Amphibian220

@BooksandTrees I have already taken action with regards to my diet. I just always feel hungry from the “right eating” but i think if i add more vegetables into my meals i won’t be as hungry. I cannot have much bread because I seem to be intolerant to yeast that is added to almost every type of bread. strangely, i feel drowsy and weak if I don’t have something sweet after every meal. My back is better but kind of the same. When I do exercise, on that day I feel more focused and less tired. I am sure that stretching on its own isn’t going to work and I need to swim at least three times per week.

Emotions are very tough to deal with. Sometimes i wonder if i should pre plan my dialogue regarding a subject to make sure I don’t go off course. was your weight loss intended?

I can suggest a number of books: 1) Atomic Habits by James Clear Most people interested in changing their way of life don’t have any bearings on the psychological nuances. This book gives those bearings to the reader (not necessarily a gamer) in a very clear and practical way and enables him to see the cost. Atomic habits is a great piece of work, it will put you on the spot immediately by making your subconscious impulses evident to you, and by explaining to you what works in dropping bad habits and what doesn’t. 2) Power of habit Similar work to Atomic Habits but more technical on psychological issues. The following two books will shatter beyond repair the wishful thinking of any emasculated western subject (not implying you are such): “No more mr nice guy” by Glover ”Death of Ivan Iliytch” classic by Leo Tolstoy. This second book was hard to read for me. It tells a story of a man who is constantly trying to fit The values that society imposes on him and goes to ridiculous lengths to achieve that. He then loses the plot entirely and seems just to be racing to make more money. Nothing else really matters at that stage. It sort of just voids his life entirely of any meaning and closer towards death he is suffering morally for having turned away from honesty and sincerity with himself. P.S. Fight it man, your striving is not in vain.

@Ikar I’m rereading James Clear yet again and took notice of his rule of thumb: if something presents you with immediate enjoyment here and now, almost always it is going to lead to a bad outcome in the long term. And vice versa, activities associated with difficulty here and now are going to lead to great results in the long term. I wonder if there are any examples that contradict this hypothesis but I haven’t found any. In fact this hypothesis changes my attitude whenever I come back to it. Revising for exams is feeling fun now! Edit: I think self-accountability and journaling are the greatest tools for becoming honest and developing a unique character. Nothing helped me more than that in the last ten or so years.

Hey Ikar, you said in one of your earlier comments : “The annoying part of knowing what you want is you know when you have failed” What do you think about the identity based approach, where you think more about how much you reflect a desired identity rather than the results that you are achieving?. After all, even the best athletes and businessmen have their share of failures. On another note, Made me smile when you stated you have to put more effort into relaxing. My day took a very good turn when I did one of those things that I have a habit of avoiding.

Near term objectives are instrumental in development. In the previous job my employer expressed the possibility of offering me a paid position. I had to drive two hours to and back from work. I had to visit a hospital for my treatment. I had yo attend university lectures. I had to track my medicines, clothes, wash and iron them. I was doing all that and feeling robust as i have ever been in my past years. in the new job I’ve relative job security and no tangible near term objective. Its beginning to have a negative impact. the current culprit: bad back and eating habits. near term objective must reflect and have meaning with regards to your long term objective.

The coolest thing for me is you are going to start rock climbing again! Sport is such a morale builder, its like air for us. I’m hoping you are going to get good sustained momentum with this.

Hopefully you will be able to change your environment for the better. I employ certain tactics in order to prevent myself from being tempted. Whenever I’m revising or cooking, I put my phone away and keep it on silent. That way I’m never distracted from my activities.

Welcome to the forum I think this kind of scenario is more likely if you encounter a leader /group that is attractive to you because your values are the same. Usually, you want to earn your place in that group and you are distracted so much and so frequently from your usual mode of behaviour that new habits start to take form and put your old habits to sleep. Trying to change your environment as much as possible is a great idea and the greatest character shift comes from communicating with charismatic leaders. I find that I cannot have ANY excess capacity. I have to spend my energy and time in a balanced way each day. At times I develop a habit of creating extra time with no allocated activity. If this goes on for long enough, old thinking patterns activate. hope this post was of help to you.

Well done, what sort of changes to your habits do you think worked in improving your revision?

Welcome to the forum. Hopefully you will stay on the program and reformat your habits into a healthy lifestyle. May I ask what your interests are and the stage of your academic career?

Glad to hear that. Your new activities are your safeguards. I don’t get upset about being late in life with certain milestones anymore and this is why. I professed the qualities of a “successful” university graduate, but there were serious issues underneath the surface. Conversely, I observed people that were much less capable in skills such as memorization, numeracy etc. but they had the morale and consistent approach to slowly fix all the issues. This kind of attitude carries over into fitness too. I would go into breaking my personal records to do more pushups, but I would sacrifice technique and lack consistency. I felt super excited, but my approach did not convert into meaningful results. Being pumped and excited is alright, but without a sound plan these impulses aren’t going to work on their own. You are keeping in touch with your school friends and that is a great habit. Who knows, this can produce an career opportunity of sorts.

When a task is perceived as an obligation, you may not be as enthusiastic about doing it. Look at the difference : 1) i have to call 3 clients with a prospective offer. 2) i have an option to call 3 clients with a prospective offer. Approach number one means you are proceeding in autopilot mode. Approach number two engages you. You become aware of your priorities, and vision of where you want to go with this action. You even start seeing what is wrong with how you execute it on a habitual basis. It is a much more wholistic approach. Even your sales pitch is going to be different.

You are welcome. Let me tell you, i stayed some time without media stimulation. At first, my emotions were negative. After all, internet media served the need for distractions very well. But I held on a bit and started noticing the world around me, started talking to people and developing skills and insight and most important of all, started accepting boredom! Its a must to be a healthy and a resilient man. There is a story of a desert fortress where the men are expecting enemy attack at any moment. But the enemy upsets their expectations by not attacking. They then have to endure inhospitable conditions of the desert and boredom (!), but because they have a very well thought out plan, they are able to go on many years without losing form, morale, training etc. ultimately, the enemy force attacks them and they give a good fight because they didn’t give in to wishful thinking. This story has inspired me.

Let me see if I understood it correctly: you are going to put yourself back in trial and test to see if video games start controlling you again? What is the point of that? There is a very minor upside (getting a thrill from a game) and a potentially major downside of this sort of experiment. You talked about underlying problems being the root cause. The way I perceive underlying problems is that gamers try to escape issues by playing games, but then the games make them less capable of solving them than they were in the first place. So, basically games become another root cause, next to which the initial problem may not have been as serious. A positive feedback loop of sorts. One of the most important habits to train is to learn to tackle issues head on because once that is in place, you are prepared to attack unfamiliar problems. At that point you Don’t see a point being in denial, but just do everything based on a sound plan.