Nick

Making this post as a big thanks to Cam for providing this platform. It has been a while (few months) since my last post. I don't feel the need to journal anymore, but I felt like I had to close this chapter. Ever since I quit gaming my life really changed. At first I got bored all day long but as months passed I changed my gaming with other habits. Reading, drawing, learning new stuff, spending more time with the kids. It's been great! :-) So... Thanks Cam! I came across this platform at the right time. I'm sure you're going to inspire a lot of other people to quit gaming and change their lives. I'll keep watching your Youtube videos and read your e-mails. ;-)

One month without gaming. I made it. Right now I don't feel the need to game any more. The way I'm feeling, I'm sure I will hit the 90 day milestone. :-) It's been great to quit games. I've got a lot of free time since I've done so. I also no longer have the need to 'charge' to my pc the moment I wake up or get home. Perhaps I wasn't addicted to games as much as I thought I was (since I found it so easy to quit?). or perhaps I was. It doesn't matter. Even though I showed addictive behavior and gamed nonstop for most of my life, I feel like games have been there for me to avoid real life and difficult situations. It's easy to stay at home, game and do nothing. Games are easy, they make you feel like you accomplish things, while you're having fun. I did not achieve as much as I wanted to in the first month without games. But well, it's only a month. I guess the main thing in the first month was that I quit games. Changing my personality and other habits will take several months, if not years. It will be hard work, but I'm sure it will be worth the 'trouble'. Even though I haven't journaled as much as I'd like or in as much detail as I wanted, the GameQuitters community has been great for me. I've read most of the journals and seen people struggle/fight the same struggles I've got. I'm going to keep this journal updated once a month. When I hit the two and three-month milestones.

Thanks for the suggestion. Going to read it today. :-)

A mix of both. I've got this app called Clear on my smartphone. Most of the time I write down all the things I've got to do in it and 'clear' them when they are done. It's usually when I've got nothing specific to do when I find myself just sitting there and letting my mind wander off, while I could be doing useful stuff. Now that I think about it, whenever a task has to be done I instantly do it. But when I have the feeling that it doesn't matter when I have to do it, I just keep postponing it. It's been like this in school aswel, I postpone the task till the date I really have to start working on it or else I wouldn't get it done, instead of just doing it right away. I've got to learn to just do the tasks right away.

It has been three weeks (or 21 days!) since I stopped gaming or watched anything related to games. Three weeks full of change and new habits. Some days it feels like I've got less time than before. All these things I want to do: clean the house, learn, exercise, meditate, walk with the dog, eat healthy, read books, watch some fantasy series, spend time with wife and daughter, ... Other days I got plenty of time to do all these things, but I can't get myself to do them. It's strange. The motivation is in my head, but I can't seem to actually do things on some days. I also feel like I changed my gaming addiction for an internet / smartphone addiction. Always browsing Quora, Reddit and some other forums. Filling my head with useless information. I've got to cut down on that. Things I want to change in the coming week: - Quit my coffee addiction. <(O_O)> - Less time on the internet / phone. Good habits I want to keep doing: - Learn each day (for a minimum of two hours). - Drink 2l of water each day. (since I started doing this, I feel less tired). - Exercise three times a week. - Take the dog out for a walk each day. I am a bit scared of the future though. With our second child being expected in may, we'll have two 'babies' at home. Our daughter will be 13 months old when our second child will be born. If birth doesn't happen faster. After that I'm getting a new job. So we'll have two babies and a new job. I keep hoping that I'll have enough time for myself. It might sound selfish, and I know I'll take care of my wife and kids first, but I do want to continue studying and improve myself each day. I hope I can keep up. :-)

It has been another week since I've posted. I have not been gaming for two and a half weeks now. It has gone pretty smooth so far. I've only been tempted to download some games on my smartphone, but I didn't. It sucks that whenever you open the App store you get the 'latest and hottest' games. This week I haven't done anything important. I binge watched some series on Netflix, rearranged the house and did some cleaning. My girlfriend has been home this week so we also did some shopping and have spent time together. Next week she'll be working again so I'll be home alone. My goals for next week: - Start the treehouse learning HTML and CSS courses. - Meditate for 10 minutes every day. I've also got to find a way to dedicate myself to the goals/tasks I set. It's so easy to just relax and do nothing. Short post but I'll start journaling again next week. :-)

Since I'm on parental leave I'm getting payed till september. It's not as much as when I'm working, but we can get by. I've set myself to start working again end july, early august. So I've got a lot of time to figure out what I'm going to do. I if don't find anything I like by that time, I'll take any job till I find one I really like, like you suggested. As much for the plan, I've told her what I've been doing at home. She's really liking my new non-gaming lifestyle. :-)

It's been one week since I've started the no-gaming life. Things I've done so far: - Delete all my games and game-accounts. - Complete the HTML / CSS course on Codecademy. - Starting a 3 week full body workout routine. (I've stopped training for 4 years, before that I was weight-lifting for 3 years. Gaming stole away all the fitness time) - Read 3 books. (Final Mistborn book, Half a War and Elric of Melniborne) - Searched some information about how to start a (small) home business. - Changed companies for our phone / electricity and insurance bills. Trying to save some money. Things I want to do in the following weeks: - Keep on reading / exercising. - Start the HTML / CSS course at 'Treehouse'. - Start the Javascript course after I finish the HTML and CSS course. - Start getting some information about what jobs I can do with my teachers-degree. - Find out some amazing way to ask my wife to marry me (been wanting to do that for a long time). - Get a birth card designed for our second child. Lots of things to do. ;-)

I think that is what I've been missing out on during the last three years. I realized when I graduated and started out as a teacher, the job wasn't right for me. Because of other people's opinions, job security, a lot of vacation and all of that, I just kept the job. After three years I crashed. I finally told my wife I hate the job (I told her before, but it was just something I 'mentioned') and can't keep on doing it. My wife is a teacher herself and she understood the things I was feeling. She also finally realized the job wasn't for me. I hope I can find a new job that I can be happy in. Something that goes well with my personality and current life situation. My daughter was born in march last year. I'm having a second child in may this year. I do want to spend more time with them instead for working for school. I guess any 9 to 5 job will do that for me. It doesn't matter that it pays less. I don't want a life full a luxury, just a happy life. :-) It's not easy though. My wife is scared we won't get enough money with two kids. I'll also no longer be at home during the holidays. She's cried about it, which really hurt my feelings. She comes from a family where money and job security is put over happiness, it's how she's been raised. I told her that if she really wanted to, I'd keep my job as a teacher, if that would made her happy. She doesn't want that, but she's just insecure about what's to come.

It's been a weekend since I've posted. The not gaming went fairly easy during this time, until I got my PSVita out of my desk. I wanted to sell it on eBay. Yet for some reason I can't. Whenever I hold it, I feel hurt inside when thinking of losing it. Such a stupid feeling, since its just an object. I felt like I had to change my gaming for something else, something to fill the time. I decided to finally finish the Wheel of Time series, which consist of 13 - 14 books, each about 800 pages long. That will keep me busy. :-) I'm also going to refresh my web develop / design skills as well. A few years ago I went for my webmasters degree. I finished it as best as the class, made a website for my brother in law, but never used the skill set again. This weekend I started relearning the skills all over again with online tutorials and courses. My long dream has been to have my own business. Maybe if I work hard enough, one day I can be a professional web developer. It doesn't even have to be a fulltime job. I do feel like I will have to push myself hard.

It might sound stupid, but it does something to me that people read my post and reply. Thanks for the support and replies. :-) Day one (yesterday) went fairly well, though I was bored most of the day. During the evening I decided to start reading again. I picked up the Mistborn trilogy and got 100 pages left till I'm finished. I always loved reading but seem to have to push myself to actually do it. Today I got out of bed and felt like I was missing out on something. What was I going to do all day long? How easy it would be to just install some game and kill time. Then I heard my dog barking. 'I'll take her for a walk after noon', I said to myself. That is another one of my problems. I postpone things, all the time. It's something I will work on during the following days. As we say in dutch 'een schop tegen mijn kont geven', I have to kick my ass and start doing stuff. So I decided to improve my French skills. In Belgium we speek three languages: dutch, french and german. The german part is only a small part of Belgium. Speaking both dutch and french in Belgium is a must for a lot of jobs. I've had 8 years of french in school, but I never really committed myself to studying french. I've forgotten most of it. Time to do something about it! If anyone has any suggestions on learning / improving your language skills, I'm open for suggestions. :-) I tried the Babbel app so far, but you have to pay for more lessons. Anyway, I'm off to take the dog for a walk!

It has always been hard for me to structure my thoughts, but I'm going to give it a go. I quit my job two weeks ago. After three years of being I teacher, hating the job, dragging myself to work, being snappy at my wife. My wife and I had a good, long talk and decided that teaching just wasn’t my thing. She’s scared of what is to come: what my new job will be, will it be well payed, will I have decent working hours, … Because of this I have a lot of free time on my hands right now. Time I intend on spending with my 9 month old daughter, time I’m going to spend looking for a new job. To find something I’m passionate about and something I love doing. Something that doesn’t feel like a chore. This might be wishful thinking, but one can hope and dream. :-) At first, because of all the free time, I gamed all day long. Like the addiction it is, it sucked me to my computer the first day I was at home. So far I spent one week full-time on gaming. Telling my wife I did all things at home, feeling ashamed when I do, when all I did was game. But I guess that is what I've been doing all my life. This is day one. I quit gaming yesterday morning, after a gaming session of 6 hours. After the session I was feeling another headache, having neck pain, brain fog, lower back pain, ...I deleted all the games on my pc, smartphone, tablet. The only thing left is my Wii U, which I don't play unless my friends are visiting. That is usually once a month. Anyway, I’ve got so much more to tell but I can’t seem to write it down. I hope the story makes sense so far. Wish me luck on my quest. ;-) Day one, here we go.