I discovered this word from Urban Dictionary. My sources might be slightly dubious…
…but I still kinda think this term is amazing.
Cause I’m kinky AND geeky, which basically comprises 90% of kinksters in my very rough and unscientific study. And, yes, I am often the social butterfly greeting the newbies at munches and parties. Still. Sometimes I’m feeling anti social, but still open to talking if the other party makes the first efforts.
“Okay, but what is an NPC?”
For those of you who have never heard of The Guild, never used a die with more than six sides or owned a single light saber like instrument, an NPC is a Non Player Character. Often loosely based on or voiced by celebrities. You venture around the game and, from time to time, you can choose (or sometimes you are required) to click on these characters that are just…there. They have preprogrammed responses that activate some quest or progress the storyline. Or they just say random nonsense that they will repeat as many times as you click on them (sometimes they have three or four statements on rotation).
The key piece I want to highlight is that they are unable to speak unless spoken to first.
They will stand there all day, I suppose, until you click on them.
So, NPC energy is when you’re the wallflower or the girl sitting in the booth sipping her cocktail or the guy standing in the corner— and you just wait there for someone to talk to you, if they care enough. Because you have the kind of energy that is just enough to talk to them, but not enough to approach them first.
I feel like it explains a lot about those people that do respond to me, yet never seem to reach out themselves. Do they not like me? Do they only put up with me because they don’t know how to turn me away? Or are they just in that NPC energy?
Heck, sometimes I’m in that NPC mode myself. Now I have a way to describe myself on those days.
Anyway, still don’t go on Urban Dictionary unless you want to be disturbed.