Why do long time players play the game so differently?

[Nethereal]

Because nothing matters.

Outside of the actions you put value and being a decent human nothing else matters.

I went try hard through Stormblood and Shadowbringers.
Capped tomes on reset, pentamelded gear, studied outside raid time cleared TEA before 5.2 dropped by doing 5 days a week 5 hours a day I was 7 other dudes spouse, father, mother, and family for about 3 months and my reward?
1 ultimate and my efforts in vain with no new content left to do for almost a year.

I made tons of unforgettable memories both good and bad and it has definitely done something to my mentality.
I've moved data centers, lost friends, gained brothers, lost free companies, gained free companies in my pursuit of simply moving forward and at the end what I learned is that there is no end, so why rush?
The only thing you're going to find is stress and disappointment.

I went through 7 statics just to get past LC for TEA and it took my 8th to finally get a clear.
It got to a point where if someone messaged me on discord I would check it a day later because it was probably someone telling me they were leaving the group.
Even with the 8th group it was a wonderful hell, when we finished we didn't talk to each other for 2 weeks.
I would have to calm my nerves every day 15 minutes before raid time.

I personally don't know if I would do it again if I knew what I know now but what I do know is I'm never doing it again.
Endwalkers comes around I didn't pentameld anything, I stopped capping my tomes 2 weeks in despite needing them for BiS, got BiS yesterday after barely playing the game outside reclears.

It really doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is if you're having fun and your group is having fun.

And that's just from the raiding perspective.