NEW VIDEO: Why You MUST Quit Gaming in 2025
BooksandTrees
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Posts posted by BooksandTrees
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One of the hardest things to do in life is to stop thinking and just do what you want. I struggle with this sometimes along with billions of others. It's something where we want to do something, think of it, think of why not to do it, and just agonize. Anxiety looms over us like a shadow on an almost sunny day. We just gotta stay strong and let ourselves know it is ok to try something. What are your goals for speech and posture? I'm currently doing that. I also track my calories on myfitnesspal and read at night. I've lost 15 lbs in the past 1.5 months as well. What are your goals with weight if you don't mind me asking? If not, don't worry about it.
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Also, I finally listened to Bohemian Rhapsody today. I didn't listen to it because these people in high school used to sing it all the time and it pissed me off. But I really love the power of the song and how it makes you feel like you're escaping this prison and unleashing yourself. When Freddie Mercury screams "OOOHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH BABY!!!" I just feel invincible.
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Today started off terrible and got worse by the hour. Different events at work kept cascading on top of me as I tried to maintain sanity, composure, and reason. I got blindingly angry and had to step aside multiple times to walk, take deep breaths, and calm down. I wanted to badly to go into my car and scream and punch the passenger seat, but I did not. I just walked and took deep breaths until it was right for me to talk things out and move forward.
No matter what happens in life, there will be people who try to hurt you and bring you down. Your best option is to defend yourself and move on. You'll learn who is pathetic and who is not pathetic. You don't have to associate yourself with pathetic people and you damn well better be sure you're not pathetic.
I'm 12 days free of gaming and I'm years free of torture. I can do anything and will always have my back. Let's fucking go!
Matt
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22 hours ago, fawn_xoxo said:
During my past attempts I spent a lot of time self loathing, blaming myself, hating myself for who I was, how I was. First of all, it doesn't help. Secondly, I wanna share with you that whichever emotional state you are in, I know that it's difficult to break free from it, that's why I too would linger in this state for hours or days and what it would do to me is I would end up thinking I can't do it, that I'm doomed, that I'm depressed etc. Recently I found out about how a change of emotional state is necessary to move on, and usually we look for this in other people, when we share our feelings with them we're subconsciously seeking that, for them to tell us something that will make us feel another way so that we can break free from how we feel at this time. If you look into it you'll find that what really happens is emotions change, or can change, really rapidly. Just like you can suddenly laugh with a joke or cry if you get hurt, emotions just come and go unless we choose to pay them all this attention. Acceptance of an emotion and agreement with it are also different things. You can accept that you felt bad in that moment, without agreeing that it's right and fair to yourself to feel bad. What helped me in this was recognizing how humans work in a chain of reactions. There's an event, then there's thoughts we produce because of it. Then based on each person's unique thoughts, they feel an emotion. And then based on that emotion they react to the event a certain way. We can't control our emotions, but what can we control? How we think about the event.
I had the exact same problem myself, I couldn't let it go, I kept blaming myself and couldn't forgive and at one point someone from my family told me that it was my ego. And I was like what? How is this ego? And they told me well, you wanna think of yourself so high and mighty that you can't even make a mistake? I considered it. And I've had ego issues a lot of times in my life, didn't expect ego to mess with this too, but I think it is true. So what did I do? I accepted the following words like I would accept them for someone else. No, I'm not perfect and I'm not that amazing yet. I make mistakes, I'm human, I can do better if I try harder, but in order to do so I have to have me as an ally and to do that I have to love myself. If I love myself, I forgive myself and try again. What also helped me with this was reading the book the six pillars of self esteem.
I agree, but it's so hard for me to change these thoughts from my emotions. I keep trying to tell my therapist I might be bipolar or something, but he says everyone deals with these emotional spiderwebs where we can't escape our emotions and thoughts. The more we struggle, the more we just get wound up in this web of frustration. It's about calming down and changing the way we think about it. Plus, I don't get into a manic state during these episodes. I remain full control of my psyche and that's why I am fine apparently.
One of my thoughts was that we go into a fight or flight mode. So when something frustrating happens it is easy to just think of ways to escape or quit your job, etc. These aren't reasonable solutions to just logically solving them or moving on. I don't know if anyone is the master of these emotions because people are terrible and always find a way to unhinge your calmness.
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Today was good. I met up with an old friend and connected with her for a few hours. It was nice since we haven't seen each other in years. I really look forward to things like this because it makes me feel a lot better in general. I had a good day today, but had a very depressing end to the day where I started to beat myself up for wasting time and not being as good of a worker as I thought I'd be during the day. I let myself down, so I'm gonna work hard tomorrow to make up for it and finish strong.
I'm 10 days clear of gaming and starting to get my mind back. I'm making lots of plans to see friends, but I'd like to do better with controlling my emotions and not being so hard on myself. I have gotten better than I once was, but I'm still a disaster. I make a mistake and start to crush myself and swear at myself to the point where I want to cry. Instead of being sad, I get angry to hide the sadness and get into a bad mood. I'm trying, but it is so difficult to forgive myself and move on.
My goals this week are to continue seeing friends and get into a good spot and then slowly get back into my podcast and cartoon if possible.
Matt
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I've been 9 days clean of gaming. I'm having a difficult time trying to pursue my creative hobbies due to being tired after work. I have also been spending time with friends and family outside of work. This has been important to me. I'm making connections with people who want to live life, be happy, work hard, and do different things. It's made me really enjoy life more and have a more positive outlook.
I think this means I'm doing the right thing and I'll pick up these hobbies when I feel it's right. I believe this is correct and will keep pursuing it. Short post, but I am tired. I had a great day since my coworkers took me out for dinner and drinks. We're going to a sporting event later this week together as well. I'm just very pleased with people right now.
Matt
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Good job today. Try not to take on too much at once. I noticed as gamers we are very efficient minded people who try to do all kinds of tasks at once. It's overwhelming and difficult to maintain this.
A few suggestions I had aside from taking on too much is to try and not game during the day. Your mind will need to have a break from gaming to heal itself. You can remove a lot of fogginess and irritability from not gaming. The first couple of days are the hardest because you'll crave dopamine rushes. It's important to not binge watch shows, youtube, twitch, talk about gaming, or play games during this phase. Just know that it's ok to be bored sometimes. It's ok to sit there and relax at night. This is the time to clear your mind, do yoga, meditate, read, or focus on drawing, etc.
I also wanted to suggest not snoozing. If you wake up in the morning, get out of bed immediately and start your day. I noticed that if I snooze during the mornings it gives me a grogginess effect of heavy head and lethargic thinking. It made me feel depressed when I wasn't, but that made me get depressed. It's confusing, but that happens. This also helps get a good routine where you can get control in your life to exercise more, work on hobbies, meet people, and find yourself.
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Hi Fawn,
I'd like to say welcome to our forum. You took the right step toward healing and becoming the person you were meant to be by recognizing this as a problem in your life. I would like to recommend my story to you here: My Gaming Addiction Story
I had a very similar issue you have where I gamed endlessly into the morning hours and then would sit in bed and have an anxiety attack. I was so malnourished after gaming. I wouldn't eat, drink, or sleep. I just hated my life and myself so much. But I realized I actually didn't hate myself that much and that I loved myself. It's a very important thing to recognize. If you are here to help yourself it is because you do love yourself.
Quitting gaming will help you appreciate life more and gain gratification for hobbies and activities you do.
Let me know if you need help at all. Otherwise I'll keep reading your story and daily journal if you keep one (you should). We have a good community here.
Matt
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24 minutes ago, Niko_Buccellati said:
"Every great journey begins with a step" I also read your story and I got a vibe that you got quite good organizational skills.
That's great. We just gotta keep moving forward and recognize the things we desire most in life. I just was giving up too easily all the time. Thanks for reading my story. I hope it helps you and others move forward with their addiction recovery and achieving their goals.
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Thank you! I was really proud of the whole thing and just felt like I can expand my life a lot more now. It was a huge moment for me and I'm gonna work to figure out how to improve each time.
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Pride
Today was my 6th day without gaming and I decided to push my comfort zone very far. I went to a night club by myself in a city I never go to. To say I am proud of myself is such an understatement. I have wanted to go to a club and dance with people for years. I dreamed of it. None of my friends want to go to clubs and I was so afraid to go alone, but I did it. I found a meetup group and just went. I was so nervous all last night and today that I had a severe anxiety attack and just started swearing at myself all day and night. I called my mom and my friends and they told me I had nothing to fear or worry about. Dancing with people and grabbing a drink isn't hard. Overcoming an abusive life, neglect, almost failing out of college and turning out to be in the top 5 students of engineering, getting a great job twice by myself, and becoming a leader in everything I do is harder than that.
Today was a victory for me and I'm beaming from ear to ear.
Thanks to everyone for believing in me and I'm gonna keep going.
Matt
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I'm 5 days without gaming right now. I had another night where I read my book. I'm currently reading "Going Bovine" by Libba Bray. The first few pages were terrible, but I actually enjoy the story now. I'm about 60 pages in and hooked. I had a great day at work getting a lot done. I went out for lunch with some great people and then went out for a birthday dinner with other coworkers after. It was really nice spending time with them and it's just a great community.
Tonight I'm going to relax, read, and go to bed early. I'd like to go to the gym tomorrow morning. I didn't do yoga tonight because of the birthday party, but it is ok. I still stretched a lot today and stood at my standing desk at work to help my posture. I really enjoy it.
Matt
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Today is my 4th day without gaming. I woke up early today and got a great start to my morning. I also finished a large submittal at work. This allowed me to move to another project that I was not originally assigned to work on, but it allows me to help my coworkers who need help to reach another deadline next week. I had more fun with coworkers today and came home feeling accomplished, but tired.
Instead of taking a nap I set in phase another thing I wanted to do, which was practice Yoga for 30 minutes when I get home. I wanted to do this because my mind needs a break from staring at the computer all day. I don't want to come home and look directly at a computer again. I took 2 hours to clean my room, do laundry, and practice to gain peace of mind, exercise, and feel good.
Now I am ready to go out for that dinner and then relax and be ready for tomorrow. The next thing I'd like to get in action for my daily routines is going to the gym in the mornings, but one thing at a time. I'm really happy I got my yoga in today and want to continue doing this after work. I don't really enjoy being online all day.
Matt
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This is very true. I think I just see how much effort the end goal is going to take and don't want to do it. There are times when I come home from work and am just so tired I can't possibly work on something new. That's why it is so easy to fall into old gaming habits. I really like that mentality of practice makes perfect, but practice what you preach, and preach love. I'd like to draw a bit soon. I really enjoyed my cartoon storyline and wrote almost 10 episodes. I got really let down by the animation and drawing aspect since i know nothing about it.
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Today is my 3rd day without gaming. It was a better day for me mentally. I'm really getting down on myself about not recording a podcast recently. I just fell behind and got upset. I did a full analytics portion on hockey teams who were playing above or below what their standings reflected. I made predictions of who would move up and down the standings and my predictions all came true, but I didn't publish the episode.
Moving on from this I can't beat myself up. Whenever I fail at something I just beat myself up and make myself feel terrible, which is what used to lead me to playing video games in my abusive environment previously. I'm going to take positives from this. I still have a following on social media and online, my predictions were correct, and I'm still getting asked where my episodes are. I'm going to come back strong this week and produce something fun for people to see and for me to feel better about.
Tonight I'm starting my reading again. I want to read for an hour or so before bed each night. I also had several more people at working telling me to do stand up comedy. I'm very close and just want to make plans with people to see a live show soon. Tonight I have more energy than I've had in a while. I feel my life coming back to me slowly. I feel like I can grab this energy now and work on my podcast a bit or another hobby. I'm also getting tired around 9 (right now). This is good for me.
I also have been watching 1 episode of a show each week. Sundays I watch Handmaid's tale, Tuesdays I watch The League, Wednesdays I watch This Is Us, and Thursdays I watch South Park. I am doing this because I remember how excited I'd get after school when I was younger to watch shows. Binge watching them is like playing video games and makes you get that dopamine rush. Also, I don't want any TV show recommendations. I don't really care what you like to watch to be honest and am sorry for sounding rude. I just get annoyed when I tell people I'm watching a show and they blurt "Oh My GoD hAve Y oU SeEn RiCk AnD mORtY??? WHaT a BoUT gAmE Of ThRoNeS?" Stop....I don't care...please just let me watch my shows.
Matt
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It's an interesting quote. I used to think the same thing, but when I began spending time with people in real life and acting like I did online, but in public, I really thrived. As you can tell I was not one of the cancerous gamers, but more of a kind leader who worked hard in game. Now I just do that in real life.
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Thanks man. I appreciate the support. I'm determined this time and think I have a lot to look forward to in the upcoming future. I always thought that first week was hardest.
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Today's been better for me. I'm starting to heal a bit. I've noticed and mentioned previously how my mind was craving video games or stimulus during every day situations because I had been playing video games passive aggressively. I'm starting to naturally tire out around 10 PM now instead of 2 or 4 AM. This is much better for me obviously. My thoughts are starting to come back and my fogginess is disappearing. I'm 2 days free of gaming.
For me, the fogginess and anxiety is always the toughest part of being a gamer. My short term memory is trash and I'm constantly under anxiety. I'm always worrying about something instead of relaxing and being confident in my abilities. I feel my natural drive to pursue hobbies slowly returning. I feel terrible because I started a podcast and I haven't produced one in a couple weeks. I was so depressed and addicted to games during that stretch that I didn't even want to consider producing content. I worry that I lost people, but it is ok. I'm going to come back strong when I am ready.
For now, I'm really looking forward to doing physical activities. One of these mornings I'll go to the gym and do my routines. Ideally, I'd like to wake up at 6 AM and work out for an hour, come home and shower, eat breakfast, work from 8 to 4:30, do yoga til 5:30 or 6, eat dinner, work on a hobby or relax/both, read for 30 mins to an hour and then sleep.
I will work on accomplishing this. I'd do it cold turkey, but I just wanted to decelerate my sleep schedule instead of rapidly changing it. I had been going to bed at 2 AM or 5 AM at times over the weekends. I think it made more sense to shave 1-2 hours off each night. Last night I fell asleep around 11:30 which is fine. I really value sleep and think that 8 hours is important.
I've taken steps to spend more time with friends. I have a group from work who is going to a hockey game with me next week. I'm looking forward to that so much. I really love spending time with them and hockey is my favorite thing in the world. I also arranged a dinner with my friend and his fiance (also my friend before the met), and have yoga scheduled for Wednesday and Friday. I'll be recording my podcast this Thursday and tomorrow night. I also am going to try to attend my first meetup group this weekend for a morning hike somewhere.
A funny video I watched today was this YouTube poop of Paula Deen:
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Thanks. I'm gonna check them out and see what's up. Think it will be fun regardless.
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We should surround ourselves with the dreams we envision. I'm gonna attend comedy shows just to get a feel for the atmosphere and maybe it will warm me up to the idea of performing. Do you attend smaller shows at small night clubs at all?
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Thanks for the update. I am guessing I am the friend? I'm glad to hear from you. I felt terrible when I missed your last progress update. Be careful with the job search. I would keep searching and try to maintain your position you currently have until that time unless you have a fall back option. Sounds like your knee is getting better?
I've been doing a lot better. I kind of hit a low point with the heavy work load this summer and started playing games more, but I had a realization moment and just kept pushing forward. I love myself and want to do better. It's funny, sleeping the first night without playing video games was impossible because I kept wanting to satisfy these passive urges in my mind to stay mentally stimulated and game.
Keep in touch.
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Lol like many of the other members of this forum, we share the same issues it seems. I'm glad we are not alone. I have no issues socializing once I'm in the middle of it all and in fact crave that rush of attention from people in the event. I thrive as the center of attention. For some reason this doesn't give me the confidence I need to actually continue doing it on another stage or level. I don't get it.
I had a weekend 2 weeks ago where I went hiking with friends, went out for food, went to a farmer's market, and then hung out with coworkers for a few hours after. It was the best day of the year for me. I really felt alive, wanted, and happy. It's something that I never feel with gaming. I just try to remember that time to give me motivation.
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I work as an engineer 40-50 hours per week and my gaming habits never impact my work life. I just feel like a wonderful person at work who is accomplishing great things, working with my great coworkers, and having the ability to be confident, talkative, happy, and social there.
It's just when I get home I kind of get depressed. I feel lonely and that any hobby I try is daunting and terrible. My life isn't terrible anymore, but I just find that I lack that drive to commit to being more social, meeting better friends who love life instead of just play video games and stuff. I'm impacted by my atmosphere I think.
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I relapsed for the past month and a half. Most people on this website only make it a few days before going back, so be proud of yourself for making any improvements. Keep a daily journal and I'll try to find it. I keep one in there as well that I just started again.
Fawn_xoxo daily; thoughts, goals & evaluation
in Daily Journals
Posted
You're doing great. I am very proud of you for speaking with your family about it. Recognize that this phase of the healing process is going to unfold many revelations for you. You're going to start researching all of these things that can hinder your growth as a human in your eyes. Losing weight takes a lot of time and commitment. I have lost 15 lbs from eating 5 meals a day about 200-250 calories each. Dieting is different for each person because our bodies react differently. Recently, I've been enjoying these meals and the meal preparation has helped me play fewer video games and be more responsible with how I eat.
I'm also working on my posture. I got a standing desk at work and have been doing yoga for a while.
Are you looking to quit gaming altogether? I noticed you still play 4 hours a day and was wondering what your sights are set on.