Do you feel that ABJD's compensate for something you don't have IRL?

they are the muses of my art, the life within my stories, the modles i need for my drawing....it all boils down to, art, they are my art. I love them dearly.

 

i think my doll expressed my inner desire of how i want to dress, look and feel. i think dolls really show the person personality and how much the doll would resemble the person (i dont mean figure and facial).

 

Yes, not only BJDs but the whole doll collection means a lot to me and compensate the fact that I work for money, and not on something I like, and it also let me dream and free my imagination, just like writing and drawing do. My job is quite boring, so I can dream and play with colors, and have started to be more interested in photographing, because of my dolls. Also, I can escape from things that hurt me. When someone near to me died, I began to think a lot about my dolls, and the thought that they were there for me, conforted me a lot.

 

Yes. Beauty.

 

Ha ha, I will agree with this one.

My dolls represent fantastical creatures with things I will never have, [wings, magic, weapons...etc]. While I'm not exactly living through them, it gives a nice escape from boring normal human life and lets me "experience" things that I never truly would from a safe - and sane - distance, using the dolls themselves as avatars in a sense. It makes me happy to slowly put them together and make them as they would be, finding or making the "real life" versions of things, upgrading them as I go and constantly improving closer to that vision. It's as close as I could ever personally get to that in reality.

The short answer is, yeah. I don't have cool stuff, they do.

 

I would say the right/money to wear gorgeous historical clothing So my doll compensates for my fashion frustrations, until I get super rich and get the right/means to be an "exentric" :p

Also I agree on the subject of "pets" I just an't have pets in the appartement and I'm curently preparing my diploma project (graphic design). I sometimes have to spend from one to five days just working 12 hours a day at home, and going out with friend is a big no-no so during those peculiar times it's nice to have a friendly presence

doesn't seem weird at all I heard that it's a know psychological fact that playing with dolls as an adult is just like taking care of the younger you and I do think it's important to stay in touch with your inner child

 

Althought as mentionned before, I don't think my doll really compensate for anything particular, I ready don't think putting a lot of personal feelings in a doll doesn't make them less enjoyable
Even if I don't always share those feeling Its seems to me quite normal that the issue arrises, looking at how they are basically little copies of human beeings!

 

My boy isnt really a compensation as much as an outlet, im a piscies and am very creative by nature. Of course silly me decided/forced to be a chemist so my boys are more of a creative outlet where i can make wigs outfits and make up for them. im even hoping to get into making shoes for them. so thats how i feel about my boys.

 

No. They are pretty things to collect.

I don't see why making up characters, alternate universes, what have you, is so linked to trying to compensate for what's lacking in our lives. Are there reasons for what we choose to put in those stories? Sure. But that's not an immediate indication of dissatisfaction with one's own life. Playing with and styling my dolls is fun; that's why I do it. I do not feel the cold void of not being a resin lump dressed in frilly shirts.

I do agree that there are collectors out there who use dolls as stand-ins for human relationships, just as some people use pets or writing or other hobbies. You only get into trouble with hobbyists if you suggest they all have the same reasons for their love of the hobby.

ETA: Isn't this more of a General Discussion topic? We're just voicing our personal feelings on this issue, not debating.

 

Deep down I really do love frilly dresses and cute things, and Asian-styled garments. There's no point for me to wear them in real life, though! But there's always to dressing up dolls and make them look all cute and pretty, so I guess they compensate something in that sense ^^.

 

LoL me too, about buying pretty thing like pretty shoes, bags, outfit...etc XD but I like art in general and reading and daydreaming XD I practice all of that in my BJD hobby, it is another wonderful medium to me making outfits, faceups and photographing and enriching my imagination with stories...
AAAAAnd when i feel down i go out shopping ....and since i start this hobby I shop for my BJD too
So maybe I like to have pretty things to fill a void, i dunno what is it, I am pretty myself and the dolls doesn't make me feel extra beautiful ...
this is an interesting thread to see how this hobby to each one of us.

edit: yes this is not a debate

 

[chuckles] While I certainly wouldn't complain about having Sannru or Gaia's wardrobe... not to mention the kind of build to look as good in them as they do... I'm not sure any of my crew are consciously representations of anything that I lack myself or of anything that I aspire to.

There are bits of my beliefs and personality in all of them, I guess (They are my characters, after all. My creations. I don't think there's any way around that-), but none of them are meant to be in any way avatars *of* me.

 

In a way, I do. I feel that dolls can let one express themselves in a way we won't allow ourselves to do in real life. Like, can we really bring ourselves to wear those kinds of clothes? Have those kinds of tattoos? Wear that kind of make up.

So the thing It has that I lack is...courage...?

 

Well to put it simply, doll are an attachment for me and they fill a void.

I have been told by many specialist's I am unable to have children. So be it and it does not bother me, entirely. What I will not miss about having a child is crying, diapers, mood-swings. And the overall dirty process of children and all the dirty icky things like bodily secretions, smells, feces, and urine. I am highly crazy about germs and the sort. Not to mention I hate children crying, its seriously nails on a chalk board. Most people that have children reading this would typically be freaked out about my view of children. Personally I find them vile and disgusting within reason to a very select few. As I do know I am not nearly mentally prepared for a child let alone the responsiblity. As that being said it is thankful and god sent that I am unable to carry children. In my own way BJD's are a way of filling that void. But what I will miss about not being able to have children is the photos. Showing off my kids, picking out outfits and dressing them.

As strangely as it sounds, they do fill that void for me excluding all the germs. haha. The taking pictures, dressing them and sharing them is a huge part of it. As well as meeting wonderful people and making great friends who share such a facinating hobby like this. The fact that I can dress them, take photos, and play with them until I am bored and simply put them away appeals to me. They can wear the things I wish I could wear. They are the perfect mold to create the perfect personality with. They are a tool as I see it for my creativity and fill a small void within my soul.

 

My dolls (ABJD and other types) don't replace anything missing from my life, but through them I've forged friendships with other collectors, and doll artists, and been given the chance to learn new skills....sewing, and various crafts, as well as hone my writing. I do enjoy dressing certain of my dolls in fashion styles that I could never pull off Lolita and Gothic to name two, and just having them brings me joy. Making something for my dolls, styling their hair, re-dressing them, or just posing one, is a great form of relaxation for me.

 

I suppose I could answer somewhat with how you've said, a "character that needs to come alive". My doll is in fact, a character that has become a part of me so deeply that the very urge to have a tangible being for me to interact with was apparent. He is parts of me nobody knows I have, and it's almost easier to deal with it that way, to put these things about me into him instead.

So yes. If this indeed answer the question? ._.

 

Yes, in a roundabout way.

I studied fashion and costume design in college (and before it, working in local theater and whatnot throughout high school). I was consistently obsessive about it to the extent that I got about 4 hours of sleep at most for years because I couldn't stop working on developing relevant skills, reading up on this or that related subject, and so on. I was going to DO this, it was just in my blood.

Then I had a car accident that pretty much guaranteed I wouldn't be working in that field without tears-streaming-down-the-face-at-random-intervals levels of pain -- and believe me, I fought long and hard against that doctor's assessment and tried to keep on for a few years afterward. (That shops and workrooms are designed for people about 6 inches taller than me as a general rule wasn't much help, either, but in the end, lugging around bolts of fabric was enough to put me in bed on heavy painkillers for three days at a stretch even four years later.)

I have the fabric. I have the skills, the drive, the tools -- all that fun stuff, and it has been gathering dust. I just don't have the 'client' that wouldn't practically kill me to make something for them... unless that client is potentially small enough to fit on my lap. Knowing my penchant for overkill, that's still no guarantee I won't be trying to lug around a big ol' bolt of fabric for a single doll outfit some day, but it's considerably less likely.

I deeply hate waste, and the thought of all of that (time, money, etc.) investment coming to nothing is the kind of thing that kept me up at night. So... that's the roundabout way of saying, "Yep, they're that potential mystery client that would have let me dress them insanely if a moron with no insurance hadn't decided to run a red light once upon a time."

 

That's precisely one of the major reasons why I was attracted to BJDs. Growing up in both Korea and Canada, there were no Asian-looking dolls to speak of in either countries. My best friend (who is a Chinese-born Canadian) vouched for the same phenomenon in her childhood. It's still the same when I browse the websites of major Korean toy companies. They have a lot of anime-related products and Barbie-like fashion dolls, but nothing that actually reflects Asian ethnic characteristics or names.

Here's some food for thought on Asian Barbies themselves. I frequent small stores and major retailers like Toys R Us on a regular basis, but I've never seen the "Kira" doll.

So in a way, BJDs do compensate for something I lacked for a long time; there's something comforting about finally having a doll with the same kind of background and culture. Other than that, my dolls will be mostly a reflection of my blurred casual/girly fashion tastes and the happy times in my life (ie. meeting my partner as a teenager ages ago), rather than a desire for some missing relationship/life/fantasy/body ideal.

 

Yes, my Mars compensates for the fact I havent found a man that hot yet... If I did, he might not respect me for my abstinence before marriage. But as far as beauty wise, I'm not.. unglamorous.. so.. not in that respect.