BooksandTrees

I'm not going to relapse, but I really miss how often I could talk to people on video games. I feel like so many of my friends are such a giant let down. I'm usually good about this, but I dislike how little people care about others. My friends still rarely contact me first and it's usually some crap. I just feel so empty most of the time. My mom wants to help other people instead of me because of how confident I am. I don't display being pathetic so she just leaves me to my own devices and just helps others or talks to others. My dad wants to talk to me, but I'm not ready for that. My friends just talk if there's a purpose for it. I miss people just talking to talk. I really hate being lonely and want some social involvement. I spoke about this and encourage others, but usually like 5 times a year I get very let down by how much effort I have to put in to socialize with others in order to get something in return. I'm usually comfortable doing this and can get people together, but if I don't do it my friends are mutes and don't start anything. Most of the people I've met in the past 10 years fit into one of these categories: introverts who don't like to socialize or plan anything, people who used to plan things but now just hang out with their significant other and I won't see them until they break up, are just fake friends and weren't interested in being my friend anyways, or just there because they're obligated like most of my family. Not everyone fits these categories, but many do, and it's disappointing. I think they view friendship as a convenience thing. "He's within 30 minutes of me so I'll schedule a hang out where we can each drive 15 minutes" or "he has a girlfriend also, we can do a double date instead of a 3rd wheel thing because my significant other feels awkward and I'm too pathetic to hang out alone with my friends now that I'm in a relationship". It's just annoying. People want to hear I'm doing well so they can get instant gratification and move on to their problems or move forward. I think people today view their friends like Instagram feeds. They like good posts and scroll down, then scroll past bad posts, then try to post themselves. And before anyone gives advice, I don't really want it. I apologize. I know I can join Meetup groups, I know how to meet people, I know how to join clubs, and I know I go to bed in 2 hours and I'll see my friends tomorrow for rock climbing and I have a bachelor party this weekend. I get that. But I just miss talking to someone at night. I miss calling a friend or talking online to friends at night after work to unwind and not have to go to some shit bar. I'm a little tired of it.

This turtle is beautiful. I actually really love that. How did you make that? Also, have you considered creating or joining an art group? I mention this because video games are keystone lifestyles that replace or fill the needs of humans. We crave things such as Creativity, Variety, Growth, Love and Connection, Contribution, and Significance or Purpose in life. Have you broken down these ideas to see what you are missing and see if video games are fueling that? I wrote this blog piece that I'll post soon. It's based off of Tony Robbins' idea that there are 6 fundamental needs every human requires to live:

I'll check it out now, the funk soul brother.

I don't know what to say because i've never faced the decision you've made to train yourself to be in a gaming environment but not suffer addiction. It kind of reminds me of just gaming in moderation and forcing it to work, but I don't know. I don't know if it's a good idea but it is not me deciding. I know I couldn't do it because in my heart I know it's right that I quit gaming. Just be fair to yourself and make sure you're doing the right thing. I'm not a fan of it, but I wish you luck.

Also, I apologize for spamming people if they get notifications for my posts. That is not my intention. I just have a lot on my mind recently and hope I'm not disturbing anyone. Anyhow, I also wanted to point out that I'm starting to lean away from stand up comedy ideas. Although I really want to perform and have had success with comedy, most of my stand up comedy is either self deprecating or stemmed by anger and in a rant form. I don't think it's healthy to seek attention through anger and hatred either directed towards my self or others. Writing my cartoon has opened my eyes to situational humor, which I've always been amazing at, and I'm starting to enjoy it more. I have a talent for completely taking apart a situation and hurting people's feelings in a funny way. I did this because it was the only way for me to survive abusive situations as a child. I just don't like it anymore. I hate hurting people's feelings and I don't want to be the center of my own hatred anymore. Maybe improv comedy for situational humor is what I'm actually looking for, but I'll have to think about it. This is tough because I really want to make funny videos on YouTube, but they're all centered around anger. I want to make videos where I make fun of these fake people trying to be social media influencers and take advantage of others for money. I'd be great as tearing them down and making myself look good in the process, but what's the point? I don't want to be known as the rant guy anymore. I don't like being angry all of the time and I don't want to target other people for attention. This is something I'll think about for a while, but we'll see what happens. Maybe there is a more creative outlet for my comedy that I can still post on YouTube aside from my cartoon and book ideas. Or maybe I'll just give in and do these things for attention. Idk. I don't really want to though.

I don't think it's worth being a sports fan anymore. I'm tired of investing hours into something and being so passionately dedicated to something out of my control. When you lose it's just debilitating.

It is ok. I am going to write a list of cues that lead me to watching porn and just be mindful of them: Becoming tired Feeling a dopamine rush of any sort to do something such as writing, go out, see friends, do a hobby This includes waking up in the morning and feeling the desire to do something. Porn is that fake thing that makes the day worth while, but is a lie Being stressed out with being afraid to start a project or assignment, but wanting to feel accomplishment Dating Reading Anxiety attacks regarding my stomach condition, dying, being afraid, or nerves Seeing a picture or video of any woman on the internet (I apologize if this offends anyone, but my mind is trained to be aroused by women on screens right now. This will change) Feeling depressed about my self esteem, low worth, and wanting to love myself Being very hungry There might be more, but I can't think of them right now. I think just noticing cues, recognizing what triggers a relapse, and being mindful of it will help me fix my environment to avoid it. I am keeping all internet products out of my room, using an old alarm clock, and eating food when hungry or just sleeping when I'm tired.

Welcome back

I've been making a weekly schedule and it has been helping a lot. Last week was my most productive week in months.

How are you doing?

Is there another activity that can help you relieve stress and get rid of restlessness? Or is there a way to look at the gym as I'm doing with just the expectation and appreciation for movement instead of goal setting? Yoga perhaps? It can change your environment and be physical, social, and mental boosts.

What are the negative emotions making you feel? I found that studying the 6 things humans need in life that we sometimes cater to vices that supplant them. I wrote this piece for a blog I want to write. Maybe it can help you understand the negative emotions and where they might be stemming from:

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I appreciate it. I have a lot of projects I want to work on and I just feel another job will hurt me. I find that when I'm working on these projects I feel better about myself and feel busy. I think if I replace porn with meaningful interactions with people and self love, then I will be successful. I haven't craved video games since October. I see friends now instead and talk a lot. I now need to figure out why I watch porn and replace it. I watch porn for self esteem, self love, interaction with women (mental), flirting (mental), sex (mental), and feeling like a man. Feeling powerful, confident, and worthwhile. The adrenaline rush of exertion etc. I think the gym, yoga, and talking to some women I find appealing will be helpful here. There are two women I'm interested in and knowing how outgoing and flirtatious I am I know I'll continue to meet them at the gym, hobbies, cookouts, etc. I'm just going to build confidence off of the gym and hobbies and socializing, while building willpower through meditation, a reliable schedule, and confidence with the hobbies. I have a feeling I'll return to engineering in September, but if I do then I'll have 3 websites built, confidence in uploading YouTube videos full time, confidence writing my cartoon, confidence writing a book, and a set mentality for exercising for stress release instead of being a pro body builder. I expect too much perfection of myself and treat too many things like jobs. You're right. It's only 2 weeks in. I am fine. When I go back to work I'll treat people like coworkers, not friends, and just look towards my friends for friendship and not my coworkers. That's not real. I also want to build willpower to ignore these people who suck the life from me. I talk to these people at work who just won't shut the fuck up about their lives and then they don't care about mine. It's irritating. I'm going to try and sleep at a normal time tonight to start my new routine for sleep. Matt

I feel like such a failure. I'm watching porn a lot and I'm constantly battling with the regret of quitting my job. I am having trouble just following the path. I was feeling better about what has been happening in my life, but I watched porn 6 times in the past 2 days. I also watch before bed each night. This keeps me awake an extra 3 hours each night and it's affecting my mood. I already chose this decision, I already chose that I would create my websites, make youtube videos, write my cartoon, perform stand up comedy again, and learn to treat myself better by following routines because I know routines provide certainty in my life that I rely on for stability. I'm not doing this and I'm looking for people to explode on so I get into arguments with my mom and people online and don't want to help others because I just want help for something I already figured out. Porn and chronic masturbation are killing me and making me upset. I am struggling so much with this. I was able to quit video games because I started being more social with real friends. I played video games because I was lonely. I watch porn because I want some intimacy with a woman and to feel comfortable with her. Unfortunately, I live with my mom and it's gonna be awkward. Also, this fallacy that having sex will improve my life is just that - a fallacy. Having one night stands is just a more realistic form of masturbation. They last one night, like masturbation, and don't fulfill what I really want. I want a partner I can trust and build a life with. I want to share hobbies, days, and experiences together. Porn and masturbation do not bring this to me and neither will one night stands. I need to get it through my skull that if I stop watching porn and chronically masturbating that I will be able to discover things about myself that will help me enjoy life more. I'll be able to see things in a woman past her looks. I am only attracted to women who look like porn stars right now and that's not real. Porn isn't real - it's a fucking sickness. All of the scenarios are fake, never happened, and are honestly sickening. I want to quit these things because I'm brainwashing myself from seeing the true value of a woman and her companionship. I am being unfair to myself and every woman in the world because my mind is always in the gutter and I'm creating this delusion about life, women, love, and happiness. I have these few months now to focus on my hobbies, which I am. I have 3 websites bought and I'm creating them. I wrote a lot of my cartoon already, and I have several ideas for the books, YouTube videos, and stand up comedy I want to do. I just need to do it. I am setting myself up for failure by watching porn at night, then getting urethral burning for an hour after finishing because I am too aggressive when I masturbate and masturbate too much. I go into bed at 11, look for the perfect porn video for over an hour until midnight or later, watch for like 10 minutes, angrily close all of my porn tabs and feel like a failure, try to go to bed, wake up and feel pain for an hour when I urinate, try to calm down, then I get angry at myself for another 2 hours because I didn't want to watch porn in the first place. Now it's like 3 AM and I realize I need to wake up in the morning and can't sleep. I zone out until 4 Am and wake up at 8 AM for work or now since I quit, I wake up at noon. Porn has really hampered my life and created imbalance. I'm at the phase where even masturbation without porn is bad. If I keep this up I'll start to get a bad feeling about sex and never find that intimacy with a woman regardless of how much healing I go through. I need to take this stand. I need to do it. I'm sorry for not commenting on other people's pages, but I just have nothing to offer at this stage other than my honesty about my own predicament. I'm 32 weeks free of gaming and proud of that, but I'm only able to go 5 days without porn and then I watch it 5-10 times in one day and go on benders. I've never faced anything so difficult in my life.

I had a really busy day with my artist. We revised our character drawings, background drawings, and created a list of things to do for artwork regarding character rigs, background creation, camera angles, etc. We also read the script, made several good revisions, and set up a schedule for that as well. I feel very happy about that. I feel that as I come home tonight I want to continue doing more productive things. I think I'm mixing up "being hard on myself" and "wanting to do something productive". I'm pretty tired since we worked together for 9 hours and we drove a total of 2 hours. It's kind of like a normal work day. I just find that I have more energy right now to work on something fun and I shouldn't feel bad about that. I want to learn some animation techniques for future projects because I enjoy doing it. Maybe this is encouraging me to keep living life outside of work and that being creative on projects doesn't mean I'm "working". I'm just "creating" and sometimes it takes thought. Not all nights will be like this. I might want to read or something as well.

I wanted to add that I'm trying to settle down my racing thoughts. I still panic about quitting my job, insurance, and steady paycheck. I'm treating this as a mental therapy break. If I somehow find myself making money with my hobbies then I'll be happy. If not, I'll be happy with the fact that I've taken months of time developing skills to spend my time doing after work. Over the next few months I'll be learning to animate, video edit, write, exercise, perform comedy, produce a website, write books, write scripts, and live life a bit more fearlessly because of willpower and confidence boosts. I'm hoping this experience humbles me and helps me stop worrying about others and only worry about myself instead. I want to feel comfortable knowing that I can do productive activities outside of work and I can learn new things. It took me over 2 years to transfer that script into a proper program because I was scared. Instead, I spent 8 hours doing it today and really enjoyed it. If not, I might try taking CBD oil in a few months to calm my anxiety and just keep going. I do want to own my own house one day and I will always regret not buying that house. I'm just using the experience as a reminder that I can buy a house one day and when I appreciate life more I'll be ready to stick it out and buy an even better house.

Today was productive as well. I got really frustrated this morning because I had no willpower. I got sad and wanted to just give up and go back to work, but I ate breakfast, took a shower, shaved and looked good. Then I contacted a gym to figure out if I want to go there. I then panicked again. I panicked because there's so much I want to do and feel lost sometimes. But I remember I wrote out a structured outline for every project I wanted to work on, so I looked at all of my projects and decided I wanted to work on the cartoon today since I wrote a blog post yesterday. I spent 8 hours writing today and finished my first script of the cartoon. I thoroughly enjoyed the writing process and feel very good about it. I'm meeting with my artist tomorrow and feel like we're on a roll now. I got a dopamine rush getting excited to write my cartoon script, but my body was confusing that for the dopamine rush for watching porn. I did not watch porn. I stretched, changed my environment, and relaxed. I then went and wrote. Matt

You can message cam and he can message a moderator to delete the thread.

I've been really wanting to perform comedy. I managed to do an open mic 4 weeks ago and got a standing ovation with great success. I've just been a little nervous to go back again. I love the attention and making people laugh, but I was shaking so much. I get so nervous before going on stage.

I took the time today to write a 3,500 word article about addiction and habits. I wrote a lot about willpower and the fundamentals of life. It was a great process for me and it took over 6 hours to do. I would like to post it on the website I'm creating, but I'm worried that a lot of it is material from other professionals and I'll just be taken as some hack. I just really like to take notes from the books and articles I've read and the videos I've watched regarding addiction, willpower, and habits. I think I'll post it and I'll link it here. Hopefully it helps people. I'm going to be creating a blog for self improvement and comedy once I get things straightened out. I was happy I wrote the article today because I woke up 5 hours later than I normally would due to anger and frustration. I decided to slow those down and just focus on the good things.

I wanted to point out that relapse isn't a relapse unless you binge it. I'm taking the approach that if you sleep 8 hours a night for 3 weeks, but one of the nights you sleep for 3 hours, you won't be effected by it in all facets of your life. If you get 3 hours of sleep per night for most of those 3 weeks, then you will be delirious, fatigued, sick, etc. and your life will be in a worse spot. Take this time to reflect on bigger goals such as the reasons you've quit and don't crush yourself in moments like this. Reflect on your journey so far and use failure as sparks to push forward because that greater thinking will lead your path.

Great response. Thank you. It's kind of strange that I started thinking about this after watching the movie No Country for Old Men and seeing the monologue at the end. I get frustrated because I'm depressed and just finished school and can't understand the feeling of raising a kid and bringing them back to school after I got out. I'm nowhere close ti having a kid obviously and it would be 5 years after birth that they'd be in school, but it's time. I think maybe it's depression talking since I'm not really happy or experiencing love yet.

I feel such an emotional disconnect with myself as if I've lost who I am or if I was ever anything in the first place. Straight lines go straight when curved lines meander. I guess it just means every line has a direction and the purpose for that line just happens to be cause and effect - or maybe just momentum. I look back at the path and try to put together the pieces that caused momentum and helped further the path. But I also look away and laugh at a YouTube video where somebody uses a soundboard to disrupt and harass Ventrilo voice chat rooms. I'm grabbing for sentimental pieces to put in my pockets when the pants I'm wearing don't necessarily have pockets and the place I'm going might not even require me to need pants in the first place. I'm trying to understand what makes people decide to have children. What is their goal for the children and their involvement with that person's life? Biologically, we are meant to reproduce often to keep our species alive, much like other animals and organisms. I ask this because I took the path to becoming an engineer and established professional. I went to school until I was 27 and finished my masters while working full time. I now had the ability to finally date and live life. But I'm filled with wonder about what happiness and love are and if I truly understand it. I remember loving my mom and the world. I remember being obsessed with building, action figures, hockey, and creating things. I've always had deep thoughts in my mind and wanted to create things after deeply thinking for hours. Is that normal to critically think and fantasize for hours? Did any of you pace back and forth or find moments of bliss and clarity when the night covered the world and we were alone in quiet with the stars above us. What could we create and what will we get once we are there? I hold onto thoughts of happiness when I'd play kickball at school and come home to watch Dragonball Z and then Ed, Edd, n Eddy. They had friends and I didn't once school ended. I was alone and didn't spend time with any of the friends I'd made. I lost all of those friends once high school ended. I kept all of my friends on RuneScape added on my friends list past the point where they'd quit. I held my online friends so dear to my heart and they didn't feel the same way for me. I still remember all of the names of my RuneScape friends dating back to 2004 because they were all my only friends and the most important things in my world. I used to pace around my home for hours daydreaming about being the 4th Ed in the show Ed, Edd, n Eddy and try to come up with scams and shows to be in. I used to pretend I was a character on Dragonball Z and gain power levels to help fight enemies. When I got too powerful and numbers meant nothing, I restarted the daydream and would repeat this for hours. Video games let me talk to anyone I wanted at any time of the day. I am lonely. Humans are lonely. I want people around me at all times. I want friends all of the time. I want to lead my troops on missions for things that don't involve killing or conquest. I just want to lead my troops to the store and get groceries for a barbecue on top of a mountain that we need helicopters to reach while escaping from nothing. I want to lead my friends to college at a massive complex university built for several thousand students and stay there forever as I do fun activities and see things that give me purpose. These are the dreams I have ever night. They make no sense. I lead my group of 2-10 people on beautiful missions in outlandish settings for a prize of insignificance and meaninglessness, but I was with them, the scenery was beautiful, and we enjoyed the journey. I spend so much time being angry at the facility I'm in and blame the people in my life for the anger I feel when I just don't seem to see the mystery, adventure, and intrigue that life seems to give me in my reminiscent dreams of things I've never experienced enough to reminisce about. It's like I live two lives: my real life and my unconscious dream life. I'm never happy or satisfied. I don't just do things for the feeling of it. I just chase goals and speed through the journey without smelling the roses. I don't think this is a mindfullness issue either where I focus on the food in my mouth to truly taste the steak instead of swallowing it for sustenance in order to do my next task because I won't be hungry anymore and can focus on the next thing. Or maybe it is. I rush the dinner, get angry about cooking the dinner, eat the dinner, and rush to work on something I'm frustrated with because my dreams are to see the end product and I get angry at the steps along the way. I hold onto the memories of me as a kid watching TV but look back at how long ago those memories actually were. It's because I don't relax and see it when it's there. I don't taste the food or enjoy the journey. I'm treating my life like a Netflix show, binge watching it to get to the end like a lifeless zombie instead of appreciating the characters in each episode regardless of whether they're going to be in the next one or not. I ignore the settings the show takes place in instead of noticing it. The line I chose meanders because the ball rolls up and down embankments and takes the path of least resistance. I think it's important for me to experience the ball rolling instead of understanding the importance of the structure of the path and why it shaped the direction when the path is still being made and can is held by a universe we know so little about. If you reached the end of this long post I would surmise that my point is I think too much and don't experience the journey. Time for a deep breath and some mindfullness. Matt

I just talked with my friend for 4 hours this morning and she said pretty much the same thing. A lot of this is me pointing blame onto others due to faults within myself and it's tough to face them. I'll keep running from my problems and my life if I don't stop and face them. I need to keep going. I agree. I'm right here. This is the burning hand, it's right in front of me. I can use water to make it worse or use vinegar to neutralize the burn. All of this hate is coming from within and it's so difficult to love myself when I've hated myself for my whole life. It's time to change that and I want to face these issues so I can move on and create these things that I want to create without being paralyzed.