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Congrats on quitting @LiamL. I'm glad you realized what you were losing before it was too late. I'm 29 and struggled with a gaming addiction for as long as I remember too. But I'm celebrating 29 days of no games today and I couldn't feel better. You've taken steps in the right direction, and the only thing left to do is to keep taking them. Go forward everyday and don't stop to look back at what happened in the past. I'm moderately active on these forums, and am more than willing to help in any way I can. So if there's anything I can do for you, just shoot me a DM. Again, Congratulations and Welcome to a better, happier Rest of your Life.

So much for keeping a "daily" journal on here... However, the reason for the lapse in entries is a good one! So what is it? I've been hard at work on my side-hustle. I have my company website nearly built now, and it feels like things are coming together for me to begin this journey into entrepreneurship. This is something I've wanted for a long time. and I'm really excited about the prospect of working for myself some day; BUT I also have bouts of anxiety and nervousness. Sometimes fear will creep into my mind and pollute my thoughts with whispers. What if I'm not good enough? What if the competition is too strong? What if I can't find any clients? Wouldn't just be easier to play LoL and not worry about any of it? Now, I know this is to be expected but it doesn't make it any easier. And while everyone may have their doubts, not everyone seeks the ease, comfort, and safety that virtual reality provides like I used to. But I've been resilient against those urges to drop everything and fire League back up again. And I'm proud of myself for not shirking at those undermining thoughts. It's been 29 days since I've last played a video game. And friends, besides the rare urge, I rarely think about gaming anymore. It's a freedom unlike any other. I'm not sure if this is the longest time I've gone without gaming; but I am sure it's been the most productive time of my entire life and the proudest I've ever been of myself.

Congratulations on your successes thus far @Lorente. All those winning streaks are definitely something to be proud of regardless if you have had longer streaks in the past. Look, I have a terrible addiction to League of Legends as well. And I've had plenty of 6-8 hour sessions of straight League. It's a very alluring and captivating game. But if you're like me, you know that even a win where you carried your team starts to feel hollow. That's because unless you're in the top .1% of players, it is hollow. It's absolutely meaningless, adds no value to your life, and drains your most important resource: time. So always, always, always, keep that in mind. And if you're having trouble filling the void, the best thing that's worked for me is focusing on a project with achievable, measurable goals. One idea is making your studies your project, and while it doesn't sound fun, I can guarantee you'll feel a million times better when you achieve those A's than you ever did on League. Keep the hope alive and then begin to transform that "I hope I can quit" to "I know I can quit". We believe in you.

@JustTom nailed it. vs. Really, it comes down to the why and how. Are you using it to actually build something? And are you making an effort to get better? If you answered yes to both of those questions, then your adventure into creative design is a hell of a lot better than gaming. If no, then digital media creation is only better because it doesn't have nearly the capacity for "time loss" or addiction

I know that feeling - the anxiety that comes from thinking "it's only a matter of time until I mess up and game again". That self-doubt is natural for anyone trying to break a bad habit. Best thing to alleviate self-doubt? Self-praise. You need to praise & worship yourself for every day you don't play. I'm not sure how prevalent or acceptable self-praise is in Chinese culture but I feel like here in the States, most people see self-praise as arrogant or boastful. And I find that we instead become hypercritical of ourselves and become our own worst enemy. You have to get past the (invalid) idea that praising yourself is wrong or prideful. Try some daily self-praise and let me know how it goes. It may feel awkward at first because we are used to a negative voice in our heads. Just keep trying and that positive voice will start to be much louder. Good luck! P.S. You don't have poor English, it's pretty good for a non-native. So don't worry about it around here.

Thanks, @PoweerWealth. If you know of anyone that needs a website built, send em my way ? And good luck to you as well @Luiz F.! We can do it! We just have to work the system.

@dxzmpk_CN Congrats, 董雄。You've taken your first step toward freedom. It will be a difficult journey, but quitting gaming is certainly possible with determination and a little help from your friends (us fellow forum members ?) You're mindset really resonates with me. I have a very troubling addiction to League of Legends myself and have tried for a long time to quit playing. Gaming completely wrecked my GPA (the U.S. education metric) and my social life while I was in college. But I made it through, I have a decent job, and now I'm happy to tell you I haven't played any video games (or watched any gaming content) in 12 days. I can tell you now though. You are smarter and stronger than you think! You had the wits and the power to know that it was time to stop gaming and decided to quit. Don't discount this first step. Use this step and every single one after as a reminder and a source of strength. P.S. I graduated with a degree in CS and work as web developer now. If you need any help with school, or anything for that matter, feel free to send me a DM.

@NannerZ and @JustTom definitely gave you two really good ones with meditation and reading. Ones I've been practicing myself for the last 11 days. If you're bored while reading, it's like NannerZ said: find another book. Find a book that you enjoy. Otherwise, it definitely will drive you to do something else. And for meditation, I've been using the Headspace App. It's subscription based but I'm doing the free trial now and I like it alot. But another thing I like to do and Tom kinda mentioned it was to come here to the forums or look in on the stopgaming discord. I'll try to chime in on the conversation here or there and that has kind of helped me unwind in the past. Honestly though, everyone needs downtime, and watching 1-2 hours of T.V. a night is - I'd gamble to say - less than your average American/European. I watch at least an hour of T.V. a night with my girlfriend. The key is temperance. If you find yourself bingeing for 4+ hours, then yeah that's kinda just replacing games with T.V... but a couple hours here or there isn't a problem IMO. Another thing to do is to pickup a hobby like painting, or some kind of physical art. I'm seriously considering buying the Bob Ross Painting Kit off Amazon and following along with his videos on Netflix. If I like it, great! It's something I can interactively do without too much brain power involved. If I don't like it, at least I tried and then I could pick up clay sculpting or photography (prices may vary by hobby ?)

Agreed @BrassWolf There are two sides to every coin. Like anything else I think temperance is key. Unfortunately for most of us, temperance wasn't possible. @Saut, I would at least limit the amount he or she plays per week, and even remove video games entirely on certain days of the week. From personal experience, I grew up on video games, and while I've done pretty well for myself, I still have an addiction that stopped me from doing even better. And it would be my guess that the groundwork for this addiction was laid when I first started playing for extended sessions multiple days in a row. (12-15). Now I'm not sure how old your child is but I would venture to say: the younger they start playing for long periods of time, the more likely they will have problems with video games 10, 20 years in the future. So, imo, just keep an eye on it and don't let it become a regular thing.

Thanks @DaBest. They definitely are. Especially for me, because it's the game I played consistently for the longest period of time.

Thanks @fawn_xoxo. Sometimes, I worry I will start trading one for the other, and I've seen what alcoholism can do to someone, but then weekends like this past one remind me why I only drink once a month. So, It's been a few days since my last entry and for mostly good reasons. This past weekend my best friend, Joe, came into town and spent the weekend with me. He's old college roommate of mine so you already know what the plan was: drinking and general fuckery. Now we were supposed to have a relatively sober Friday night because of pool plans all-day Saturday, but... it didn't happen that way. Joe and I crush two Whiteclaws before my girlfriend drives us to the restaurant. Our other college roommate - who lives in my city - and his girlfriend join the three of us at Guy Fieri's downtown. 45 minute wait, "Alright, let's go grab a beer." We go the neighboring Hard Rock and order a round. As soon as he pours all five beers, Flavortown (Guy Fieri's, heh) texts us our table is ready. Alright, great, we chug our beers and leave (which honestly I was happy to do because the bar smelled straight-up like shit water). We get to Guy's, sit down at our table, and wait 30 minutes before getting drinks and appetizers. Then they tell us the special burger we came for sold out 10 minutes prior. Cool. Fuck you. We get our checks and go to our third scene of the evening, a local microbrewery and restaurant. The three roommates order liter mugs of beer, and we all finally enjoy a lively, albeit longer, dinner. As I said (wrote?) before, I don't drink often so being 8 beers deep in 2-3 hours was doing a number on me, and the night looked like it was only getting started. Thankfully, reason prevailed and we went home after dinner; But little did I know, I had just set myself up for near disaster. So once we got back home, my girlfriend went to bed while Joe and I stayed up to watch the animated Spiderman movie on Netflix (It's actually pretty good). I watch the movie as Joe nods off, and as the credits roll... I get an URGE I walk into my office, sit down at my desk, and wake the computer. I pin my way in and check the Downloads folder (I always used to have a League install there). Nothing there. I open Chrome, and realize... I'm going to have to disable the website blocker. For the first time, I glance at my other monitor and see the source code for my business- an inkling of resilience grows in me and fights back the craving. I close Chrome. I sleep my computer and I go to bed. *double finger guns* WOOO! REALLY PROUD OF MYSELF Y'ALL But anyway, we had a great Saturday by the pool, and then me and the lady had a hangover day Sunday after Joe left. So I didn't really have any cravings to play the rest of the weekend. This week, I've busied myself with getting my business off the ground, which also feels amazing. 11 Days. 11 Wins. Let's keep this train rolling.

Not in the same boat as you. I'm a full-blown 29-year-old addict. But I think it's great that you're taking preventative measures to keep gaming from being a problem. As far as motivation to reduce your time with technology, you should try visualization. Visualize yourself 10, 20, 30 years from now. As you attempt to do this, get as detailed as possible. What kind of clothes will you wear, what kind of car will you drive, where are you living, etc. The more specific the better. And most importantly, visualize yourself in your career or reaching your goals or becoming "what you wanna be when you grow up". Then when you know what your future self is like, ask them what you end up doing to stop or temper your gaming. Because once you've visualized your ideal future self, they can tell you what it will take to get there. Now, I know it sounds corny or even mystical, but visualization works. Self-fulfilling prophecy, law of attraction, many theories to back up the practice of visualization. If you need any other ideas, my DMs are always open

Good point @JustTom. After thinking about it more, I'm sure if the physical products companies *could* challenge customers requesting discontinued use of their product; they would. It's our responsibility to be mindful consumers. I guess I was just partially bitter about having the "wool pulled over my eyes" so to speak.

Day 3 Today was a rollercoaster to say the least. I got to work about 8:30. Got a good amount of work done throughout the day, and had some very interesting talks on the stopgamer discord. I was feeling pretty great, and I had my mission on my mind; I was ready to come home and get some serious work done on my side project. Well, seems fate knew I was having a good day and decided to throw a wrench into it. On my way home from work, my car started losing acceleration - on the interstate mind you, in the far left lane. I'm only 2 miles from the exit; is this seriously happening right now?!, I thought to myself. Thankfully, I was able to safely coast across 5 lanes to the divided highway exit and into the emergency lane. I was sitting there, trying to get it to restart, when I realized I'm out of gas. Now I know what you're thinking... how could you not know you were about to run out? I'll tell you why: my gas gauge is fucked. Not like totally dead fucked, more like engaged in assorted fuckery. When the tank is full, the car says it's empty. And now I know: when it thinks it has 21 miles left, it is empty. Anyway, so I get to spend the next 30 minutes walking down the ramp and dodging cars as I attempt to cross an eight-lane street to the nearest gas station. Buuuuut, Fate wasn't finished. Oh no, not today. The gas station was out of canisters. My luck, right? So I got take my very unhappy ass to the next gas station another half mile way. Did I mention it was nearly 90° outside? Anyway, I get to the second station and begrudgingly pay EIGHTEEN DOLLARS for a plastic jug. I fill 'er up, and start heading back. At least I can finally get home, get some air conditioning and relax, I'm thinking as I climb the ramp with cars flying by in the opposite direction. I get to my car, fill the tank (I've never been so thankful my gas tank was on the passenger side), and go to put the can in the trunk. I open the trunk and laugh to myself. Yup. There's already a gas can in there. With gas. And no, I'm not fucking kidding you. I slam the truck, jump into the passenger seat, and crawl across to the driver's side as cars whiz by to the left. I start her up. "Thank God", I say audibly. Finally, there's a break in the action and I'm able to get off the ramp lane, and back on my usual route home. I pulled into the gas station by home and filled her all the way. Needless to say but very necessary to me, I also bought a couple beers. And while I'm not super happy that was my choice of action, I think they are well deserved because normally that stress would have driven me to play video games until 2 or 3am. But today, I just decided to buy a couple beers and write out my feelings. I'm bummed that I didn't have an awesomely productive evening; but I'm even happier that I didn't have a relapse. One battle at a time.

I 100% agree with this. I'm not saying Company X producing Product Y should make Y less fun or pleasurable. To the contrary, I believe X not only has a right but a duty to its investors and shareholders (if publicly traded) to put out the best, most profitable product. I guess my major beef is when the consumer is trying to stop using Product Y, and Company X uses seemingly underhanded (to me) tactics to keep that consumer on the hook. In all of your examples except social media, I don't find the company forcing its consumers to go great lengths to get away from their product. I know companies will use, can use, and - in my humble opinion - shouldn't be prohibited from using any psychology to retain their customers. But challenging a consumer's decision and using cognitive biases in an attempt to get them to change their mind? That seems different to me than just making the game so enjoyable that it becomes addicting. Does that make sense?

24+ hours down. I feel good. Still too early to tell how hard it's going to be though. I've quit for longer periods before but never felt this good about quitting which is both scary and exhilarating. Riot games pissed me off today; so I'm going to use that fuel to remind me of the reality of what video games are. Anyways, that's enough for tonight; it's late and I have work tomorrow. Here's to making it 48 hours!

That's certainly true. Social media is a big offender of this; and people are definitely addicted to social media. I hadn't thought about that. And you point out a conspicuous thread of what great lengths these Big Tech companies will do to prevent you from escaping their platform. The age old dilemma of when do business practices go from persuasive to unethical.

I am a very pro-business, free-market, individual-freedoms-with-individual-accountability kind-of guy. But I feel like this crosses the line of acting in good faith with the consumer. Especially the act of challenging the consumer's attempt to remove the company's product from their life. And it's not a stretch to call it outright manipulation and use of a cognitive bias to keep a potentially unstable person "using" their game. I don't see other businesses with addictive products doing the same. Granted, the most addicting things are illegal; and drug dealers will continue to market to you if you were a regular customer. But alcohol? You don't see beer and liquor companies stopping people on their way out of the grocery store, asking them if they are sure they don't want to buy their booze. Cigarettes, etc. I think it's unethical but I don't think it should be illegal. Not sure how you could even regulate it, or that I would want more regulation, but I definitely think that League is operating in bad faith by having that as their response to an account deletion request. Because, we agree; it's certainly an automated response. ---------------------------------- After reading your article, I think they know how to make the game more addicting; and I think they do. Of course, they will deny it because there's no proof, but I think some of Game Dev studios really know the right knobs to twist to increase game durations. As for me, it's my responsibility to be wary of the predatory nature of these things and accept I've willfully blinded myself to it for too long. But more importantly, it's my responsibility to take a stand against it. Not sure how I'll do that yet; but talking to parents early might not be such a bad idea.

Hey Matthais, I'm new here too. I wish I were your age when I decided to quit. Stay strong, you're going in the right direction. It won't be easy but we'll be here to help. Newbie to newbie, if you need anything feel free to DM me.

I'm only on Module 3 so I'm not sure if he covers this or not but: @BrassWolf, you make a good point. But at what point does consumer retention become manipulation? The addiction may be our faults but are these companies at fault as well? I suppose that goes a bit deeper into a moral and philosophical argument which may be controversial and I don't want to stir up anything so soon. ? @NannerZ, I agree. I felt a degree of anger when I read that reply from the support admin, which I think will certainly help me in my renewed battle, but do you think that anger is warranted? Ultimately, I'm mostly angry with myself for allowing it to happen, for succumbing to the temptation time and time again. Nevertheless, do you think we have the right to be angry at game developers? @BrassWolf, your thoughts?

I'm not sure how old you are, or how feasible this is for you but the best way I know how to make friends is: Get around people. The best way to lose the "gamer" label; stop being a gamer and get outside for some activities. Join groups that have similar interests. Try using Meetup or looking for local classes, workshops, etc if you don't even know what your interests are yet. Then go to every meeting that you possibly can. All that matters is: you go outside of the house and look for things to do where people will also be doing the same things. You never know what you may get out of it. Getting to our best self means laying down what's easy (gaming) and looking for our next challenge. If you're introverted or have social anxiety, it will be a bigger challenge. But I guarantee you; the second will be easier than the first, and the third easier than the second. Also, this. This, this, this, this. THIS. Work on yourself. Try to develop a new skill: coding, marketing, graphic design, survival skills, whatever it may be. Find a mission. Make that mission your number one priority. Need a mission? Visualize where you want to be in 10 years, 20 years. That's your mission now. Go get after em. And I'll help you in any way that I can.

I don't want to sound conspiratorial, and I certainly don't want to be controversial on my second day. But do you think certain game developers intentionally make games more addicting under the guise of more "fun"? I only ask because I got an interesting reply to my request for deletion of my League of Legend's account. Now, this may be as harmless as this particular support guy has the same sunk cost fallacy that most of us have. Nonetheless, it caused me to question. So, I wanted to come to you guys and gals to ask your opinion. Underhanded tactic or harmless ignorance?

Anytime, Kris. If you need help with anything that I could work on remotely, I'd be willing and interested in helping. In starting this game-free life, occupying your time is a big part of not relapsing, right? If I can occupy my time by making a friend and helping kids & parents dodge the pitfalls that my parents & I fell into? Even better. Send me a DM if you need anything.

Thanks for the well wishes @NannerZ. I'm definitely ready to start leveling up in reality.

Thanks much Kris. Looking forward to hanging out with you all! I think the lack of community also doomed me on my previous attempts. Now that I have these forums I think this time will be much different.