[Rasa's diary]

On 11/16/2020 at 9:27 AM, codepants said:

What time do you get up and how much sleep do you get?

I have a schedule to wake up at 7:45am daily regardless of what day it is but sometimes I can't meet it. Usually it's because my work day stuffs my schedule up and I have to work overtime to meet deadlines. My ideal sleep time is 10:45pm, which will ensure 9 hours of sleep but recently I've just been going for getting to sleep before midnight. Recommended hours of sleep is 7-9 hours so try very hard to not go above or below that because oversleep is a real thing and isn't beneficial.

On 11/16/2020 at 11:30 AM, dasvira said:

Read your entire diary, keep up the good work!

Going into a detox myself. I installed coldturkey today because of your experiences with it, hope it works (i.e. I have the willpower not to cheat).

I actually use youtube and facebook for studying sometimes, but it is not an essential source and I think I can quit it for a month or so. Those are some of the most toxic and malicious coorporations I know, their entire operation resolve around getting you addicted to it. There is a book named Digital Minimalism that denounces that.

Even after, unsubscribing to everything, clearing and pausing my search/video history and moving all my privacy setting to max; youtube keep sending me suggestions that clearly shows they still have my data somehow and I usually click on the links with the content I want to avoid which is really frustrating. Same thing goes to Facebook, but I find it easier to manage it.

Sad part is that my google and facebook account are linked to most of my other accounts on other sites, so there is no way I can delete it.

Thanks for the read and I appreciate the support! Best of luck with the detox 🙂. Coldturkey is great and you can set it so that you have to type for 15 minutes worth of text to disable a setting which is incentive enough for me. It also prevents you from uninstalling it so that's why it's pretty effective. What do you mean by using Facebook to study btw? I personally don't have the Facebook app installed or browse facebook.com and I only use Messenger so I can use it for chatting purposes only. In terms of YouTube, yea nothing really matches it in terms of video services so I can see why it's difficult to not use that.

 

[Rasa's diary]

Day 37/90 detox
13/11/2020 Friday
Play games / watch game related videos? No
Workout? Yes (push)
Study? No
Duolingo? Yes
Reading? Yes
Meditate? Yes
Podcasts? Yes
Sleep before midnight? Yes, 11:59pm

This is a catchup diary entry. Today I went out to sort out a few things. When I got home, I did all of my daily habits. It was a productive day!

Day 38/90 detox
14/11/2020 Saturday
Play games / watch game related videos? No
Workout? Yes (pull)
Study? No
Duolingo? Yes
Reading? Yes
Meditate? No
Podcasts? No
Sleep before 11:30pm? Yes, 11:29pm

Something significant I am working on is winding back my sleep time. My target from here on out is 11:30pm so you may notice an adjustment to the above daily habit. I worked on a task for work for pretty much the whole day and achieved a nice flow state.

[Rasa's diary]

Day 34/90 detox
10/11/2020 Tuesday
Play games / watch game related videos? No
Workout? Yes (Yoga)
Study? No
Duolingo? Yes
Reading? Yes
Meditate? Yes
Podcasts? Yes
Sleep before midnight? Yes, 11:59pm

This is a catchup diary entry and I’ve already forgotten most of what happened on this day. It was a work day. I decided to implement Yoga into my exercise regime since I found my legs cramp easily when trying to fit through a small space. This stuff is super hard since I don’t normally use those tendons so it’s like I’ve started working out from scratch.

Day 35/90 detox
11/11/2020 Wednesday
Play games / watch game related videos? No
Workout? Yes (Yoga)
Study? No
Duolingo? Yes
Reading? Yes
Meditate? No
Podcasts? Yes
Sleep before midnight? No: 1:30am

This is a catchup diary entry and I’ve already forgotten most of what happened on this day. It was a work day lol.

Day 36/90 detox
12/11/2020 Thursday
Play games / watch game related videos? No
Workout? No
Study? No
Duolingo? No
Reading? No
Meditate? No
Podcasts? Yes
Sleep before midnight? Yes, 11:59pm

This diary entry is for yesterday. Today was a work day. It was a fairly messed up evening and I wasn’t very productive. Had an issue with a friend of mine but was cleared up the next day.

[Rasa's diary]

Day 33/90 detox
09/11/2020 Monday
Play games / watch game related videos? No
Workout? Yes (Pull)
Study? No
Duolingo? Yes
Reading? Yes
Meditate? No
Podcasts? Yes
Sleep before midnight? Yes, 11:59pm

This diary entry is for yesterday. Today was a work day. When I got home, I was a little unproductive however and managed to fit in all the daily habits I had planned with the exception of meditation. I need to work on starting meditation earlier.

[Rasa's diary]

17 hours ago, codepants said:

I will miss reading your updates, but of course, what you post is up to you. Keep going. 💪

Thanks for the encouragement @codepants. I never really stopped to consider the impact that could have on others so I have now decided to first write up my own diary, then a more general one which I am comfortable to post. Onwards to you too!

This diary entry is for yesterday.

Day 32/90 detox
08/11/2020 Sunday
Play games / watch game related videos? No
Workout? Yes (Pull)
Duolingo? Yes
Reading? Yes
Meditate? Yes
Podcasts? Yes
Sleep before midnight? Yes, 11:58pm

Today was a powerhouse of habits completed and I plan to keep it up. As per ‘the slight edge’, making a plan is important to get you started but the plan you initially create is rarely the same plan that you will use to achieve your end goals, however, starting is what matters. Was a very productive day as I completed many set tasks. I have also added an extra habit to keep up with, which is to listen to some informative podcasts such as the Ted talks on Spotify. There’s a super interesting one on the intricacies of the US presidential election which I highly recommend.
 

[Rasa's diary]

Day 30/90 detox
06/11/2020 Friday
Play games / watch game related videos? No
Workout? Yes (Push)
Study? No
Duolingo? Yes
Reading? No
Meditate? No
Sleep before midnight? No, 2am

Day 31/90 detox
07/11/2020 Saturday
Play games / watch game related videos? No
Workout? Yes (Running)
Duolingo? Yes
Reading? No
Meditate? No
Sleep before midnight? No, 1:30 am

[Rasa's diary]

I have made the decision that I'll take my diary offline since I feel like there's a lot of things I want to write about, but are too personal to put online. However, I will still be making habit updates for every day as a form of accountability.

Day 28/90 detox

Play games/watch game related videos? No

Exercise? Yes (Legs)

Study? No

Duolingo? Yes

Reading? No

Meditate? No

Sleep before midnight?: No - 4:00am

 

Day 29/90 detox

Play games/watch game related videos? No

Exercise? No

Study? No

Duolingo? Yes

Reading? Yes

Meditate? No

Sleep before midnight?: No - 1:30am

[Rasa's diary]

Day 26/90 detox

Play games/watch game related videos? No

Exercise? No

Study? No

Duolingo? Yes

Reading? Yes

Meditate? Yes

Sleep before midnight?: No - 3:30am

This diary entry is for the day before yesterday. Currently I'm not studying because there is an issue regarding what I'm studying for next year that I'm trying to get more information on. In the meantime, I have upped my reading and also made more effort towards social aspects of life, e.g. friends. I'm lacking the discipline to sleep and this is something that I need to improve on.

 

Day 27/90 detox

Play games/watch game related videos? No

Exercise? No

Study? No

Duolingo? Yes

Reading? Yes

Meditate? No

Sleep before midnight?: No - 3:30am

This diary entry is for yesterday. Today was a work day and I worked past when I normally finish work since there was so much to do. The US election is about to start so there was quite a lot of interesting discussion with my family. Once again sleep time was an issue and I talked to a friend of mine till quite late. Solid deep convo though. I'm resetting my body clock tomorrow by keeping firmly to my schedule and disregarding every other commitment after I finish work if necessary to ensure that from 9pm onwards, it's just exercise, and get ready to sleep and be in bed by 10:45pm.

[Rasa's diary]

Day 25/90 detox

Play games/watch game related videos? No

Exercise? Running

Study? Yes

Duolingo? Yes

Reading? Yes

Meditate? Yes

Sleep before midnight?: No - 3:30am

This diary is for yesterday. Had an outing for the morning and then primarily worked on work related research for the rest of the day.  The time at which I sleep is still an issue. I have implemented a habit tracker app from 4 days ago which I forgot to mention until now. Adding a few more daily habits to the above section now.

[Rasa's diary]

Day 24/90 detox

Play games/watch game related videos? No

Exercise? Yes (Pull)

Study? No

Duolingo? Yes

Sleep time: 3:15am

This diary is for yesterday. Slept very late but still managed to get 7 hrs of sleep. Still trying to wind back my sleep time. I was working on organising my finances and did some research for work so I would still consider it to be a productive day. Did around 4-5 hours of research.

[Rasa's diary]

Day 23/90 detox

Play games/watch game related videos? No

Exercise? Yes (Push)

Study? No

Duolingo? Yes

Sleep time: 5am

This diary is for yesterday. Slept very late but still managed to get 7 hrs of sleep. I went out for a shopping trip to sort out a few things and didn't really follow my schedule today. I also talked to a friend of mine for a few hours which I felt was really good for my mental health. It really made my day. It's pretty obvious what I need to improve on. I'm resetting my body clock tomorrow.

[Rasa's diary]

Dear diary,

My god does time go by fast. I've forgotten to write a diary entry for 2 days.

Day 20-21/90 detox

Play games/watch game related videos? No

Exercise? Yes (running on one of those days)

Study? Yes (1 hr per day)

Duolingo? Yes

Sleep time: 2:09am, 11:30pm

Yea i'm blocking Youtube permanently. It is literally screwing with my sleep time. Slept before midnight the day after I did that. Stuff Youtube lmao

Day 22/90 detox

Play games/watch game related videos? No

Exercise? No (no time)

Study? No (no time)

Duolingo? Yes

Sleep time:

Today was a good day. I slept at 11:30 and had a pretty good night's sleep. Had work during the day but stayed late. Didn't have time to do much else.

 

[Rasa's diary]

Dear diary,

Day 18/90 detox

Play games/watch game related videos? No

Exercise? Yes (push)

Study? Yes (1.5 hrs)

Duolingo? Yes

Sleep time: 2:30am

This diary entry is for Saturday. I procrastinated a lot and wasted a lot of time on Youtube. Not too much else to say 😞. Schedule wasn't followed.

 

Dear diary,

Day 19/90 detox

Play games/watch game related videos? No

Exercise? No (rest day)

Study? Yes (2 hrs)

Duolingo? Yes

Sleep time: 3:30am

This diary entry is for Sunday. I procrastinated a lot again... I have a presentation due on Tuesday and it's stressing me out. Schedule wasn't followed.

 

Dear diary,

Day 20/90 detox

Play games/watch game related videos? No

Exercise? Yes (push exercises)

Study? Yes (3 hrs)

Duolingo? Yes

Sleep time: 3:30am

This diary entry is for Monday. I procrastinated a lot, however, I finished my presentation for Tuesday. Will write more detailed diaries tomorrow.

[Rasa's diary]

Dear diary,

Day 17/90 detox

Play games/watch game related videos? No

Exercise? Yes (legs)

Study? Yes (50 minutes)

Duolingo? Yes

Sleep time: 11:30pm

This diary entry is for yesterday. Standard work day. Didn't get up to anything too fancy.

 

[Rasa's diary]

On 10/23/2020 at 12:19 PM, royal panda said:

I am glad the time blocking worked for you, has your mood changed about schedules with what occurred yesterday or is it still the same?

I think it's pretty difficult for me to stay on schedule, but i end up being more productive so i acrually prefer having a schedule now.

 

[Rasa's diary]

Dear diary,

Day 16/90 detox

Play games/watch game related videos? No

Exercise? Yes (running)

Study? Yes (50 minutes)

Duolingo? Yes

Sleep time: 11:30pm

This diary entry is for yesterday. It was a work day for me but I felt was very successful since I managed to complete all the things that I had scheduled. I was running behind around 10-15 minutes for sone sections of my schedule, however, I was able to incorporate exercise, study, helping around the house and sleep before midnight into the evening of a day I don't normally have too much time in. Time blocking is truly powerful!

Something I can work on is to be more punctual when moving from task to task. Sleep time is also another one.

[Rasa's diary]

Dear diary,

Day 15/90 detox

Play games/watch game related videos? No

Exercise? No (rest day)

Study? Yes (only 20 minutes)

Duolingo? Yes

Sleep time: 11:30pm

This diary entry is for yesterday. I had work so there wasn't too much personal time to work with. I did some study on the train and continued working on my schedule at home. I now have all my work days planned out. It's fairly jam packed so i'll see how it goes today and make modifications if necessary. I still yet to have plan out the days that i'm at home. Still need to work on a consistent sleep schedule and not procrastinate about sleep.

[Rasa's diary]

9 hours ago, codepants said:

Maybe you could group activities together? I'm not sure travel, work, and study would make a good group, but there might be some.

What about recurring events? Then if the time changes for one day every now and then you can just click and drag in Google Calendar.

I'm testing out a very granular system first but if it becomes unmanageable, i think grouping is a good option.

Recurring events are great and I already have those set up in Google Calendar!

[Rasa's diary]

Dear diary,

Day 14/90 detox

Play games/watch game related videos? No

Exercise? Yes (pull exercises)

Study? No

Duolingo? Yes

Sleep time: 11:00 pm

This diary entry is for yesterday. Although I didn't study, I was doing research into scheduling and time blocking, which @royal panda had mentioned many days before. I have started creating a weekly schedule in Google Calendar but it's taking a lot of time to allocate individual time blocks to pretty much every activity in my life, including travel, work, study, etc. I am feeling more fulfilled, knowing that my time is accountable and I also have a sense that time is quite precious now that it is all planned in front of me. I also managed to sleep before midnight, which I will keep up.

[Rasa's diary]

Dear diary,

Day 13/90 detox

Play games/watch game related videos? No

Exercise? Yes (push exercises)

Study? Yes (6 hours)

Duolingo? Yes

Sleep time: 2:30 am

This diary entry is for yesterday. Woke up at 11:30am and pretty much did the same thing as the day before. Only difference was I went out to do some shopping. I understand the significance of scheduling now since I only had 2 meals during the day. I was very productive, however, I literally forgot to eat. 

[Rasa's diary]

Dear diary,

Day 12/90 detox

Play games/watch game related videos? No

Exercise? Yes (running 5km)

Study? Yes (8 hours)

Duolingo? Yes

Sleep time: 2:30 am

Woke up at 11am using an alarm and slept for a good 8 hrs. Immediately started studying while eating at the same time. Ended up studying for 8 hours today using a pomodoro 50-10! I'm adding studying to my list of dailies since it's something I intend to keep on a streak. I haven't run 5 kms for so long and I'm finally back. That's usually what I use as an indicator for my level of fitness.

Something to improve on: sleeping time. I need to dial it back to pre midnight. I think it's a good idea to track when I sleep to hold myself accountable for that.

[Rasa's diary]

Dear diary,

Day 11/90 detox

Play games? No

Watch game related videos? No

Exercise? Yes (leg exercises)

Learned language using Duolingo? Yes, around 10 minutes in total.

This diary entry is for yesterday. I woke up fairly late but I started studying at home. I'm using a pomodoro 50-10 and I did 3 of those sessions so that was around 2 hrs and 30 minutes of studying. Focusing is no longer an issue for me now and I fully intend to ramp it up. I also helped with chores around the house like the dishes for both lunch and dinner.

[Rasa's diary]

Dear diary,

Day 9-10/90 detox

Play games? No

Watch game related videos? No

Exercise? No (break day)

Combing diary entries for 2 days. Been watching a fair bit of TV shows and not too many productive activities. I feel like I'm losing myself a bit. Self motivation is quite a challenge for me atm. I did go through an entire linkedin course on Motivation though and took 2 pages worth of notes. They are very actionable notes so I will implement them now.

[Rasa's diary]

Dear diary,

Day 8/90 detox

Play games? No

Watch game related videos? No

Exercise? Yes (running)

Learned language using Duolingo? Yes, around 5 minutes in total.

Once again, this diary entry is for yesterday. I had work during the day, and studied on the way home for 30 mins again. I also washed my clothes and did some interval running for 12 minutes (goal is 20 minutes).

@royal panda
I'll def look into scheduling for the days when i'm home the whole day because i have found that those days are usually super unstructured.

@codepants

I am on social media but funnily enough that's not the activity i spend the most time on (i hardly spend any time on social media). Youtube was a big one for me in the past before i blocked it.

[Rasa's diary]

Dear diary,

Day 7/90 detox

Play games? No

Watch game related videos? No

Exercise? Yes (push exercises)

Learned language using Duolingo? Yes, around 10 minutes in total.

Once again, this diary entry is for yesterday. It was actually a pretty jam packed day where I had work during the day, studied for the first time in what seems like forever on my way home on the train for around 30 minutes, then got home, ate and WASHED MY CLOTHES. Been putting that off for so long lol. I then went out to shop for some food and came home and exercised before bed. I slept a little past midnight but this still ensures i get 7 hours of sleep.

@royal panda
by time blocking do you mean like scheduling and planning your day? I hate schedules and have never really ever madr one for myself but i'll look into it. I'm definetely doing the other things you mentioned though :D