alphadax

Cool songs! This is something I came across recently I thought was very inspiring: link.

Day #22 Daily reflection: Kind of a weird day today. Been obsessing over my hair because it looks terrible. I want to grow it out longer but I also need it to look professional. Right now I just look ridiculous. If I can just tame the sides in I think it will be ok. I did some research and I think my hair is just dry so I'm going to try conditioner. I got it trimmed recently but I don't think it helped at all. My goal is to get to shoulder length and eventually be able to put it in a bun or ponytail. But it's incredibly frustrating when your hair just looks like shit for months... Hopefully I can get it to a point that myself and my workplace will be happy with. Kind of feeling crappy today so tomorrow I'll start the day of right with a shower and some breakfast. Then I want to get some laundry in and go for a walk, and work on my programming. I have a bunch of house stuff to do as well in the afternoon, but I'll start with just getting groceries. Sleep (Goal: 8 hours, 11:00 pm-7:00 am) Good Daily exercise (Goal: 30 min) None

Well TIL Kalimba is an instrument. I thought it was just this banger tune from Windows 7: Anyway good luck on your journey. I agree music and blogging can be quite therapeutic. Also it is amazing how much time we spend on screens, I think it is good you are looking for other types of hobbies.

Day #21 Daily reflection: Hi, hope if you're reading this you had a great day. Mine was ok. I still wasn't very productive with moving stuff, but I at least got some algorithms lectures done. The weather's been so great lately that I just wanted couldn't get any work done. First I went for a walk and played on my drum pad outside, which I haven't done in a while. Made me reminisce about my highschool days. There's something very simple and right about just being outside playing music. Preferably with other people but you know how thing are right now. I also did some more guitar and piano, trying to learn Jolene by Dolly Parton on guitar and the Howl's Moving Castle theme on piano. It's funny because on guitar I feel like I know what I need to do but my fingers don't have the technique to do it, while on the piano I don't know what to do because I suck at reading music but my technique is pretty solid. Met a friend randomly at the park while I was skateboarding. I was happy to see him, but later I was kind of bummed because he didn't even tell me he was in town. I guess he's only in town for a couple days, and the virus has kind of crapped on everything, but it would have been nice if he had reached out. Anyway I felt way more comfortable on the board today than yesterday. Still working on trying to Ollie but I'm not too worried about it. I'm more in making my general skating more solid. And to do that I literally just need to skate more. It's pretty fun but also very tiring, so if I do my time efficiently I can only last 2-4 hours max before I need to head back inside anyway. Also evening showers are definitely becoming a thing, because boy do I stink afterwards... Today I "beat the snake" for the first time in a while if you know what I mean... Awkward to talk about on here, but I think it's an interesting topic. In some ways I'm guessing that it's kind of similar to gaming, where you get that rush of dopamine and endorphins. A quick Google search online generally shows that masturbating is healthy, but I wonder to what extent that's true? Perhaps the old mantra "everything in moderation" applies here. But how much is too much? In general, I feel like my mood is better when I haven't done it in a while, but I'm not sure that's a causal relationship. If we use masturbation to feel better or relieve stress, then when we aren't doing it that could just mean we aren't feeling anxious or stressed to begin with. So I'm going to be keeping a closer eye on my habits. I think it's probably not a good idea to make masturbation your "default" activity for stress, boredom, anxiety, etc. But at the same time, I do feel like relieving sexual tension is kind of a basic human need. What do you guys think? Let me know if you have any good sources for scientific research on this topic. Sleep (Goal: 8 hours, 11:00 pm-7:00 am) Good Daily exercise (Goal: 30 min) Skateboarding Today I am grateful for family, the sun, skateboarding, cold showers, and salads

Day #20 Daily reflection: Chill day today. Got more into piano and guitar. Need to be a little more productive tomorrow with moving checklist. Sleep (Goal: 8 hours, 11:00 pm-7:00 am) Good Daily exercise (Goal: 30 min) Skateboarding

Chiliflavor, I have only just started reading your journal posts, but I am impressed by how detailed and informative they are. You seem to know yourself very well. Welcome to the forums and good luck.

Hi, welcome to the forums! Those look like good goals. I've also been trying to exercise 30 min each day and I think it has done wonders for my mood. If you get tired of walking, try going someplace different or do some other exercise (I like dumbbells, running, and skateboarding.) Python is also on my list to learn. Right now I am doing Princeton Algorithms 1 on Coursera. It's Java but I am learning a lot about algorithms and data structures. I'm planning to do Part 2 and then maybe try to pick up Python or start doing more Project Euler. I also enjoyed reading but right now I don't know what to read! If you have any suggestions let me know, I'm open to pretty much anything.

Congrats on deleting your accounts. I think a lot of this process is being able to let go of things so that you can become something new. For me I had to let go of my old N64 console and games. I'm also trying to let go of my Magic cards, but interestingly with covid my local shop is not taking cards at the moment. So for now I guess I will hold on to them, unless you have any suggestions for how to get rid of cards?

Day #19 Daily reflection: Great day today. It was hot and sunny but I didn't mind, it's a good change of weather. Might have a slight sunburn. Walked to campus and had some graduation photos taken with my cousin. It was pretty fun. Also went skateboarding for a bit. Might try to get out to an actual skate park one of these days, getting a little tired of my small patch of sidewalk at the local park. I'm getting better at turning though. Still trying to Ollie. If the weather is good again tomorrow I'll probably go practice skating some more. Oh yeah I also got a passing score on my programming assignment for this week, so that's nice. Might take a second pass through tomorrow to clean it up. Sleep (Goal: 8 hours, 11:00 pm-7:00 am) *thumbs up emoji* Daily exercise (Goal: 30 min) Skateboarding, walking Today I am grateful for the weather, family, skateboarding, guitar, my hair

Day #18 Daily reflection: Today, there was many algorithms to be had. I finished up my implementation of the 8puzzle board class which seemed to be working, so that's good. The solver is a little bit trickier so it could take some time to work out. I think I have at least a skeleton worked out now, but I need to look more in detail at the implementation. Made a small bit of progress on move-out stuff. It's hard because i want to get rid of things, but everything is still kind of shut down. Did some skateboarding today which I haven't done in a while--works out pretty well for quarantine. Plan for tomorrow will be also somewhat laid back, but I'd like to spend at least a couple hours on coding and cleaning. Over and out. Sleep (Goal: 8 hours, 11:00 pm-7:00 am) *thumbs up emoji* Daily exercise (Goal: 30 min) Skateboarding!

It's amazing how easily others can affect our mood... Both negatively and positively. I try to remember that and err on the positive side...

Hang in there and finish strong! I am still waiting to receive my diploma due to corona and I graduated beginning of May... Maybe you will get yours before me!

Day #17 Daily reflection: Hello! Today was a pretty good day. I managed to get rid of a lot of stuff and made some decent money as well. Hopefully I didn't catch corona. I've also started making headway into the closet ahead of schedule, which is great. One of the things on my to-do list is to go through my wardrobe, but it's kind of difficult to buy clothes right now because most places don't want people trying stuff on. I guess I'll start by tossing stuff I know I won't wear and try to get stuff that I know will fit. Tomorrow I will spend a bit more time on programming, then work on cleaning some more. Sleep (Goal: 8 hours, 11:00 pm-7:00 am) Great! Daily exercise (Goal: 30 min) Same as yesterday. Weather permitting I'd like to get a walk in tomorrow to give my arms a break. Things I am grateful for today (Goal: 5 things) 1. Kindness of strangers 2. Good luck 3. Vegetables 4. My friends 5. Kindness of strangers It's funny thinking back on everything that happened today. I had one negative interaction in the morning that I noticed immediately. I thought about how strange it was that it affected my mood in such a big way. I resolved to try and stay positive and make a good impact on others for the rest of the day. Like magic, every interaction I had with another person for the rest of the day seemed more positive than usual. People just seemed much more friendly. I don't know. Just an interesting observation.

Day #16 Daily reflection: Greetings. This will be short since I don't have access to computer today. Made good progress on my move out checklist. I have a plan to finish going through most of the stuff in the living room tomorrow. If I don't want to put my programming on the back burner though, I might need to move my deadline back. We'll see though. Tomorrow I will sell a good chunk of my nostalgic gaming gear. Wish me luck. Sleep (Goal: 8 hours, 11:00 pm-7:00 am) Perfect. I've felt very good in the morning the past couple of days. Hopefully this continues. Daily exercise (Goal: 30 min) Dumbbell exercises and pull-up bar again Things I am grateful for today (Goal: 5 things) Will report back tomorrow

Day #15 Daily reflection: Yay, 15 days without gaming! *pats self on back* Today was actually a pretty good day! I woke up early (6 am) so I felt like I had a ton of time. I managed to ace my programming assignment, which felt really good after all the work I put into it. I spent a bit more time on the couch than I would have liked in the afternoon, but I think I made up for it later in the day. Side note: I've been following this YouTube channel for the past couple of days and it's REALLY interesting. He has this marble machine video with 140 million views and it's ABSOLUTELY insane. Go check it out. Anyway, his video on focus and productivity was really interesting and I've been thinking about a lot of the stuff that he said about dopamine levels and how that relates to gaming/porn/other stimulation. He stopped listening to music and stopped checking messages on phone/computer/YouTube (to reduce dopamine levels) and made his goal to focus for the entire work day--he said this made him more productive. Thoughts on this? Anyway, like I said later in the day I got kind of sidetracked while trying to clean up my apartment but I think it was ultimately productive. My task for today was to go through my shoes and decide which ones I wanted to keep/toss/donate. What I ran into was that I wasn't sure what shoes I would really want to wear. I've always hated dress shoes but for work they're kind of required, so I've been on this quest to find really comfortable dress shoes. That led to me lurking on reddit looking at shoes, and then socks, and then all sorts of things and it kind of spiraled out of control. But I think it was good because now I know about all different kinds of shoes like bluchers/derbys, bucks, balmorals/oxfords, brogues/wingtips, chelseas, chukkas/desert boots HOLY CRAP WHY ARE THERE SO MANY..... But yeah you get the idea. Right now I only have one pair of dress shoes that I would realistically wear to work, so I'm thinking of getting another. So I managed to spend over THREE HOURS learning about shoes, believe it or not. Then I ate dinner went back at it. This time I started looking at shirts / trousers which got me thinking about laundry. I don't really think too hard about laundry because I live in an apartment and use a communal room. But when I move I'll have access to my own washer and dryer, which should make things a lot easier. Anyway I spent another three hours reading about laundry and how to wash/dry different types of clothing. I think I have a much better idea now of how to take care of my clothes once I start buying new things. Whew. The time really flew by today. Tomorrow I need to take some time to organize my thoughts a bit better, but the rough outline is to continue onto the next lecture and assignment for Week 4 and try to have at least an outline by Monday. I probably need to spend more time on cleaning tomorrow to make sure I can get to closet stuff by Monday as well. And a trip to the grocery store is also in order. I'm not even working right now but I feel like I'm staying busy. I don't know how working folks do it honestly... And imagine having a kid on top of that! ALSO my hair is absolutely killing me right now, I need to get a haircut pronto but nobody is open. Sleep (Goal: 8 hours, 11:00 pm-7:00 am) Got up at 6:00 am since I went to bed early last night. It was great! Daily exercise (Goal: 30 min) Went for a walk. Trail was flooded so that was cool. Things that I'm proud of I'm thinking I want to experiment with this section. Gratitude is great and all, but I'd like to maybe have some different prompts here to switch things up. Let me know if you have any ideas. 1. 15 days of not gaming 2. Perfect score on my programming assignment 3. Waking up early

Congrats on 10 days. I have also slowly noticed that I am living more in the present moment in everyday life. This is something I am excited about because i have struggled with it for a long time. When I am in social situations, sometimes my mind tends to wander.

I'm sorry for your loss. I also started to game more once the pandemic started. I would spend all day online and not really get anything done. Eventually I decided it wasn't worth it to keep playing anymore, and I wound up here. I would still consider playing games that are in-person and social, like card games and board games. But I am done playing games by myself. I don't want to get addicted again.

Hmm. I guess it depends on your mindset. But it is true, there was a time when you didn't exist in this world, and there will be a time when you will be gone from this world. Nothing matters because the universe will end someday anyway, right? You could live your life thinking like that, if you wanted to. How do you think that would make you feel? How do you think that would make other people feel about you? Probably not good. Who wants to live a life with no purpose? But we humans are pretty amazing, and we can change the way we think about life. We can choose to give our lives meaning: whether it be through the promise of an afterlife, through the relationships we share with others, or something else. Once you take responsibility for yourself and your life's purpose, the possibilities are endless. You can make your purpose whatever you want it to be. What is it that makes you happy? What is it that makes you feel fulfilled? Is it a good cheeseburger and a pint of beer? Is it gaming? Is it talking to a friend? Or something you have yet to find out? I think we all quit gaming because we didn't want to play games anymore. Whether or not we realized it, gaming was having an overall negative impact on our lives. That might not be true for everyone who plays games, but it was true for us. Gaming wasn't something we saw as fulfilling our life's purpose anymore--it wasn't leading us to become the people who we wanted to become.

I think it part of it is the environment. Having the pull-up bar and dumbbells now help. But it's kind of weird to set aside a full 30 minutes to do indoor exercises. I'd like to be able to get out of the house more and take a walk.

Day #14 Daily reflection: I realized that it's hard to look at my computer screen at night because it's so bright. I've re-enabled the flux app which I had installed on my computer so that it's less harsh at night. I had it disabled before because I used to stay up all night gaming and it messed with the in-game colors. Much more pleasant to look at now 🙂 Started the day with some new Algorithms lectures. Not really sure what my approach should be to these still. I think maybe I need to better define my goals for this course because i seem to be lacking some motivation and not really knowing what I want to do. Goals: * Become a better programmer. * Learn good programming practices * Become a faster and more efficient programmer Hopefully that helps. I want to make sure I am taking the time to really learn and internalize the material as much as possible. I should take my time with the assignments and make sure I am thinking holistically--what methodologies can I employ to make this code easy to read, fast, and efficient? How can I design a simple and efficient solution to the problem, instead of just coding the first solution that comes to mind? Other, non-nerd news: I've added another milestone in my move-out checklist (MOC) which is due June 1st. Every day I will spend 1.5 hours on the MOC. Today I went through some items I had already cleaned out from my room and sorted them into trash vs. keep/donate. I will go through those items further starting tomorrow until everything is completely sorted--with the goal being Friday as the deadline and Sat/Sun as off days. Then Monday I will begin what I have called "Closet Week", aka sorting through all the garbage in my closet 🙂 Sleep (Goal: 8 hours, 11:00 pm-7:00 am) Got up at 7:00 am! (will continue until Monday, then might try to push back to 6:30 we'll see) Daily exercise (Goal: 30 min) Today I took more breaks throughout the day to get up and do some quick exercises. I kind of liked this format, especially since the weather was crappy today. Things I am grateful for today (Goal: 5 things) 1. My friends 2. flux 3. My pull-up bar and dumbbells 4. My voice 5. My hands Tomorrow will be the 15th day in a row I have gone without gaming. Looking forward to it!

I had the same feeling with that anime lol. A lot of people like it but I got kind of bored with it after a while. I still finished it though.... Would not recommend lol. You could probably find a summary on YouTube somewhere that would explain all the major plot revelations. But I felt like there was a lot of filler.

I've been trying to establish a habit of getting off the computer in the evenings about 2 hours before bed. This helps keep me from gaming and also gives me a bunch of things to do. Here's my full bedtime routine at the moment: Reflection Journal - last thing before getting off the computer for the night is to post my daily reflection journal The next things I do are what I consider "chores" or things that should be done before I start to relax and wind down for bed: Brush Teeth and Floss - Doing this 1-2 hours before bed helps because I'm not actually tired yet. If I still have to brush my teeth when I'm dead tired it really sucks. (Clean dishes) - If there are any dirty dishes in the sink, wash them. Kind of like making your bed, it just makes the next day better. Next, I pick some relaxing activities that help me wind down. Right now all of these are on my phone, so I use the Twilight app to reduce the amount of blue light and also reduce my overall screen brightness. At this point, most of the lights in the house are also off and my bed is made. I tend to sit on the couch until I feel tired and then go straight to bed. (Read) - Still working on this one, but there are a few decent e-reader apps like ReadEra. (Anime) - Watch a couple episodes of my current anime Lastly, the most important thing: Sleep - When you're feeling tired, just go straight to bed. Since you've already brushed your teeth and done whatever else you need to do for the next day, this should be easy. I put my phone far away from my bed so I'm not tempted to grab it if I get restless. I also use my phone for my alarm so I have to get out of bed to turn it off. I recommend you try to wake up and fall asleep at roughly the same time each night, and follow your routine every single day, even on weekends. My example: I wake up at 7:00am now. Two weeks ago I was waking up at 1:00 pm. I followed this routine of going to bed when I got tired and set my alarm for between 7 and 9 hours later (the average amount of sleep most people need.) I found 7 was not enough so I went to 8 hours. Now I get between 8 and 8.5 hours of sleep which seems good for me. If I go to 9 hours I get groggy. Anyway, I tried to move my morning alarm backwards by 15 minutes every day. Eventually I made it to 7:00 am. If you try to move it back too much, you'll just get tired during the day. Short 10-15 minute naps or meditations can help. Struggles: Don't eat anything 2 hours before bed. This really screws you up. In fact, if you eat something right after you wake up, this actually will tune your body in to waking up at that time. Good luck!

Day #13 Daily reflection: REALLY tired, so this will be quick: Birthday party was fun. Again, kind of a lazy day. I'm going to set some deadlines for my house cleaning in preparation for my move next month. June 1st is my first deadline. Need to get some exercise tomorrow. Sleep (Goal: 8 hours, 11:00 pm-7:00 am) Got up at 7:00am! Daily exercise (Goal: 30 min) Nothing in particular, kinda skipped today. Maybe I need to set aside 1-2 times if I really want to do it every day, in case the first time gets filled. Things I am grateful for today (Goal: 5 things) Will report back tomorrow

Day #12 Daily reflection: Not much going on today but it was a good day. Got my laundry done early like I wanted, then ran a couple errands out of the house. Weather was great so I exercised a fair bit more than normal. I've also found that changing my environment helps with exercising in quarantine--I cleaned my room so there's more space to do body-weight exercises. I also have my pull-up bar out and my dumbbells lying out. Makes it a lot easier to randomly decide to get some reps in. Did a couple productive things but not much. Worked on my music and drawing which was different and fun. I've realized that I've been bored with music lately because I never challenge myself or try to learn something new. I need to find things to be inspired by to challenge myself. I never practice anymore like i used to. if I want to get better I need to have some focused practice time instead of just random playing every now and then. So I want to make sure to schedule some time to work on my music. Going to a birthday party tomorrow which should be fun (just family.) Sleep (Goal: 8 hours, 11:00 pm-7:00 am) Got up at 7:15am, trying for 7:00am tomorrow Daily exercise (Goal: 30 min) Run/Walk, Dumbbell exercises, Pull-up bar Things I am grateful for today (Goal: 5 things) 1. My hands. 2. Music 3. Good weather 4. Birds! 5. Vegetables