karabas

Lol, no ? You've gone 10+ days in your detox several times (your record is close to 50 days, right?). I'm talking about people who can't even get a good start where losing the streak is a big deal (i.e. people who fail 3-4 days in). So yeah, when you have a streak, losing it is a strong motivator. When you don't have a streak, it can be discouraging.

Thanks man. I think overall it was watching the world cup. It encouraged me to spend an hour or more a day watching games, replays, catching up on news, discussions, etc. It also brought me back to watching videos on YT. And it brought me back into gaming (I'm playing football manager). I almost relapsed during my 90 days because I saw news about the upcoming fallout game and I wanted to go back and play old fallout games. So I think I'm overall good as long as I don't get "triggered" by a reminder of a game or another I used to play. Considering how many thematically different games I've played over the years though, it's unlikely I'll be able to just avoid those triggers. My other problem (that's currently coming into the forefront for me) is that I can't for the life of me go to bed early. It's probably one of the biggest reasons I relapse or am unproductive even when I don't relapse. But it was my attempted goal throughout my 90 day detox and I was never able to do it for more than a few days in a row. This is something I really don't know what to do about because nothing I've tried so far worked. Anyway, let's see...

New Detox: 3/6 Productive hours: 4:50/8:00 An ok day, didn't game or watch videos or read junk books. Wasn't super productive either, but at least I'm not gaming!

New Detox: 2/6 So the last week or so has been a total disaster. I did relapse in terms of gaming. That lasted a few days and I racked up 50 hours of gaming within those few days. It was bad. I got really sick of myself but wasn't ready for another long detox. So I decided to do a 6-day detox and allow myself a day of gaming on day 7. The mini-detox has been great in that I haven't gamed or watched videos. But I guess I found an alternative (which I always had): books. I spent the last two days STILL not doing anything except bare life necessities and reading. I finished two books (which were the last two in the most recent series I got addicted to, so thankfully I'm at a good stopping point). Overall this has been a disaster. I think I've relapsed worse than my last relapse 90+ days ago, because at least I was doing SOMETHING at that point. My last week has been virtually all gaming or videos or books and barely any work or study or anything else. It's sad, because I feel like a complete loser for not being able to do things that I feel passionate about. There are so many things I'd like to accomplish. And to accomplish any one of those things would be far more rewarding than becoming a top-league football manager in some stupid game. But it is what it is. It's early and I'm going to bed now. I'm planning to wake up early, have my breakfast, hit the gym, and finally crush the day. And you know what? At the moment, I'm not feeling like coming back to that game at the end of the week. Maybe I'll set another detox and I want to beat my past ~95 day record. Let's say 120 days. That's a 1/3 of the year. Let's see how I feel about it tomorrow.

Oh I didn't mean a counter in the profile... I'm just thinking that most people who have journals usually do some sort of X/90 day counter in their posts as it's a suggestion that's made. Maybe we should start adding this other suggestion as a possibility. Longest streak is also a great idea, although I know some people who haven't gone beyond 10 days, so that might be a bit discouraging depending on the situation. There needs to be a balance between positive feedback & some pressure

Hey guys, So I had an idea based on something Cam said at one point, which was that if you relapse, you should try to minimize the number of relapse days and increase the number of game-free days and keep a "high score" of each to motivate yourself. And one of the things I noticed is that many people struggle if they routinely relapse during the 90 day detox. So what if, in addition (or instead) of the 90 day detox that resets if you fail, we were to count total game-free days since starting in the community? The benefit is that it can help people feel more positive about what they've achieved. The negative is that losing a long detox streak is definitely a strong motivator not to relapse and the counter may make this motivation weaker. But if a person routinely fails the 90-day detox (as I've seen some members do), the benefit might outweigh the harm. Thoughts?

Agreed. While I'm still struggling with some things, this community has been a total game changer.

No games: 93/90 No vids: 0/90 Early to bed: 0/7 Productive Hours: 3:20/8:00 Sleep: 1:30am - 6:00am; 1pm - 4:30pm A few reasons for failing again today: my health issues have been pretty bad (I spent 3 hours in the bathroom... have a suspicion as to the food that's causing... will test), the world cup final happened and took another ~2 hours of my life, and vids. I used excuses like "oh my friend sent me this, it's OK to watch it" or "this is educational" and ended up wasting several hours. I was prioritizing my studies, which means that I got most of those done, but almost no work. I'm going to have to change this. The last week has been the worst in terms of work, I probably got about 10 hours from the whole week. I can't live on that little money ? I'll have to change this going forward. Start the day with getting work out of the way, then do the studies. I find studies easier to do than work, so it should be easier to finish the day off with them. Still haven't played games because I can't get myself to get those 8 productive hours in. *Sigh* Also keep failing with the going to bed early. It's like a habit. I even bought a bag of chips to reward myself for going to bed early and so far it's still sitting in the kitchen. *double sigh* Anyway, here's to a better day tomorrow. Daily Routine: 15 min Qur'an reading: check (2 day streak) 30 min Qur'an re-memorization: fail 45 min Islamic Law study: check (2 day streak) 45 min Purification of the Heart study: check (2 day streak) 30 min personal tasks: check (2 day streak) 15 min working on my business: check (2 day streak)

No games: 92/90 No vids: 0/90 Early to bed: 0/7 Productive Hours: 4:25/8:00 Bedtime last night: 2am Woke up: 6am (napped 12:30-3pm) Gah! I was really excited about today because I woke up for prayer at 6am and wasn't tired. Here it was, a chance to get all my 8 productive hours in by 2pm (my wife was sleeping in, so I was all alone, no distractions). So I watched a ton of vids instead, mostly for the game that I want to play myself. The funniest part is that I already told myself that I'll allow myself to play as long as i get the 8 hours in... so I could've had like 4-5 hours of game time if I wanted to. But instead I just watched videos. This is the epitome of my not working towards my goals. I can't even focus for the sake of gaming. Sigh. This is stupid. I'm making another commitment to no more videos (which really shouldn't be a problem given that gaming is the prize on the line). I'm going to type out a daily to-do list so that I can get some good momentum going by crossing off to-dos. I'm also going to try to break up tasks into smaller chunks to make it easy. I need to start tracking the time I spend on different things. Also I need to start realizing that when I want to watch videos, it's an addiction. I need to stop for a bit and focus on the feeling and just accept it instead falling into it. Anyway. My hope is I go to bed early today, wake up at 6 again and retry the whole process. Hopefully will report something better tomorrow.

No games: 91/90 No vids: 0/90 Early to bed: 0/7 Productive Hours: 0/8:00 Bedtime last night: 5am Woke up: 11:30am Waste of a day. Vids weren't so much of a problem (though I did watch some stuff), but I actually had a problem with reading a book. Like I mentioned way back when I first joined this forum, if I don't game I watch vids and if I don't watch vids, I read books. I recently got a new book on my Kindle, it was super addictive and SUPER long (I think over 15 hours of reading total) and the worst part is that there are like 15 sequels or something. So the past few days have been full of my just reading this thing. It's finally done and I'm not getting the sequels because there's no way I'm doing 15x15 = 225 hours of reading. Thanks man. Yeah, it feels a bit anticlimactic for me. But I think part of it is that the only reason I didn't relapse is because I was like "I'm not going to ruin the 90 day detox when I'm less than a week away". So I held out just on that, but I'm pretty much decided on going back to gaming now that 90 days are over. BUT I do have enough willpower to set some ground rules. Going to only let myself do it if I finally get my 8 productive hours in and I have to stop by 10pm. If I fail at controlling myself and breaking those rules, I'll do a mini-detox of like 7 days and will keep increasing as necessary. The other part is that originally I was going to detox from games + vids together and reset my detox counter if I relapsed into either. And now I'm having trouble even starting the video detox. And the effect for the last several weeks has been the same: I'm getting almost nothing done. But yeah, no. I didn't know I could go cold turkey from games for a whole 90 days. That's pretty nuts and feels like a super long time. So there's definitely something to celebrate! Now to just get my life back on track...

No games: 90/90 No vids: 0/90 Early to bed: 0/7 Productive Hours: 2:30/8:00 Bedtime last night: 3am Woke up: 9:30am Meh. I had some things I had to do today that took away from my productive time, but I also wasted a lot. I'm feeling extremely lazy these past couple of weeks. I don't have the motivation to try very hard and I'm falling behind on my clients' projects. Writing out my goals felt like a chore. I want to achieve them in theory, but not in practice right now. Sigh. I really hate these phases, but I also don't know what to do about them. Oh, and I'm not drowning in vids, but I'm still watching them. And I still can't get myself to bed early. It's past 11pm, so that's another day gone, although if I can do it by midnight, I'll be a happy camper.

No games: 88/90 No vids: 1/90 Early to bed: 0/7 Productive Hours: 5:25/8:00 Bedtime last night: 2am Woke up: 9:30am Hey hey, today was a lot better! Didn't have a video problem (so far). Still have a bad problem with cravings to play games. It's particularly strong because I feel like once I clear day 90, I'm "allowed" to do so in moderation. In reality, I know that's not a good idea. Did a decent amount of work, but my studies have fallen by the wayside. But one thing at a time.

Hey man, I've lapsed a bit with posting on this website, noticed you haven't posted in a while. Everything OK? Do come back and post even if you're relapsed, it helps a lot just to get the words out on the page.

Game Detox 87/90 | Vids Detox 0/90 I'm in a pretty bad place right now. Still not gaming (but strong cravings), but I'm watching a lot of vids (I unsubscribed from all channels and removed history & search history on YT, no luck). I'm also going to bed super late. These two things are throwing off my entire days and I've been really behind on my work and responsibilities, let alone any of the other stuff I want to accomplish. I'm going to do two things: tomorrow I'll start my day off with writing out my short-term, medium-term, and long-term goals, and the steps I need to take to achieve all of those. I need to remind myself why I want to do these things. I'm not sure whether to tackle videos or bedtime first. Vids are what's making me go to bed late most of the time. But sleep is what's making me weak and enabling me to watch vids. It's a vicious circle. I'm going to try to start with sleep. Drop everything by 10pm. In bed by 11pm. If I keep this up for a week, I'll reward myself with a nice meal somewhere. That's the plan.

Game Detox 86/90 | Vids Detox 0/90 Still have a problem with vids. But my country's team is out of the WC now, so the tournament got less interesting ? I'm probably still going to watch some games, especially since the final is looking very interesting. No gaming yet and I'm almost done with the 90 days, but the cravings are there. It's a problem, because I'm craving to play football manager (hm, I wonder if watching all that football is causing that?), and that's one of those games that you could play forever and can take over my life (where I'm thinking about it even when not playing). Overall, as much as I love the world cup, I think I shouldn't watch it next time around. It's the reason I wrecked my video abstinence and it's the reason I have gaming cravings again. Thankfully, this kind of thing happens once every four years, so I'm not at risk of getting sucked in forever. But I can't do it again. Anyway. Still struggling, I've been essentially working part-time as of late and my studies aren't really happening. I have to step it up and get back on track, but it hasn't really happened yet.

Game Detox Days 69-78/90 | Vids Detox Day 0 Hey guys, sorry for disappearing. I haven't been super-relapsed. Just really busy and I kinda fell off my habit of posting here. I'm struggling a bit with my new schedule. My wife and I go downtown 5 days a week for her classes at a center there. I stick around, but the whole transit time + hanging out with people there + being tired when coming home has taken a severe toll on my productivity. I'm really behind on my work, let alone anything else I want to do like my studies or working on my business. The other problem has been videos. I'm still watching a bunch - not full relapse style, but enough to waste a lot of time. @JustTom, I think I'll take your advice and will unsubscribe from all my subscriptions (not that many anyway), remove all my browsing/search history, and stop supporting channels on Patreon (they haven't been producing content I enjoy for a long while anyway). Another big video problem is the World Cup. Been watching more than I planned of that... but honestly, it's once every 4 years and it's so much fun and it'll over soon enough. I don't watch every game or anything like that, but there are enough interesting matches to take a chunk out of my work time. I'm going to re-dedicate myself (yet again) to no vids, except World Cup matches that are interesting + highlights. That's it. Starting a counter up top to make it more official. Also sorry to y'all for not keeping up with your journals. Will do my best to start checking in again. On the plus side, less than 2 weeks away from my 90 day gaming detox goal!

Days 67-68/90 | Video relapse Man, that trip screwed me up. I was so tired that I ended up watching a lot of vids. Then more the next day. Now I'm full-on video relapsed: I just binge-watched a whole season of a show on Netflix in one day. I've been sleeping like 2 hours a day. My wife thinks I'm heroically working to put bread on the table. I am getting the bare minimum of work done, but I could be doing a hell of a lot better. I hate myself when I'm like this. Such a waste of time and opportunity. I'm re-resolving to quit vids tomorrow. I need to get rest and go to bed early tomorrow. Still haven't gamed though, so that's a good thing and why I'm keep the counter going.

Days 65-66/90 | Travel Alright, today was a write off. I couldn't wake up for ages (recovering from the trip) and was sleepy and unproductive most of the day. And now it's super late because I was trying to finish up some urgent work. Hopefully tomorrow will be a better day in that sense now that I've gotten some rest. Goal is to wake up before noon. Also, our clocks moved forward today, so my short-term bedtime goal is now midnight. Just making sure you guys don't think I decided to slack off :)

I love that app, used it before too. I could never stay consistent with the pomodorro timer, unfortunately. But it's a great tool and if you're using it, great! Outdoor activities are the best. I do gardening on the roof and it helps me a lot to be out in the sun and enjoying the fresh air instead of being cooped up inside next to a computer screen.

This is brilliant man. It seems like you're really drilling down to your core problems. You seem to have real clarity on what's causing you to struggle. You may have known it all along somewhere deep down, but now you're looking at it analytically and problem-solving. Compare it to where you were before you started this detox and journal. It's a huge step forward, isn't it?

I'm glad the blocker is helping. It's a good crutch to use at the beginning. It's also a good opportunity to practice mindfulness and let the feeling pass instead of letting it over-power you. I've found with myself that if I use an external preventor, I don't actually change in my dependence on games and will just channel that dependence onto something else. But external tools can be a great tool to get you out of the woods and started on your detox. So good luck!

Days 65-66/90 | Travel I had to do some necessary travel to renew my visa, so the past two days have been a write-off mostly. Also I'm really tired, but I'm hoping I can bounce back tomorrow. Let's see how that goes. I'm totally back into vids now, but I'm really not feeling like renewing my addiction. The problem is the World Cup. I'm not a sports guy and I don't watch sports, but I love the WC and I've been watching commentary/predictions/highlights videos non-stop. So, a new resolution: I will once again stop watching all videos unless they are: - My home country's WC game. They are super highly unlikely to go past the first knockout round, so I'm looking at 5 games in total, tops. - Highlights of other WC games - Semi-final and finals of WC. - Educational videos I intended to watch (I've been bad about watching educational videos in my areas of interest, but without pre-meditation) This bad includes Facebook videos, as well as bringing my phone to the bathroom, even if I'm having trouble going. Ok, so that's #1. #2 is I need to re-new my early sleep habit. The latest reasonable time I can wake up for prayer is 4:45am. Optimally, I want to get 8 hours of sleep in one go. 7 would be second-best. That means going to bed at 8:45pm, or at least 9:45. That's tough, so I'm going to give myself a break and say 11 to start with. I need to be in bed with lights out by 11. That means I need to drop everything by 10pm and I can't have dinner any later than 9pm. If I can maintain my 11pm habit for a week, I'll move to 10:30 and so on. The sunrise time will be getting later and later now, so I won't actually need to be sleeping at 8:45 to get my 8 hours. #3 is my plan for my religious studies now that Ramadan is over. I realized I need to complete these thing ASAP. So I'm going to try to maintain the 2:15 hours I've been putting in Ramadan. Right now I'm doing 45 minutes of Qur'an review, 45 minutes of jurisprudence, and 45 minutes of spirituality. I should be done with Qur'an review soon, at which point I can allow for just 20 minutes a day to maintain my memorization. That will give me 65 minutes to study spirituality, which I should be able to finish in a month or so. Once it's done, I can focus on the biggest subject, which is jurisprudence, for 110 minutes a day. It'll still take me a long time to finish thing, but it'll be coming along a lot faster. Finally, #4 is I need to put in 5 hours of work a day, meaning 35 hours a week. If I don't have work, I can always look for more clients. That, together with studies and personal tasks and working on my business, should amount to 8 hours/day. It's totally doable, but I haven't been able to accomplish this as a steady practice in the past. I need to identfy the problem and start with that. My wife is starting a course at a center across town. I'll be coming with her and will look for a cafe with good wifi to use for my work and studies until she's done. This sounds like a good opportunity to see if getting out of the house would be a good practice for me to get my productivity up. Alright... that's all for now :) Let's see how this works out!

Hey Mohammed, Read this after seeing your journal. I know how you feel (ish). I'm married and I found that gaming was destroying my amazing marriage. I'm always the meanest to my wife when she's preventing me from gaming. I'm 2/3 of the way through my 90 day detox and it's already made a huge difference, so stick with it!

Oh man that's tough. I'm sorry to hear that mate :(

Hey/Salaam Mohammed Happy to have you here! Will follow along. I've tried quitting games for 10 years straight. Aside from a good stint of a year or so, this forum and posting regular updates has been the best abstinence I've done from games. So it's really worth your time to invest in posting here.