ElectroNugget

This is really important in my experience. Cam recommends a book called 'The Slight Edge' which is kind of about this idea, that small tasks you perform every day are really important. 'Easy to do, and easy not to do', is how he puts it in the book. Like brushing your teeth. It's easy to do, and easy not to do. But do it every day and you have healthy strong teeth your whole life. Forget to do it every day and you get gum disease, bad teeth, and painful visits to the dentist. Journalling has been one of those habits for me that has made a big difference. Writing things down makes me feel better and helps me process my emotions, and in hindsight I can look back and learn interesting things about myself. So yeah! Keep checking in and you might be surprised by the results.

Sorry to hear you're having such a rough time right now Catherine. Just remember you have a community here to support you. This tough week of yours will soon be over, and you'll have made it 7 days without games during that time. That's a real achievement! Don't forget to pat yourself on that back for that. Celebrating even small milestones is really important.

DAY 18-20: I'm currently keeping another journal that I write in daily, which I think is kind of hampering the attempt to make a habit of posting here as well. I write a lot more personal thoughts in the other journal which has been great for my mental hygiene. But I am a long way from done with this detox, and I'd really like to be here more often to interact with the community. I'd like to try and post here daily as well. Things are going well. I haven't experienced many strong cravings except for one very powerful urge on Friday night when I realized I had no plans for the weekend. My mind immediately jumped to 'LETS PLAY VIDEOGAMES'. As usual, it's interesting to reflect on the motivation for these urges. In theory, there's a load of productive things I could do with two free days, but the addictive part of my brain was immediately enthralled with the idea of burning all those hours on a fruitless pursuit. I've also started to look at other timesinks in my life with a new eye. I play Warhammer, which is a miniature wargame with rather expensive miniatures that you can collect, build and paint, then play battles with. Yesterday I spent the whole day painting up a few models and came to the realization that I spend far more time and energy on building and painting the models than on playing the game. Arguably, the game isn't even that good, there are better board games out there that are cheaper. I love going to Warhammer events, throwing dice around and moving minis while eating beer and pretzels, that sort of thing. There's definitely value in that. But is the investment of time, money and energy comparable to the amount of social entertainment I get out if it? I'm starting to think not. It doesn't necessarily mean I need to abandon the hobby, just that maybe there's a different way I could approach it while being mindful of the other needs I have in my life. This new mindfulness and awareness of how and why I spend my time and money has been a nice side effect of this whole experiment. I look forward to seeing where it will take my life.

Killing the soft drinks is a tough one but I can recommend it. Whenever I slip and go back to them I feel awful.

Best of luck on your journey man sounds like you have a good action plan. I might need to copy that idea of having a list of activities to do.

DAY 17: Gorilla Mindset is really great. Concise and to the point. I can see that my biggest challenges going forward will involve cultivating the right mindsets to face the challenge. Depression leaves you with a very fixed and negative mindset that's hard to shake. Deep down I still don't believe in myself. I've been very busy with some projects and some socializing today so I literally had no time to even think about gaming, which was nice. The fight continues.

Thanks for the feedback Ikar. There are indeed successful artists out there. I've just had a very, very rough few years at the start of my career that's making me feel like I don't have 'it'. It's quite trying. Best of luck with your own business ventures. Hopefully, we'll both figure it out.

DAY 15-16: I finished reading Hungry Ghosts. Very good advice on dealing with addictions in there. Next up is Gorilla Mindset. I've applied for some local art jobs that suddenly appeared on my radar yesterday. Hopefully, something will turn out. There's also a position available for a 'Citadel Miniatures Conceptualizer' at Games Workshop in Nottingham. I've applied for the position before, it's basically my dream job. That has a deadline on May 3rd, so I'll have to put together an application for that as well. The cravings have subsided significantly but I still find myself procrastinating on uncomfortable tasks. That's something I really need to work on. Just seeing the benefits of a break from gaming is making me consider taking a hiatus from Youtube and perhaps Reddit and Facebook as well. Now that I am able to look at my online life from a new perspective, many elements of it are losing their lustre. I still have trouble believing I will ever 'make it' from a career perspective. But I guess I just need to keep my head down and keep trying, stick to my good habits and something will change for the better eventually.

DAY 14: Two weeks videogame free! I guess I should try to celebrate that a little more as it is an achievement I never would have imagined for myself just a few months ago. I'm guessing I'm still going through odd phases from withdrawal or something as today was absolutely awful. I felt low on energy, demoralized and struggled to focus while working. I'm also seeing what big gaps I have in my life, especially from a social aspect, without video gaming. I am a very extroverted person and I pretty much have nothing to fill in the social gap that's been left open here, which has contributed to my slumps I think. I feel isolated and lonely. I have a tight deadline coming up so there's not much time right now to correct that but perhaps it should be a priority to solve that particular issue this weekend.

DAY 13: Tomorrow will be the two week mark, pretty crazy. I can tell this is just the beginning of a larger change. I've been reading the 2nd book on Cams recommended list: 'In The Realm of Hungry Ghosts'. I spent 7hrs just focused on reading today! That would have been unthinkable on a weekend not long ago. The book contains some truly harrowing tales of addiction, but also very insightful and hopeful in the end. I have other addictions in my life I will have to attend to beyond my gaming problem. Porn, the internet, social media. One thing at a time.

Hey man, I know this is a late response to this musing, but was just reading your journal and felt a late response is better than nothing. Anger is a very difficult emotion to handle well. It's powerful and can consume you if you're not careful. That said, it's also sometimes a healthy feeling to have. When I was younger I was an extremely angry man for similar reasons to the ones you've listed here. For a time I swore off being angry entirely after I had an explosive outburst that terrified a mentor I respected. But suppressing my anger wasn't really a great idea either. It seethed beneath the surface and turned into a different kind of resentment, and eventually self-loathing. Nowadays, I'd prefer to be angry and vent my frustration now rather than to bury it and have it become despair, but that's just me. The way I see it, there's two ways to deal with repressed anger. You either vent it in a controlled manner, or you forgive the person you're angry with and rise above the anger. How you do that is up to you. Venting it could be channelling it into your exercise, a boxing bag or art and music. Forgiving a person is harder, but it allows you to let go of the emotional burden you're feeling and even to get some positive energy out of it. I'm not a very religious person but I've found the words of the Dalai Lama on anger to be very wise: “We cannot overcome anger and hatred simply by suppressing them. We need to actively cultivate the antidotes to hatred: patience and tolerance… When we are engaged in the practice of patience and tolerance, in reality, what is happening is you are engaged in a combat with hatred and anger.” Another way of looking at it, which is perhaps my favourite, is this little nugget of wisdom from Buddha himself: ''Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned.'' Good luck.

I see you're struggling with sleep problems. I've been chronically sleep deprived pretty much my entire life, it was only recently that I decided to start doing some learning on why that might be. When do you naturally feel sleepy? And when do you naturally want to wake? If you're a night owl chronotype (like me), you might only want to naturally sleep from about 1AM to 9AM, in which case that might explain your troubles getting to sleep early in order to wake up early. Just something to think about.

Thanks man! I'll keep that in mind during any future 'panic attacks'. The intensity was really wild, but I guess it just goes to show how wired my brain is.

DAY 09-12: Wow, a lot has happened. I need to try and check in here more often. Not only for my own sake but also to support others. I've had a few chilled days at home during the Easter break, staying with my parents and discussing life. Recently I read an older article of Cam's '5 Books You Must Read To Help You Quit Playing Video Games', and purchased them. I've been reading them in the past few days and they've really begun to turn my mindset around. The Slight Edge, in particular, gives me hope that my life is far from over. In the slight edge positivity and 'happy habits' are highly recommended due to the fact they increase overall happiness, productivity and lifespan. So I've doubled down on my meditating, which I'm trying to do every morning after I wake up, and every night before bed. This seems to have had a massive effect on my mood as well. I'm also trying the method of gratitude listed in the book: only three things a day, but you can never repeat an entry. I've had very severe cravings on some days. It's been quite illuminating in the sense that the level of craving has shown me how much I was addicted to games. I can almost salivate at the thought of playing a meaty strategy title like Civilization or Anno. That said, 12 days in and I'm still going strong! I've accomplished a lot in the past few days (at least in terms of educating myself through books), so hopefully, with time and the Slight Edge as my ally, things will improve.

This sounds like something I should do as well. ? Good luck with your journey!

Wow dude your portraits are awesome, beautiful shading! I have a completely different style. ? You can checkout my portfolio here: https://johnmuller.artstation.com/ P.S: About your sleep and daytime anxiety, have you considered that you might have a night owl chronotype? I discovered this was actually a thing recently. It's explained a lot about my sleep troubles and early morning drowsiness.

DAY 08: After yesterdays blowout I felt pretty emotionally numb today. In hindsight, I think I might have skirted a panic attack. Hindsight also granted me the wisdom to know that I was overreacting. A month ago I'd never have imagined I would have gone 8 days without videogames willingly, started reading and meditating again, and got a load of art tutorials done in one week. I should acknowledge my accomplishments and keep the growth-oriented mindset going. That's how I'll win this race.

Haha, fair enough. I think regardless of their true value, the big number plays into that sunk cost fallacy, which is why I mentioned it. I'm not proud of the number!

Hey man, do you share your art anywhere? If you'd like to swap deets, perhaps we can encourage each other to keep drawing. ? Cheers

DAY 07: Today has been extremely difficult, I don't know if it's a withdrawal thing or just my general life scenario that's gotten to me but I really hit the bottom today. I'm 28 years old and despite some 'high profile' jobs in the past, I am now about 4 months unemployed and see no end in sight. It really pains me that there are other men out there at my age with a wife, kids, and a house. This was not at all where I'd imagined I'd be at my age. And I don't feel like I can run fast enough to catch up to the rest of the rat race. I'm really angry at myself for having wasted so much time in the past years. Now I find myself far behind the pack. I'm faced with perhaps having to give up on my artistic career. I'm not sure I can do anything else. Anyways, I guess I still made it 7 days without games. I have no intention of going back, despite my urges. I feel they are directly to blame for where I find myself now. My lack of self-control in the past cannot continue now. Exercise: ❌ Meditate: ✔️

Hey there. My steam account is worth over 5000 USD, I've put pretty much all my disposable income into it for 14 years. There isn't an easy way to get rid of it, your loss aversion is high when it's something so important to you. If deleting the account feels like too big a step right now, just uninstall it and ask a parent or trusted loved one to change the password. If you're really serious you can have the email changed too so there's no way for you to get the account back without going through this person. That way the account still exists but it's far enough out of your reach to make it really hard to just give in to your urges and play. In time, you may decide to delete it. I haven't deleted mine yet, but I think I probably will at some point. Each day I go without games the thought becomes easier. Good luck, I can say that I wish I had made the decision at your age, so don't hesitate if you feel like this is the right thing to do. The best time to start is now.

DAY 06: I have had a busy weekend, hence the lack of updates. Nonetheless, I think I need to try and be better at posting here every day in the future as it helped me a lot previously and I feel like the accountability I get here is important. Haven't been on point with meditating or exercise recently, but I'm 6 days in with no games. The last time I went this long without any kind of gaming willingly was about 3 years ago, so that's great. Been very tempted at times to download something on my iPad but I'm holding on. I even had a dream where I was playing World of Warcraft and it became a nightmare as I knew it wasn't what I wanted to be doing. So the idea is subconscious as well. I have an absurd amount of free time. Weekends feel like eons now, which is great. I'm not awesome at spending that time productively just yet. Mostly I've been watching history documentaries on Netflix, which I guess is better than gaming but I really should be working on my art instead. One step at a time though. Exercise: ❌ Meditate: ❌ Gratitude: I'm grateful that today is a sunny day. I'm grateful that I'm finally beginning to make major changes in my life. I'm grateful that I have all this new time to spend on more important things. I'm grateful that I have this laptop to journal on. I'm grateful that I had a good breakfast.

Hey man, good to have you here! I'm just starting out too, it's a tough decision but I think hopefully worth it in the end. Keep at it and don't be a stranger!

Hey man, good to have you here. I'm an artist too, and I totally sympathize with the battle between your art and just killing your free time with gaming. Art asks that we do more than that. Your ideas need time and attention, and you have to give it to them or they will wilt and so will your creative spirit. So it's good you are here. Good luck on your journey!

DAY 03: I woke up extremely tired today and experienced extreme lethargy until about midday, ended up sleeping in and watching some Star Trek. This was a bit disheartening, as I'm not sure why I felt such acute exhaustion. Can the detox cause tiredness? I experienced some cravings today as well, which happened sooner than I expected it to, but I guess when you game daily for 22 years your brain notices even when you go just a few days without it. No gym today but did plenty of walking. More than 6000 steps so I feel good about that. Might need to start a 30-minute routine for each day but one thing at a time. Didn't meditate yet which was a bad call, but I will before bed. Really need to make a habit of doing it in the morning but my tiredness got in the way. I had a board game event this evening and I could feel the allure to play very strongly, my mouth was practically watering over some of the big strategy titles I own. This threw my addiction into a sharp light. At the same time, I've always strongly identified with the strategist in me and loved to play tactical and strategical games of all kinds. I used to be on the chess club in high school and I've gathered a large collection of big strategy boardgames over the years. It feels very hard to deny this part of myself. I'm not sure how I'll resolve this in the long run. Exercise: ✔️ Meditate: ❌ Gratitude: I'm grateful that I'm learning more about myself and my relation to games and gaming. I'm grateful that I have warm clothes to wear in this awful cold weather. I'm grateful that summer is on the way and we're getting more light every day. I'm grateful that I am evolving. I'm grateful that I have some awesome audiobooks to listen to.