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mli

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Everything posted by mli

  1. At least you are here. From your previous posts it looks like you've had a couple of minor relapses. And I suppose that's the answer for you. You think of game quitting as of loosing something great. From this point of view you can never be free. Here comes my strange advice. Read any of Allen Carr's books. I've personally quit smoking using his book 5 years ago (in around 5 tries, not a single relapse since). But the most important point in his books is that you are free the moment you get rid of a bad habit. Not in a month, not in a year, but right away. And that what makes quitting permanent. And even if you get overwhelmed by gaming — just be honest with you. Are you having the ball every minute spent playing? How are you feeling in the morning? Is it really worth it?
  2. mli

    Alexey's Dairy

    Heh, finally I've got some time to write the celebration post 105 days on game detox. Also I've started alcohol detox because I need that energy for other things in my life. 20 days and counting. So WOW, I'm awesome I've got some urge to play. But when I imagine the process in details, that urge disappears. Looks like I want to play some very cool game and there's no such game in reality. So reality is waaaay better!
  3. mli

    Alexey's Dairy

    Hm, looks like another month passed by. It's 65 day now. Way easier. The hardest part was to say "I'm in trouble and I need to get rid of gaming completely". Now every day is better. Though sometimes I catch myself gaming and in a few seconds realize that it's a dream. Have not played a single minute while awake for the whole time :-D Now targeting 90 days.
  4. mli

    Alexey's Dairy

    That has been the busy week. And the month has been busy too. But at least it's worth it. 36 days detox and keep on counting. Hmm, 36 days is 10% of the year. That's WOW for me. I've got occasional gaming urges but it has very little to do with the games. It usually means that there's some task I don't want that blocks the future tasks. Or I have no idea on what to do next. I have no urges when I'm resting. And I wonder where did I take so much time as to game. I barely can do my average day plan half of the days. And I have to choose fun activities every day because there are pretty much of them and not that much of my time.
  5. mli

    Alexey's Dairy

    Had just a couple of thoughts about games this week. It was really a busy week. Quick summary of useful thoughts: 1) Energy Gaming takes a lot of energy. Work takes energy first but then fills you back. Don't really know how this works but I feel the best in the evening after the most busy days. Of course, sometimes I'm just plain tired but the energy quickly returns the next day. Learning takes even more energy than gaming. And at first it's not rewarding. But then (in my case I was watching a professional conference for a couple of days) I see that I'm better at something than most people. So learning is like converting energy to confidence with some lag. 2) Games are boring I've read quite a few LitRPGs for the last year. And it was great for me. The reason is that when I feel the urge to play, I recall what is it like and then compare it to LitRPG ideas. And it's like eating a potato after reading about all the best world deserts for the whole day. I just don't want that ugly potato 3) I got some money for a project and then I tried to spend them on something cool. I spent a few hours thinking about what do I want and then imagining getting it and estimating the level of fun. I ordered one book that I wanted to buy. And then all the next ideas were too boring. The fun/price ratio was too low. So I went to sleep. And the next morning my brain gave me pretty clear answer. Just getting the answer felt great. So now I have a new hobby - sketching. I've chosen some inexpensive markers and pencils to start, a couple of "complete noob's guide"s. And I have the time of my life doing it. I think that's the key now — I don't set some high goals, my goal is one page of drawing per day. (And it's cool how all things are related. Watching my first 5 videos game me a lot of ideas on improving my photography. Something that is not obvious in photography is a commonplace in sketching.) Stay tuned for the more updates
  6. mli

    Alexey's Dairy

    Thoughts from yesterday. It's possible to cut some time playing games when you think you waste your time. But then you get to some limit, say 2-4 hours a day which seems pretty ok to waste on video games. And you need really strong why to keep going after that. Now I need another valuable resource - energy. I'd say that I have 15-16 hours of awake time but I have 6-8 hours of productive time at good days and 2-4 hours at worse days. And it's more than enough for a nice and interesting life. But when games come in, even with 2-4 hours a day, they eat that very productive time. And sometimes they leave you with just a couple of productive hours per day, and sometimes with zero, and pretty often with less than zero. And less than zero means that you'd need more rest and that remaining hours would be deducted from next day. And the quest for energy is what fuels me this time.
  7. mli

    Alexey's Dairy

    Hmmm, looks like a year passed. Quick summary for it: 1 month wasted in one game but fortunately vacation broke the habit~10 evenings in another game spread over the year which is OK, and that's it for the sad parthad 3 vacations, visited 9 cities, 6 of which for the first time in lifeconducted my first 2-day trainingdoing my job better than anytime in the last 5 yearsgot new diver certification, Peak Performance Buoyancylearned to cook Thai foodNow I have a big goal set (I don't want to discuss details until it's done) and I need all the energy I can get. So I'm going to repeat the Respawn to clear the remaining game addiction issues.
  8. mli

    Alexey's Dairy

    Here I am again. Life has so much for me that I have no time to write to the diary Have not run a game since April 23rd and I doubt I'll do it anytime soon. When I have a boring moment I still have thoughts about video games but they vanish pretty quickly. Also I've started participating in programming contests again and that's way better competition than MMORPGs. Now I'm going to watch a couple cartoon episodes and then to go to bed - it's volunteering weekend and tomorrow have to start at 5 am
  9. mli

    Alexey's Dairy

    I had a car accident a few days ago. I'm ok but looks like I need a new car. The bright side is that I was unable to think about games for a few days. I've got a beta invite this Saturday and I installed that game just to uninstall it 10 minutes later. It was so boring. Actually the worst thing for the previous week was that my coffee maker broke. I ordered a new one but they'll deliver it in a few days. But finally I'm getting fully automatic coffee machine and that makes me happy because I need coffee right after I wake up. I suppose I'll quit drinking coffee at some point but right now I need it as lesser evil. Also I got one of the reasons for my video game addiction - for some reason I hate weekends. I like work days and I make huge plans for weekend but when I get there - everything is boring and I wait for the Monday to come.
  10. mli

    Alexey's Dairy

    Day two. Today has been the day to see how much I am addicted to video games. My mood has shown more aerobatics than a typical airshow :-D It has been up and down and any side possible. I was able to keep more or less online-games-sober for the last two years so the effect comes from usual "safe" video games. So I'm really happy for my decision to get rid of all of them. So I've had a few unpleasant hours but fortunately I have some mood related food supplements so now I'm fine. Also I've got a new toy, Raspberry Pi 3, that's a very small computer, now I'm trying to load Linux on it. I've attached a pic. And finally I've got my car back from service. I don't use it much but I like to be able to go driving around the city any night.
  11. mli

    Alexey's Dairy

    Day one. Not a very productive day, I had to drink coffee to wake my brain up, and the rest of the day has been slow. I've finished a few small tasks though. I had a few game related thoughts but they were silly. Something like "but you can finish your legendary quest line in wow" or "you have not seen each storyline in swtor". But for me it sounds like "you have not tried dying of overdose". I don't want to try any of these. My cat helps a great deal, when I pet him my brain gets rid of all game thoughts, that's some real cat magic
  12. You should definitely try Gentoo Linux, if you are able to install and use in, you'll definitely become a Linux professional :-D
  13. TV is even worse time and life eater. In video games you have to interact with the enviroment, in case of TV it's just you and sofa. Netflix/Prime/etc are specially designed to get you on hook, just like WoW. You can watch movies but in this manner - you make a list of movies for the next week/month and you can't add anything to current week/month. I have a list of 5 series I really enjoy and I go to a cinema for everything else. But I must say Netflix is a good way to learn another language, right now I'm watching Spanish movies via Spanish Netflix. As for the treadmill - you can get some neutral movies that are specially made for watching while running. Audiobooks are also great as they allow you to get new information when your brain is idle - while running, driving, etc.
  14. Day zero. Removed every game from the computer, wrote intro on this forum and signed up for Respawn. Even filled worksheet 1. Instead of playing Diablo I: a) solved my math tasks (have not used math since college and now I need it for professional education so now I take lessons to regain math knowledge); b) wrote a letter about potential chance to become a trainer as a side-job, and I like to teach It's pretty good day and I've finished the most urgent tasks. If I am a good boy tomorrow, I'll be able to finish all overdue tasks. That's my big goal for tomorrow.
  15. Hello, I'm Alexey from Russia, and I'm 36. I'm here because I finally decided to quit playing all video games. By the way, is it ok to play Rocksmith (it's a game for learning the real guitar)? I started playing like 25 years ago, but it was ok back then, I had a lot of free time and I was not an addict. Things changed after I started playing WoW. I started trial on the cold day of January 23th, 2007. In two days I upgraded to full version. Then I don't remember most of the next two and a half years, I quickly fell as low as hard core raiding. In the end of that period I have two chars with total time played about 200 days (that's 4'800 hours, and if you do anything for 10'000 hours then you become a pro). Then it went in cycles, like 1 year off and then playing for half the year. But the worse thing was that I became a video game addict. I no longer can control the time I play, I know when to stop but I can't stop. Recently I've reinstalled WoW for a laugh and that ate 10 days of my life. After that I finally decided that I don't want to be an addict. I got rid of smoking, it was so great, so now I want to get rid of all the video games. Last week has been great in giving me the goals for the next few years so now I have a great plan and it does not have any time for video games addiction. So I'm in the process of removing the games from my computer and I plan to write daily notes in my journal. So journey has already started, wish me luck
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