How do you play The Sims?

I love making big households with mostly adults, 1 or 2 couples and sibling pairs, then giving them a boatload of money, beautiful houses with plenty of skill-building accessories, and just kind of letting them develop. I usually get jobs for a few, to mix it up and give some direction to the game when I'm bored of everyone being happy all the time lol. But I know that $$$ safety and free time that I give them is something I have little of, so it's what I'm always drawn to when I play.

I'm also horrendous at builds, and lose patience after setting up one room. Would love to improve in that area.

It depends on what kind of story I'm telling. Sometimes, I play with the pre-mades, sometimes sims I created either recently or long ago; sometimes do a challenge of some sort (usually the skill-based ones); sometimes I want to build what I see IRL or in a plan or even because of a challenge presented from simmers' communities.

I almost always start with a single young adult woman, spend a ton of time planning her outfits, then move her into a starter home. I never use money cheats, I like them to struggle with money for a while. I get her a job, have her do fun activities, and eventually meet a guy, sometimes get married, always have a kid. Then I do family play.

I play legacies. I start with a couple (i used to start with a single sim, but i find boring to play with only one sim), randomize traits (even before there was an in game randomizer, i used a randomizer app to do it) and choose aspirations according to traits. Then i start playing and building their story in my mind as it goes. They always have or adopt kids. I like to see the family tree grow and how the family unfolds generation after generation. I take screenshots and make an album in word with a small description in each screenshot so that i can come back to the family history because i used to forget how the first sims were. I almost never leave the same house. I start with one of the starter homes and expand it according to what is needed. Let's say i have a music lover that pursues music as his/her living. I will most problably build a music room in the house. When i get back to my legacy screenshots album i will remember how the house was at the beginning, rooms that were completely remodeled, old rooms that aren't there anymore, besides of the sims.
That being said, this is my favourite way to play The Sims since i started decades ago and what im atm doing in sims 3, but i could never pass the second generation on sims 4.

I begin with a theme for the whole game. So I have one game set in a retro-futuristic setting (where I had to alter the decor and outfits of every single building and in built character), another which follows just one family, another which is a regular rotational game where every 7 game days a new character is moved in and another loosely based on the old Two Ronnies TV sketch "The Worm That Turned". I find the themes set the tone for each game.

Then I create the characters; I try not to make them all personality clones of each other, and then pitch them into the world! There's work/life balance, finding Mr or Mrs Right or at least Right Enough, working towards aspirations and trying to get enough money to buy those really big mansions. I tend not to micro manage my Sims and let needs and chance dictate play.

Right now, in the game set around just one family, the teenage son is finding it really hard trying to meet teenage girls. Older ladies seem to take a shine to him but he's waiting for a bunch of little girls he was at junior school with to age up. In the meantime he has to fend off all the old ladies and middle aged vamps.

I have a big rotation with a bunch of different sims. It's mostly comprised of my own sims or townies that I edited and added with some pre-mades, mostly from Get Together in my case. At this point, it's a few generations in, so it's more about the growing up children of the households I previously established. They are all going off in their own directions and figuring their lives out.

I have some dramatic soap opera households and some totally functional happy families. Recently I've been on a break but I plan to go back to it. Honestly, I have a lot of fun with my game. I set up a bunch of characters and it has all basically come together. When I consider starting a different save, I just end up playing it because I want to see where it goes. I guess I spent a lot of time developing my own characters, so they have their own personalities and quirks. At this point, they all have back stories and run into each other around the worlds.

I gradually edited the save so that I have numerous lots that are specific to my own game. I downloaded or downloaded and edited some but I've also built or created my own. I view the entire save as one integrated world. I have some rules specific to the different places in the game.

So basically, I've set up something that I enjoy. Sometimes I'll go in and build or edit. I also edit some townies that I want to keep and do my own culling. Sometimes I'll go in and build or edit lots. For example, I recently edited some of the bars to be more fitting for my sims. I added a pool to the Willow Creek gym and made the art gallery double as a wedding venue. I built a huge gym in Oasis Springs called Oasis Lifestyle Fitness with the Fitness Stuff pack. Those are just some examples. It's a cool game and I play it but I also take breaks and then come back.

I normally play rags to riches, usually as a vampire, then I have him/her search the internet for vampire secrets until he/she's a grand master so I can get all the useful powers, and finally write books until the cows come home.

I've gotten a bit tired of this though, so now I have a mortal sim, I still had her start as a teen on the empty off-the grid lot in Sulani with zero simoleons, only this time my goal is from rags to doing okay. Per now she had just made enough to get my favourite house in Willow Creek (she lived in the gremlin flat in the city before that), just had a son, and is currently studying cooking at the university.

Thank you, everyone, for your great answers! It's nice to see so much diversity in play! With the current "stay home" mandate, I find myself broadening my play style. I've got 60s style houses now, with Brady Bunch type families installed. I've got an old fisherman who lives off the fish he catches, and socializes only with his cat. I've got lots of Uni grads now, which is fun to see how it affects their careers. I do have a couple of grumpy Sims in each 'hood because that's more realistic to me. Oh! I also created a house very similar to the rental I lived in the last years of my childhood. It's tiny and weird because the real house was tiny and weird. LOL. I tried to make a Sim me but... meh. I suck at CAS.

I like to play young adults and teens, either living together as roommates or with their parents (I usually ignore the parents in the latter case), and just let them have wacky adventures (usually by bringing misery to random townies or premades I meet).

I don't. Thanks to the horrible job EA did with TS4, I've fallen out of love with The Sims.

But on a serious note... I make families and see how long I can get their family tree before I get bored. Other times I just take pics with my sims and make a story or two.