren't really apart of the cosplay community before I met them. After some time and helping them come into the cosplay community (helping them make a cosplay facebook, like page, dA, etc) I slowly notice that some start to become really absorbed in getting things like 'likes'. It starts off pretty subtle, then just gets outright abnoxious. I have seen single people posting their page EVERYWHERE. Post it as a status, in a group, on another like page, and event, just anywhere possible. Not just once or twice in each page, it was constant. I realize I'm probably not the only one who gets slightly annoyed at this. Its alright to remind people once in awhile but I don't want to see it in my news feed all the time. Its simple for me to hide it though, so I don't complain. I start to get slightly concerned though when other people start talking of how annoying someone is with this though. So, as a friend you think telling that person to pipe it down a little would be good right? Well no, not in my case. I have had people straight up stop talking to me. I was told I was 'jealous' and I was just left very confused.

     I know this isn't the case with everyone, but its happened a few times to me, and I'm just curious if its ever happened to anyone else. Just needed a rant! If you don't like it then.... well I dunno what to say haha.