why do you heal?

[Jamillion]

Queue times. But in all seriousness, I'm one of those max all combat class people, so I heal when it's needed or I'm not in the mood to tank or DPS.

[Morgan]

I heal cuz I enjoy working from the shadows, you know those guys that you know are here but you never see them on red carpets. And cuz I absolutely hate combos and rotations :s Tho I have only pld and war left to get to 60 and I follow all rotations for all jobs I never get as much satisfaction out of it as I get from healing.

[Mhiro]

I heal because I'm a masochist that enjoys taking care of children on a daily basis and not getting recognition for my hard work.

But in all seriousness, healing is far less monotonous than DPS. I'm actually a huge fan of support classes in particular over healing classes. So things like FFXI's BRD, COR and GEO are my go to. I'm more satisfied when I make my group stronger and add to that strength. Hence why I leveled and switched main to Astrologian. Many people think the ever so lost "support" roll is boring but idk...it's very satisfying to me.

[Blessedbythesun]

I heal because I naturally fell into the role and more specifically SCH. I have basically always played utility support roles in almost every mmo I have played in, more notably Alchemist/Biochemist from RO and main SMN in FFXI.

It is also of all the roles, I don't particularly trust my HP in some one else's hands. I tend to lose visual focus playing strictly DPS, and I am easily frustrated when tanking.

[Fevelle]

I heal because I love WHM (been my favorite job since my first FF) and I like to help people. Also because I have social anxiety and tanking or DPSing make me nervous (constantly stressed and anxious because I might lose hate any moment or constantly stressed and anxious because OMG I'm slowing them down).

[Rawrz]

I heal because I love the control.

DPS fail a mechanic or stand in an aoe, don't worry I'll save you.

Adds on me hitting me for chunks of life? I'll heal myself the tank and the dps that can't stop standing in the aoes, while keeping up aoe dps. Oops almost died hard casting shadowflare, LUSTRATE. All good.

Whole party wiped? Let me sing you the song of my people. LB3.

Did I just fail a mechanic or stand in an aoe? LUSTRATE. Did not. 2gud

Need a tank? Think I can handle it! Shit. LUSTRATE.

[Heliantheae]

It's actually a funny story. I decided to get at least one of each role to 60, just to know what it's like. I did WHM last because I didn't really want to heal. BUT, then I started doing it and loving it. I was planning on leveling my Archer after I got WHM to 60, but I jumped into AST and had even more fun. I love being in big groups with a couple of Ninja and/or Monks and giving them all arrow and watch them run around like three year olds. So I guess I heal because I have the most fun with it.

[Shyluv]

Goes back to XI. My boyfriend got me interested in the game, and I was really excited to see what summoner was like. At that time, WHM was the best subjob for SMN. I was advised that I should level it to at least 37 for that reason.

So I did. And I had a lot of fun doing it. Then I was told that if I was having fun, I should just take WHM to 75 so that it would be easier to obtain all the summons.

So I did. And had even more fun. I eventually did level SMN and it was my second favorite job.

I had to quit XI after some years, and when I was finally able to go back, XIV 2.0 was very close to release. I felt like I got as much out of XI as I could have. So I signed up for the third beta, chose CNJ and had a lot of fun again.

Healing has been fun to me from the start. Even when I'm leveling other jobs, I miss healing.

I've also always been very nurturing according to friends and family. Maybe that is why I find it so fun.

[Lobotomite]

Long-winded answer to a simple question.

1) I play a "healer IRL" like OP.
2) I sort of fell into it. When I first started with MMOs, I was originally planning on being a ranged DPS, but I was asked to heal a group in a dungeon. I got compliments from the rest of the group, so I figured I would stick with it, especially after learning that healers are generally in much higher demand than DPS.
3) I heal because (traditionally) healer roles in MMOs require a set of skills that I'm good at.

DPS involves a lot of serial processing--being able to memorize a script [ABCDEFABZCACSJA] (repeat) and executing it in real time. "Good" DPS know how to execute and tweak the script so that downtime from avoiding mechanics is minimized.

Tanks also have a certain amount of execution from a script (which rotations will allow me to get the most threat), but they need to have wide battlefield awareness and be "big picture" thinkers so that they can respond to stray mobs that peel off. A certain amount of spatial thinking is also required, because they're responsible for positioning the boss or adds in a manner that will minimize the amount of downtime for DPS and unnecessary work for healers.

Healer is very different from the other two roles and is much more intuitive. It's generally a role that you either love or hate. I think that most healers think of their moves situationally instead of serially (the boss just used Heavenly Heel and the tank is currently at 40% health, therefore an Essential Dignity or Benefic II would be most appropriate at this time).

Healer also requires a couple unique skills: the ability to prioritize or triage (everyone is at 40% health. Should I patch up everyone at the same time, or focus on the tank?) and the ability to clutch (making snap reactions to unexpected damage before the player at critical health dies). Outside of clutch situations, healer is more catered to slower, deliberative thinking--if you're performing your role well, you don't need to be constantly busy and slapping out a move every GCD (at least in games that don't demand as much DPS from healers as this game does.)

[Seoulstar]

Because I generally like to help people.