Tom

Day 71. I slept longer again thanks to my wife and got up feeling remarkably better. She also made me a kick-ass omelette. I dived into work, interacted a bit on Game Quitters, and put my children to bed. Not much time for anything else today. I'm still reading Radical Acceptance although not that fast. I listen to audiobooks before falling asleep but in the past few days I was just too tired to last longer than five minutes. Today I managed to squeeze in one chapter, and now it's time to read more. It's a strange book. Brings back memories and stirs up feelings. It's quite a personal experience. Gratitude journal: Being open but selective as to who belongs in my life.NASA and ESA capturing breathtaking images of the universe.Wikipedia.

I finished The Martian a few weeks ago. Great novel! I didn't watch the movie yet.

Hey, don't lose heart! Sometimes you have to make compromises. Choirs tend to be amazing communities. They'll respect your focus, be proud of you, and wait eagerly for you to come back! Take a deep breath and start over. What else can fill your time that isn't gaming? How about working on your vocal technique?

Hey Gank, thanks for expressing this. I actually identify 100% with you here and like the same kinds of games. Open-ended games can feel like work for me; I need the excitement and structure of a narrative within which my actions actually have meaning in context. For the moment I'm hoping that I can get my enjoyment of story from books and movies. +1. Although strangely I am not missing that kind of games. If I have cravings it's always the quick fixes: TF2 or HS. Good luck Gank. Keep writing here when you can.

There are two tactics I use all the time. 1) Say it back. "Nice to meet you Alex!" 2) "Nice name! How do you spell it?"

Since you enjoy this way of exercising take a look at Hundred Pushups.

Follow Ed's post, it will work! It's quickest if you use a service like Mailinator for your disposable email address.

Please write every day

Sound very interesting! On my to-read list. Thanks!

Day 70. I'm a bit sick today. I let my wife take care of the children and got up later. Work went well, I have spent some time with my family, and sold my video card. This morning when I was swapping cards I started wondering about how they compare in terms of performance. I thought that I could run a game just for testing purposes. If I had one installed I might have even done it. Of course HearthStone would run. But I don't have it. Linux is not a supported platform. I installed low-performance drivers. I can't access my battle.net account either. I put up so many safeties that I effectively boycotted myself from gaming. The best part is that I didn't feel frustrated, I felt reassured! The fact that I'm investing so much into not gaming gives me confidence. So I gained a new video card plus some spare cash by selling the old card. I also generally feel better. I didn't change any other major variables besides quitting gaming, no new habits gained or old habits dropped, so that must be it. I simply poured time for gaming into time for other things I was already doing. That proves to me that not gaming is the right choice for me. Gratitude journal: My wife. Thinking that we are together for more than a decade! It's a blessing to be with her.My bed is awesome. One of the best things we bought, ever.Matching my PRs in the gym and the confidence that I gain from weightlifting.

Day 69. Today I took it easy. Yesterday evening I told to my wife: when the workday is over I'll stop working. And so I did. I also took better breaks during the day. A nice morning walk with my youngest son before the workday, making hummus mid-morning, chatting with my family in the afternoon. Maybe as a consequence, I was very focused at work and had more fun than usual. I started listening Radical Acceptance, the book Travis is reading. I have mixed feelings about it, which is great. I find it thought-provoking. The fact that it draws a lot from Buddhism is a plus for me, since that's a philosophy that influences me greatly. Gratitude journal: Colorless Takuru Tazaki and his years of pilgrimage. It was a great read.> echo "The command line."The possibility to have a quiet time.

Nice consistency Kyle. Keep it up! Please write how you liked Mindsight when you're done reading it. So far there have been some excellent recommendations on this forum.

Hey Bob, happy birthday! One thing that helped me greatly was to sabotage my Steam account. I changed my email address to a disposable one, then I changed my password to some gibberish, and wiped out Steam. Bye bye: I couldn't get it back even if I wanted to. Which sometimes I do Another thing I did was making my own 90 day challenge calendar. By far the best thing I've done is getting active in this forum. Good luck with your recovery!

Day 68. Screw the alarm clock. That's what my wife and I would have loved to say. But there's school, there's work, so up we go. We can't wait for the little one to get past the infamous terrible twos. Short on sleep, a bit sick and with a never-ending to-do list but I still managed to keep the spirits up. Today was also the day I had to match my personal weightlifting records and I was astounded: it was no big deal! Now I'm curious to see where this new intermediate program will bring me. Gratitude journal: My thermos cup dispensing sips of comforting, delicious tea.The fun I had turning a broken gamepad into a desk organizer like these ones.My wife for proofreading my business correspondence in her native language.

Day 67. I spent all day at home. We decorated the living room and my wife left to meet a friend. It was good to spend time with the children although I started feeling a bit too tired. I hope I didn't catch anything. The little one is acting out a lot and has trouble falling and staying asleep. Fingers crossed. Gratitude journal: My children are really happy about Christmas lights and music.We didn't have to cook much today.I don't work on Sundays.

Well done! I did the same.

Excellent post. Thank you.

You could write them all down in a dedicated notebook and read them when you feel you need some inspiration. Kahlil Gibran wrote some books made only of aphorisms. Check out Sand and Foam. Also, sharing quotes with others makes them more memorable to you as well. Nice that you resorted to calming your mind instead of ignoring the shock. Well done!

Day 66. Again the little one kicked and screamed quite a lot tonight. In the morning we were all tired and my eldest was also coughing a bit, so we skipped the swimming pool. We did what everybody swears they won't do with their children: we planted them in front of a screen for a couple of hours while we rested and regained some will to live. It was for the best In the afternoon we all went to visit our babysitter who is going back to her home country next week. We'll miss her: she was truly excellent and a pleasure to be around. Her boyfriend's computer case was on the desk with its side taken off. I had quick peek. Nice, a gamer! If we reach an agreement I'll sell him my video card and downgrade to a low-power, fanless model. Gratitude journal: We had a fun afternoon. Going out of the house helped shift into more positive gears.The prospect of downgrading my desktop PC.Spending time with my wife after the children fell asleep.

Day 65. Today is a day off so yesterday I went to sleep later. You know what the default activity would have been. Instead I sat by the piano and started learning a new short piece. I just let myself get absorbed and didn't set a time limit. So I woke up a bit tired since I slept short and my youngest was a bit restless during the night. Not too bad though. I spent the morning with my eldest, lifted weights and finished learning the piece in the afternoon, and cooked dinner with my wife. In the afternoon I also had a nice chat with the husband of our childminder. It was the first time I met him, and the first time that I got to talk extensively with the childminder too. What had to be just a pickup ended up being one hour conversing with two nice, interesting people. Our friends came over for dinner. We noticed that it's around three years that we know each other. We had a wonderful evening. I couldn't be happier. And today is Saturday, so I'll play some more music before going to bed. Gratitude journal: Edvard Grieg. I think he's underrated.Being social today. I'm starting to question my belief that I need a lot of time alone.Photographers. It's a beautiful art form.

Wow, what a video! Loved it! I'm happy I quit gaming before VR. I was waiting anxiously, thinking of "investing" in new hardware and finally flying in space. I tried an Oculus at a tech conference and was impressed. But that's because I was a gamer. Now I don't really care for it. I wonder what its real impact will be on society.

Day 64. What a nice morning. I jumped on an early call and took a longer morning break. I went to a new specialty coffee place that just opened in the neighborhood. With my wife, our youngest, a friend and her little daughter. The staff is passionate and knowledgeable and there are some special tea blends for sale at a very fair price. So we enjoyed some good coffee and cake and came back home with a bag of genmaicha, a tea on my to-taste list which I had never been able to find. Gratitude journal: Tomorrow I have a day off and a nice program.I was in a good mood all day.Spreadsheets!

Day 63. I woke up first and enjoyed some reading and cooking. I also got an early start with work to make room for a longer break I had to take later in the day. Work kept me positively busy with interesting stuff. My weightlifting session went very well. I need to find a solution to further improve my grip: I struggled to hold the bar during my last set of deadlifts and my technique suffered. I don't want to wear gloves. I'll try just using more chalk. My wife and I had a last-minute invitation to a concert from a friend. We managed to get babysitting and go. Nice! I didn't spend much time with my children today. Oh well, I'll have Friday off so I'll make it up to them! Gratitude journal: My job keeps me stimulated by throwing challenges.I got to spend time with my wife as a couple.Our babysitter is fantastic.

I didn't know them. They look fun! I was just looking for the next show to enjoy with my children and Wikipedia writes that there's a Japanese-Dutch anime series. We'll check it out if we can find it. Thanks!

I echo SpiNips. It's now on my list.