Amphibian220

My second detox from media is over. The rules for not overeating and not following distractions have been regularly broken. today was a rare exception. I followed the no distractions, no overeating rule just from getting bored. I already know what it is like to be withdrawn and passive, so i will continue for another month to see how the active lifestyle changes me. Day 1 success. highest difficulty is running a controlled conflict, or contesting an issue with my employer.

We are far more capable men on this forum because we are resisting the lazy comfort traps. It doesn’t mean we cannot have fun, just put a bit more effort and you can have a great time playing a sport. Your post just made me deny the want to surf the internet for useless information. I will wait out a week without online distractions to see how my state changes. Mohammed Ali once said in an interview how difficult his training was, but then he accepted it because of how much defensive ability it gave him in his boxing matches. He was hard to hit! There was a pre-fight interview in which a journalist openly questioned his ability to beat a better opponent, quipping that prayer was all he had, to what he brilliantly remarked : “You fool, if I pray even a mountain will fall down.”

The self-hatred and guilt that is felt from making mistakes can be tackled effectively. Humans are creatures of ever increasing "velocity" and so they need faster and simplified solutions to their basic needs. This is happening because the cost of living (or the rent) is increasing at a non-linear rate. This is harmful because if you eat fast, or too much it is not healthy for you. Our bodies are not designed for this abuse. Instead of communicating in person, we started using the synthetic alternative of the internet. From the "Power of Habit", "Atomic Habits" books I found insightful experiments about the the psychology of consumers. One hospital wanted its patients to consumer healthier drinks like water instead of sugary drinks. They thought about the range of options available (like advertising, or disseminating information about the advantages of healthier diets), but ultimately what turned the tables was the "positioning of the water bottles at the check out counter of the canteen". This simple solution caused a huge shift in the behaviour of patients (sales of water jumped by 30 % in that example). Only because of ease of access, many patients started buying water to drink. Now if we consider harmful video games, it is 1. the ease of access, 2. the collective influence (everyone is buying this new game), 3. the intensity of the experience, 4. the lack of government regulation, 5. the heavy advertising 6. the stresses caused by lack of authoritative male figures, and lack of intelligence in dealing with stresses that destines many boys in their teens to go along this pathway. We absolutely have a degree of control at all times, but we can make mistakes through lack of introspection and knowledge. The answer to the question of guilt is not a simple one, but the dynamic is immeasurably more significant than the snapshot: the little beginnings lead to great results when repeated enough times. Remember, it is non linear! The little consistent steps that you are taking now will far outweigh the losses of the past and change this world for the better. To give the opposite example, a person can possess a lot of wealth and knowledge, but if he spends more than he earns on a regular basis, and does not create enough pressure, he is not in a good place. The most encouraging sign is you are fighting back! It is going to have a non-linear effect. When you move a small bit in the direction of truth and repentance, God moves to you a far greater distance, he never stops forgiving as long as you remember him and are sincere in repentance. God is ever with the steadfast.

Welcome to the forum! Can you please share a bit more about yourself, your interests and life goals? Your goal was to log on here and practice self-accountability and get support from your peers. This shows that you are not in denial.

So surrendering the addiction completely can be worrying? In a lengthy exchange in RB1’s journal I remember that this member talked about cycles where he would stay clean for 2-4 months, then go back to the games and very quickly crash. The cycle would repeat a number of times and cause him frustration. Another forum member said something similar to “Surrender your addiction”. When asked to clarify by RB1, that forum member explained “You have to accept that you are no longer a gamer”. This was “ringing through RB1’s head” and he understood that as a man he just had to accept a new journey into adulthood and muster support from his close ones. Yes, there were these conditions that permitted him to stay in the comfort of his home giving in to time wasting , but he accepted to give it a fight. After witnessing the exchange, I accepted that time for daydreaming has run out for me. A big part of my youth was daydreaming. So if not daydream, what great thing could I do for humanity? Cam found it but has to keep working not to run out. Here is when I started giving weight to my promises and work effort and demanding it from others. I am trying to learn to accept boredom, and I was able to do it by creating motivation through new connections with people. One hard thing is teaching myself more mature habits. Yesterday I wanted to browse internet, but just wen to sleep and feel great for it cause I can exercise now.

Hello, I am starting to see something. You may be attracted to the excitement that these games bring. It is the glory of coming first in a race or ambushing the enemy troops. So when you stop playing them, you don’t seem to get that kind of fun from anything else. Have you ever played paintball? Competitive paintball gives a lot of adrenaline from my experience. Or you could actually get out to a real race track (like Karting) once a week and have a blast racing against other opponents.

I do believe from your and other members’ posts the position that we are not reaching success if we are not leading and becoming more stronger. Cameron and the people that work with him are definitely in the fight from the research and support they have made available to us. Imagine if Cam had set up “the moderate gamers forum”. It would have been a joke. The limited or false efficiency approach, where I was completing work assignments for a number of months at a cost to my health and prospects doesn’t work. It is another video game. A leader can be anybody who follows great values and mission for his community at large. So that means being tested more everyday. Its amazing how many times we can experience a reversion to old patterns, because they are coping mechanisms to some extent. i watched a documentary about elite special forces and I found that they actually work hard at getting used to situations of greater responsibility when they are in danger. Once this character is established, its amazing just how much can a former lay man achieve.

This is hard to believe. I wrote down a perfectly doable daily plan and I managed to complete most of the tasks while breaking my rules! It is amazing how cunningly I behaved, the quality of my work was poor but I made it look like I'm working! What will happen at the exam? It will be a half-assed effort. Socially I am still very withdrawn. Yes, watching educational videos for 40-50 minutes and dreaming for another 2-3 hours per day is fun. It gives me the illusion of control. I have been unable to do exercise over the last days and revise my subjects. I will try to do it today.

What if you shared Cameron Adair's research on how internet distractions are designed ground up to rob people's time and make them ill-disciplined? I was reading "Atomic Habits" yesterday and the author talked about habits of the modern societies. He says that all of these habits are influenced by basic needs that you may not even be aware about. For example, scrolling youtube distracts you from fears and anxiety, progressing in video games grants you the basic need of recognition and praise, etc. Food companies invest astonishing sums of money into researching better flavours for food that will drive consumers' dopamine levels through the roof. As we bite the trap, it causes strong dependency on these products. Also the trick that is used is the ease of access (lack of barriers) of these enjoyments. Like you say, the Xbox catches your attention and its very easy to start. He claims that if you reduce the barriers to healthy alternatives, you are more likely to change your way of life. Look at how youtube changed their policy over the years. At first, you had to search for a video that you wanted to watch, and you had to click "play". This held for a long time. Then, they started collecting information about your online interests, and posting video suggestions for you on the main page. Today, before you can even enter your search term, you are distracted by a wide range of video suggestions. Also, as your video finishes, they start loading a new video for you to watch without asking you about it. The less friction, the more likely we are to follow a given set of behaviour. If there is too much hastle getting out to jog after work, we are less likely to do it. Ofcourse in all of his submissions, the author is emphasising that most modern people have no will and are too weak spiritually to resist the traps. This book is very simple and intuitive, you can even check his claims by observing your own behaviour. Yet the book is good at influencing you to change for the better. The author confesses that he was so weakened by the modern comfort traps, that he asked his secretary to change passwords on all of his social network accounts every monday. The secretary would only hand him his new passwords at the end of his workday on Friday and he would dive into the online world over the weekend. It was such a genius idea, because overnight he noticed that daily need for social networks was illusionary and now he had unlocked hundreds of hours of time for improving his health and doing something of benefit.

Work stress changes the whole approach. If I complete difficult work I need a coping mechanism to deal with intense thinking. I just can’t release, and get all sorts of dreams. Will have to start running or shadow boxing.

Show your son a good example Ashley. Generally speaking, our parents lived much healthier lives because there wasn’t all this garbage to distract them. If they wanted to have fun, they’d play a sport. Come on, I can be happy without reading social networks or playing games tonight. You can do it too. I noticed that people that tackle problems and are more self accountable are generally healthier and happier in their lives. From my school years, i remember reading Oliver twist’ as part of my english language class. It was a coal mine or something of the sort where he demanded better working conditions. He was a special boy cause everybody else was too timid to ask for it. If i apply this to myself, video games are like scraps of entertainment, so I’ve got to push a little bit in the direction of healthy entertainment and demand for myself a healthier way of life.

Hello Sarai! I can say this forum has several benefits. You can learn more about addiction by looking at the pitfalls that other people have discovered, how they overcame old patterns of thinking and established new meaningful lives. One of the most frequently cited cases here is what you have described: ease of access of video games in a pandemic situation. If you think about how gaming products have changed- easy to purchase, never ending progression and variety, then it only makes sense why this addiction is hard to combat. At times a member stops playing video games, but struggles in changing his or her life. This procrastination can go on for months. From this it follows that it is not merely enough to stop playing games, you’ve got to direct your thoughts and energies to things that really matter and change your character. There was a discussion in one of the threads on books that focus on psychology of addiction. Some of them have helped me greatly. Also, there are bite size Vlogs by Cameron Adair where he covers various aspects of the addiction to games and social networks. Should you have any questions, feel free to ask.

Welcome to this forum. How will you substitute gaming with another useless activity? I didn’t understand that. You don’t want to miss the breakthrough moment in these 90 days. It can come at any point, even in the first month. A realization of a specific measurable goal, that is appropriate to your circumstances, that can be worked on consistently and tracked and opens up potential for even greater growth. A goal like that can totally change the thinking so that the need for old habits is gone. You don’t even have to abstain at that point. The attachment is no longer there. I’ve ran through 2 detoxes and I wasn’t pressuring enough at any point to even see a breakthrough moment. I’m on to third detox right now. Today was a different day because I had to process excuses that I typically use for not following through on my plans. Here is how it went: i wanted to rest, so my first impulse was to read the internet, but I chose to just go outside.

Its 1 month and 10 days into my new detox. Over the last days I noticed that I can’t trust autopilot mode at all. It just reverts me to old modes of behaviour when I’m in a stress scenario. I can only follow scripted action plans down to the minute including contingency plans for when my chosen activity is unavailable. I have to communicate with people more.

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"many of us harshly shame and excessively scrutinize ourselves and each other for having biological limits. At the core of every behavorial/cultural pattern, I think it's fair to assume, there is a set of values/beliefs that enable and sustain it". What I witnessed about this during my professional career, is that "values and expectations" can exert pressure that actually begins to compromise people's principles. Gaming can be an escape from an underlying problem but it also makes you think that avoiding issues is the new normality. I think that gamers have poorly established boundaries because gaming disconnects them from awareness about their needs. As you are phasing out gaming you are becoming more aware of the problems that require solving. This may appear daunting at first, but start moving at your pace and find trustworthy people. What I remember is that the consistent piece meal approach is the only way to master something. For me, I started becoming aware that sometimes people may act rudely or take advantage of me. When gaming was my number one activity, as strange as it may sound I missed these cues. At first I would experience rage from noticing such things, but then I realised that actually, with more introspection and following good examples, you can establish confidence, self-esteem and an ability to set boundaries and stop people where necessary in a healthy way. This may be a very long post.

The problem is at the present point in time, there appears to be no opportunity to have a balanced life. Its just too much work. That’s why activities that free the mind are so important. Take boxing for example, I forget everything else in the world when I am in front of a punching bag and the bell rings. In fact remembering my personal successes in sport gives me motivation in fulfilling all of my other duties.

Go for it. You have experience of swapping a bad habit for a healthy one. You can do the same with gaming.

Hello Nils, it is great to see you being self-accountable. Here is what I am beginning to pick up on. When I was at school, there were no smartphones, only Nokia phones. There was no technological device that could give instant gratification. Some of my school periods were free, meaning I stayed in the canteen and played chess with my friends or completed assignments. This was normality. At that point in time, if I watched an ordinary film on my television set, my emotions were a lot richer and the experience itself healthy because it was the right dosage of entertainment. I learned that people that eat junk food, don't exercise and stress a lot are more likely to get diabetes. This disease is on the rise and comes from an unhealthy combination of habits. If you think about uncontrolled use of entertainment, it messes with your brain and upsets its focusing ability. Are video games targeted at making people “combat ineffective”? Because any serious work is like combat. From the research already available, It appears so. Exactly because I detected that media products are designed ground up to make me ineffective) I feel more confident in rejecting them. Kicking a soccer ball is more fun than online distractions for me. Stay true to your goal man.

Games are a coping mechanism for many gamers (albeit an unsustainable one). So if you are phasing it out, or already have phased it out, what is your replacement? What clears your head and gives you a happy start in the day?

One month into my detox and I feel like I should start taking more risks and working in a quicker fashion. Most people state that they want to get rid of addictive habits. When I am staying away from my addictive habits, I am still looking for the energy and it is hard to find. I think my energy comes from sports like basketball and I haven’t got the time to get out as much as before due to the nature of my work. When I watched Cameron surfing I was totally overawed at how mentally liberating the experience is. Its exactly because he’s got to struggle against the waves that he can forget everything in the world. Its just him and the next wave.

This comeback is more satisfying than having my team win the world cup. You have a habit of bouncing back, keep it up.

Thank you. For me the greater challenge came when I realized I have to stop dreaming and following social networks and action films and just be present among people mentally. A long term weakness and threat is working 9 to 8 and not getting enough exercise. So Even without the distractions I don’t like where I’m at. I have to turn this situation around.

Yes I usually do pushups and pullups during short breaks. I had a very productive day but the next day my energy has plummeted.

Welcome to the forum. i will challenge your statement by saying gamers aren't egotistical enough. In fact, they are so unaware they cause liabilities for their families. putting more energy into caring about needs in a better and wiser way helps in solving character issues and is a way out of conflicts.