MmmWatermelon

Day 5, early afternoon Yesterday I went out and worked in a nearby juice place I had never been in before, which was nice. Enjoyed some fresh organic hippy-dippy veggie juice and felt productive for the hour or so I stayed. Worked some more at home afterwards and got done with the current piece of the project I'm working on which left me feeling like I got something done. I then spent a bit more time looking up local therapists and left some messages. One of them called me back this morning and I scheduled something for next week; I don't think seeing a therapist is something I'm going to make a big deal out of...it's completely covered by my insurance to go once a week apparently so at the very least it'll just be talking to another human and bouncing thoughts off of them. At best I might gain some significant insight and maybe strategies to cope with difficult emotions. I definitely feel good not having to pay for this since I am trying to scrape some money together I did splurge a little bit on a few new drawing pencils this morning...accidentally bought some more expensive ones than maybe cost me $10 extra. Either way, it was time, some of the ones I was using were getting so short there was nothing to grab and I probably won't need to get any new ones for two years; feels good to have a 2B again, probably my favorite hardness pencil and I've been drawing without one lately! Yesterday went to the ocean in the evening and watched the surfers at one of my favorite spots and walked along the shore in the deepening dusk, digging my feet in the delicious sand. Also had a chance to catch up over the phone with a good friend in Boulder which was very fun. Had very relaxing yoga sessions both last night and this morning, feeling as though I'm really starting to breathe off some of that tension accumulated from sitting crunched at a desk for too many hours...that's a nice thing to notice. Thinking of breakfast this morning I started salivating for a bagel with eggs and mushrooms...used to live near some places that served some good ones like that. So since I had eggs and mushrooms and cheese in the fridge I picked up plain bagels and made meself a delicious (and budget conscious!) poached egg bagel, yum; now if I could just figure out how to contain all the runny things next time..hehe Not much to do for work today until I hear back from somebody else so I'm just taking it easy playing around with my new pencils.

Day 4: after I wrote my day 3 journal I kinda crashed and took a 4 hour nap; feels like there's a lot of rebalancing to be done with my body and mind...I think constantly switching between playing games all night (sometimes for 24 hours straight ) and waking up early in the morning for several months has been pretty confusing on my body's circadian rhythms...what makes sense right now is just be patient with myself and try to be as mindful as I can of what I need to rebalance my system. My energy did come back in the evening and I took a nice walk in the darkness. I oftentimes find it relaxing to walk at night on the trail near my house and sometimes play my best harmonica in the quiet of the evening. Last night I felt called to just sit quietly and listen attentively to the song of the crickets for a good forty minutes and just pay attention to all the subtleties going on. I was a little bummed to miss the dancing especially since being more social is something I acutely need to work on, but that's alright, there'll be more opportunities. I did a pretty intense hour long hip-opening yoga sequence and slept quite well despite the long nap. Today I woke up earlier again, around 6 and had a filling breakfast of an omelette with veggies and sausage; felt hungry since I had dinner quite early last night. Then I went for a walk and my body felt quite good after the yoga last night. I feel like since I started practicing yoga more and more regularly during the last few weeks I've been able to slowly walk longer and longer without much discomfort in my back, which is very reassuring. Definitely something that feels positive and I intend to keep doing! I decided not to go right into work but do some drawing for a while which I got really into and it was very enjoyable. This is definitely a good activity for me for just relaxing if I'm going to have cravings in the next couple of weeks and to fill the time and it gives me a good feeling of satisfaction. I think I'm going to challenge myself to go work in a coffee shop for a while today just to change my routine around a bit. I definitely do have this difficult to describe feeling in the background of my mind as if something is missing or a bit of fogginess in my brain which I at least think is related to the lack of gaming. It's sort of like my brain is asking "when are we going to get to...you know, that thing that feels good!" It's a bit difficult to describe, not sure that does it justice, but it's sort of both in the background while also somewhat acute. I suppose this is related to the whole dopamine thing and so on and goes away after a while, but it's a little disconcerting to notice it : ) and it probably has to do with what cause me to relapse before. Well I suppose what everyone always says is to try to just stay present with what is happening so I will try my best...take care all!

Day 3: Got everything done I wanted to do yesterday, felt like I really used the energy I found myself with and seized the day. It was a great feeling! Even went for a longer hike in the evening after everything and tired myself out; beautiful sunset! Also to relax in the evening, got started on a drawing I'm pretty happy with so far, just a portrait of someone working off a photograph. Also had a great chat Skype with Alex, new accountability partner, I think we will have a good partnership since we are starting these 90 day detox at about the same time. I'm looking forward to trying the detox with this as extra support this time around. Last time I had also found an accountability partner who is a great person and fun to chat with, but he was far ahead in having quit games for a long time and having a busy family and school life so he wasn't visiting the forum much anymore. Today I'm feeling tired though still not as tired as Day 1 and I slept quite well, having a bunch of pleasant dreams and waking up a bit later in the morning. One of the dreams from later toward morning was playing chess with my sister oddly enough, which I don't think we've done since being little kids : ) Yes tired...I guess I'm just feeling the fact that I was pretty active yesterday and got a bunch of blood drawn that my body is rebuilding. I meditated after waking up even though my mind felt pretty foggy, I guess that's just how things are today. Been sitting down to work for a few hours even if it feels like it's going pretty slowly (currently working at home on the computer part-time). The thought of checking the forum of my previous online Minecraft community definitely easily comes up while I'm at my computer working, since it was something to easily do mindlessly in the background while waiting for something to upload for example. I resisted this temptation yesterday and gave in to it once today for a minute today then quickly decided to change my password on the account there so I wouldn't be tempted to even involve myself on the forum in the future; I resolve to do my best to let go of this piece too because it wouldn't make any sense to keep this connection to something I'm letting go of. Anywho, I will try to keep having a semi productive afternoon and maybe I'll have a bit more energy by the time the evening rolls around to go dancing, even if for a little while.

Thank you all for the warm welcomes, nice to be back Day 1 & 2: Wasn't in the best mood most of yesterday...I had a lot of trouble sleeping the previous night and finally fell asleep in the morning and slept into the early afternoon, but still felt tired. I lounged around playing some chess online for a while and watching some Netflix, not feeling like I could consider myself very awake...I was feeling a bit stressed out over a work project that I was really wanting to get done so I finally decided to get into beast mode and at least crank that out before evening since I had some phone calls with friends planned. I was feeling really angry while working for some reason because it was something I wasn't enjoying but just wanting to be done with it. Once that was all done and over with I was able to relax by walking around on a very pleasant evening and listening to the crickets and then talking to two good friends on the phone for a couple hours. That really relaxed me and put me in a good mood then I did yoga for over an hour and meditated for 20 minutes right before bed. By the time I hit the hay I was as peaceful as a baby and had a sound sleep.. Today felt like the total opposite...woke up completely refreshed around 6am and was ready to go go...I think the difference may have been that the previous night I had done some work after doing yoga and meditating and also had a bit of a heavy late night meal while working...seems likely that's what contributed to my sleeplessness so I will try to avoid eating late in the future and stick with doing a slow, relaxing yoga sequence right before bed which I have mostly been doing the last few weeks and it works to put me to sleep, and probably avoid any computer time right before bed, this probably just makes my body "prepare" to have a whole night of gaming or something, who knows . I just made some dandy blend tea and got to work this morning completely unstressed and able to work slowly...noticing the reflection of some trees outside in my mug of milky tea as something that made a nice photo. After working for a couple hours I did a bit of neck & shoulder yoga and meditated, which was quite nice. Then I finally had breakfast at 10am and now I'm planning out the rest of my day. First on the list is to go get a blood test after talking to a doctor the other week. If I'm going to go see a therapist about anxiety I think it'd be good to rule out something physical like a thyroid problem as being the cause, plus it's a good opportunity to get some general picture of what's going on with my body as I haven't done anything like this in a long time. Also planning on grabbing a few groceries and then spending part of the afternoon figuring some stuff out about my insurance and looking for local therapists. Then it's kind of freeform but I might write some e-mails and letters or maybe do something creative like draw or play some harmonica, we'll see what feels good! Also have a tentative Skype call with a new accountability partner in the late evening, if his schedule allows it. Feeling energetic and excited today...grateful for: - all the awesome yoga teachers that upload videos to Youtube - having a delicious breakfast and in being in a good mood to enjoy it

Hi there, Back after a lengthy pause from this forum. My last several months have been a mix of half-hearted attempts to stop gaming which lasted at most a week at a time, and time spent binging on Hearthstone and Minecraft. It was an odd experience for me getting pretty involved in a Minecraft online community for a while, since the majority of the gaming I did through most of the last ten years has been offline old games. Anyway, I am really tired of the negativity I've been experiencing with online gaming, yet another reason to walk away from this, and decided to come back to this forum as extra support. Looking back on the last few months, I think it was a lot easier for me to be posting on here when I thought I was succeeding at the 90 day detox and have kept putting it off until I might have some forum of success to speak of. Sadly, I haven't gotten there yet and I think I need to accept that I just need to come here more for the support than anything, even if that is mostly from me getting my thoughts out there in written form. I think importantly, what I am also learning is that I keep going back to gaming because of my seeming lack of capacity to deal with built up emotions that I've been carrying with me for a long time. One of the things I resolve to do this week is to look for a therapist or counselor kind of person to help me in this area. What else? I have been meditating and practicing yoga from online videos quite regularly lately and this is something I'm really enjoying has been becoming part of my routine. I completed the Headspace pack on anxiety and I'm currently in the middle of the one on self-esteem. I think it can be quite helpful. Day 0 gratitude: -having some good laughs over the phone with my friend tonight -taking a nice walk in the evening when the sun was setting and running into a neighbor I like and then walking and chatting with her for a while Well, that's it for this entry, I will probably feel more wordy on a different occasion. I hope everyone else on here who has been trying to walk away from gaming has had better self discipline than me and things are going well!

Thanks for all your positive thinking Cam, definitely needing to practice more of that myself, sometimes it's way too easy for me to swing from positive to negative instead of just having positive thinking as my default mode of operation : 0 Day 2.20 I went down to Oceanside to help out my old teacher with his backyard projects. It was great hanging out with him, his two very mellow dogs, and being outside on a nice day doing some sweaty work of shoveling, laying down some gravel, and pulling out ivy, and getting paid for it! I've done some of this kind of work here and there over the years so it was definitely a gauge to show me how I am indeed more out of shape than I've been in a while, as I would have suspected! Sometimes I find it so relaxing to be working with plants, smelling the smells of the dirt and grass, and garden, very grateful to get to do this today. I was pretty out of it by the time we finished, quite tired and my head hurting slightly, but we went out for a bite afterwards and that totally brought me back to life, food always tastes so good after a good workout. One other thing that came out of today is that my teacher invited me to go canoeing down a stretch of the Colorado river in Arizona where he likes to go a lot and take people. This would actually be a really good trip for me to get back into the outdoors as it isn't too physically demanding (it's a very mellow stretch of the river with no rapids and such) and cool little slot canyons in the sides with hot springs and petroglyphs. Sounds super amazing and I think we're gonna go for it in about two weeks! More motivation to take good care of my body and feel up for it, and I think it would be a huge confidence booster in learning to trust my body again. It's also been a small dream of mine for a couple of years to go down a stretch of the Colorado by boat, woohoo! I was beat when I got home and took a long nap until the evening; I had meant to go to a tai chi class in the evening I just learned about the other day but I guess I didn't make it this time around since I slept right through the late afternoon, that's alright, I think there is one on Thursday I could go to. A friend of mine called asking me for advice on a Big Sur trail she's interested in backpacking on and I had a lot of fun catching up and chatting with her about Big Sur and some of my past trips there and getting the pulse of the Bay Area mushroom hunting season this winter from her.

Day 2.19 I had a pretty good day today...was lucky there was an opening at my chiropractor when I called in the morning and I went around noon. I enjoyed talking to the secretary while waiting, she is a really interesting and very sweet person, we've been becoming good buddies. Did some grocery shopping and played around with harmonica a bit in the afternoon and then I had a tutoring session. I don't know why but I had a bit of an anxiety attack at some point during the tutoring session, I felt like my mind just could not focus on what I was trying to do for a couple of minutes...but I guess I just focused on my belly breathing for a minute and stumbled my way through a problem or two then I felt better, mostly I really enjoy working with this particular kid who is very bright and easy to be around. And he's got a really cute dog who always likes to cuddle with you while you are working on the math, not bad : ) When I got home I was feeling still kinda out of it so I made a really good chicken soup out of stuff I bought earlier while listening to some nice music; feel a lot better after that and now I am just tired and wanting to go to bed early...almost fell asleep on the floor stretching; guess sometimes you just need a good nourishing meal to take the edge off of everything. Tomorrow I'm also needing to get up early to go help my old teacher with some landscaping, hope my back will be up for it! I've also got a little bit more computer work request from some folks who run a jewelry company who I worked with a bit last year, so it's nice that I have a chance of making some more moneys with this. Grateful for: - nourishing chicken soup - having a really organized room lately - having some good work opportunities this week - my family enjoying the music I was playing in the kitchen a lot Good night to you!

Day 2.18 So I guess I will continue the journal with the same numbering system even if it hasn't been game free the whole time; I totally feel some inner resistance to this because I have a tendency to be a perfectionist but exactly for this reason I am going to just try to pick off where I left off; in fact I think the whole idea of being able to start over with a "clean slate" is one of the things that attracts me to gaming in the first place, or some kind of tendency I developed through having that privilege in gaming worlds, I dunno which came first, it feels like a chicken and egg kind of situation. I'm grateful that I was able to sleep last night at a decent hour and wake up early this morning so I am going to try to get back to a more regular sleep schedule and keep doing my tai chi before bed. I still played some Hearthstone today I have to admit but less than days before, and now I uninstalled it...I guess I have gone about half no games and half with games since starting this detox and that is at least better than having gamed for the last few weeks continuously, I know I would feel like total shit if I had done that! If I can go through the rest of the 90 day detox without another relapse I will be very happy about it indeed, and after 90 days maybe a new goal could be to go for 90 consecutive days. A couple of my goals for this week are to go to my chiropractor at the next opening, hopefully tomorrow or the next day, because I have been really missing this while being sick. Sitting around being sick definitely isn't the best, but I did do a couple of sun salutations and other stretches on many days at least and some tai chi. Today I spent some time out in the sun just feeling the sun on my skin and stretching and practicing some harmonica which I really enjoyed; my brain has been feeling so foggy lately, more of this is definitely what I need. Another goal is to go to a couple of tutoring sessions I have lined up, tomorrow and later in the week possibly. Making a bit of money would be great! Another work opportunity is that my old teacher I met up with the other week has some landscaping projects he needs help and offered to pay me. He lives a little ways away but I think this could be really great and I like spending time with him. It is also close to some dancing events I have heard about but haven't been to yet. goal #4: go dancing on wednesday, missed it this week! I might have to find a second dance this week just to get my fill : ) goal #5: swimming! I think it has been finally warming up enough that swimming during the warmer days would be feasible; heck even the ocean was almost warm enough at the game quitters meeting in SD swimming has been one of the things that has helped me the most with my back pain over the last couple of years and I'm really excited to be able to do it regularly again. I also have been developing a vision for a longer term goal, even if right now it feels very unrealistic. My cousin in Romania and I are both backpacking and adventuring fanatics and we've been talking for a couple of years about doing the Santiago de Compostela trail in Spain together; it has been a big, big dream of his for a couple of years and I always thought it would be the greatest thing to do it together with him. Last time I saw him about two years ago, when I visited Romania because my grandmother died, we had an amazing adventure in the Carpathians in February replete with climbing one of the highest snowy peaks in Romania, sledding on a glacier on our air mattresses, and nearly freezing our asses in a lonely cabin by a frozen lake, and drinking beers in another cabin with an old man who had spent his life skiing in the mountains and making awesome concoctions of mountain herb teas! We are both naturalists by education and it's a lot of fun learning from each other when we know about the ecosystems of such different geographical regions, we just get along really well, feels like we're brothers I guess you could say. So it would be most amazing to join him on this journey which he's undertaking after years of dreaming about it...the only thing is that my back feels so tweaked and right now it hurts to walk a couple of miles...so is it completely unrealistic to imagine walking ten miles a day for a couple of hundred miles at the beginning of the summer? I dunno! I wanna say that it isn't impossible but that it would take a lot of hard work, and lots of discipline in doing exactly what I need to do for my body to heal, and not a little faith in our ability to heal... Part of me is I think plain afraid of setting such a lofty goal as this because for the past year or so even though I was brave to try some big moves and ideas in my life they ended up in failure in one way or another. But I suppose part of me is also somewhat proud that I at least tried and "went for it" a couple of times even if things didn't end up as the best possible case scenario. Anyway, I could go into a lot of detail about things but it is late so maybe in a future day. "Success is the ability to go from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm" or something somebody said once : ) I'm definitely needing to apply that to my GQ detox situation right now too For now I am grateful for: - sunlight on the skin - birds' songs - GameQuitters community! It really feels like this whole thing is giving me a place to refocus my efforts in a way I never felt able to by myself

So I've been totally playing Hearthstone for most of the last week every day...I've been kinda embarrassed about owning up to it on the forum...started out being bored at home with the flu but then I kept playing for the last few days : ( Here's what I wrote to my accountability partner after being non communicative for the past few days. I don't know why it's so easy for me to "suspend" my determination to be working on something constantly every day. "So I have been totally on tilt, on the wagon, or off the wagon, whatever it is for the last week ;( It started when I had a bit of a flu last weekend and early in this week and I started playing lots of chess and go sitting in bed recouping and being pretty bored then after a day or two thought I'd try a bit of Hearthstone and one thing led to another...this game is totally the most addicting shit :\ Now I've been playing it for like a week every day...not sure how that even happened but I guess I told myself I was just playing while I was sick but even though I'm not too sick anymore I've been playing "just another bit of today." Sigh...I guess I should go back to doing a daily check in, that was rather helpful :\ Sigh..time to get back to the detox...it was feeling really good being game free for 10 days in many ways even if life was throwing new challenges my way. Now I've totally messed up my sleep schedule staying up at odd hours too : ( Anywho, sorry to come off as so pessimistic right now, it just feels hard starting this over and over again : ( I'm trying to remind myself that I managed to go for 10 days in a row twice and it wasn't so bad, I was rather enjoying lots of other aspects of life during those days, but now this damn Hearthstone...I don't know what possessed me to play a BLIZZARD game of all things ; ) sigh... I think I will paste this msg in the forum too, I've been kinda embarrassed about having such a long tilt, but I guess part of it is owning up : (" PS: Cam, thanks for the idea about the interview, I did e-mail one of the people who interviewed me to see if he might have any helpful advice!

Day 2.9 Well I didn't get the job I applied for alas, there might be a couple of reasons for this but I'm not ultimately sure why! Today I got up early to do some work at home for some clients who had contacted me, and went to the chiropractor in the afternoon then took a nap. In the evening I met up with an old high school teacher who was very influential for me and contacted me recently. We caught up over quite a bit of wine and had some good fun, came home pretty buzzed and finished part of a movie I had started the other week. Kinda bummed about not getting this job, I definitely feel like I could use something like this to fill my time with and create some structure right now, but I guess I just need to move on as this is part of looking for work. I did also apply for a volunteer position with the same organization which could potentially be fun...I think I would be basically helping sail an old replica of a 19th century schooner...so I think I will check out a volunteer training for this on Saturday morning, could be interesting!

Day 2.8 Interview went ok I guess...the two guys (maybe more one than the other) I interviewed with felt pretty somber and we didn't really laugh too much together...I think one of them seemed like he had a lot to do and had a hard time being focused with the interview, kinda annoying, but oh well. I felt like my answers were decent and I didn't feel too nervous and I did a good job asking a lot of question at the end which seemed to arouse them somewhat, so at the very least I left with a good impression. Still have to complete some paperwork to drop off tomorrow but from hearing more details about these positions they definitely both sound pretty cool. It would definitely be something that combines things I'm very interested in with things that would really challenge me so it would be great to get this...fingers crossed I rewarded myself with a favorite kombucha for doing the interview and went to the nursery nearby to pick up some kitchen herbs (kind of a belated birthday present for my mom who's been talking about wanting something like this, but I'm definitely going to make use of them too : ) and got a yummy burrito. I spent some of the day doing some small chores like laundry and cleaning my room which has gradually become kind of a mess; nice for things to be clean again...in the evening I went to my regular Wednesday dance group. I was very lethargic and thought I might just fall asleep on the floor and emotionally I was as well in kind of a negative place and feeling unable to connect with people (maybe my initial impression of the interview was more negative than looking back at it now but I'm really glad I went dancing, it totally transformed my mood and mental space. I danced with several people tonight which was really fun since folks are usually more into doing their thing in this place, but not tonight apparently. Especially fun was connecting with this one girl who's grace and dance moves I always admire when I see her (I think I mentioned her in a previous entry!). She seems somewhat badass and self-confident to the point that I was too intimidated to ever approach her, but at one time a bunch of people were twirling each other around changing partners quickly so I took advantage and swooped in there and we ended up twirling each other around a bunch. She was really into it and smiled at me very sweetly and seemed very interested in connecting, which was very surprising! So we ended up dancing together a while and having a lot of fun and smiling at each other a lot, exploring some fun arm positions, it was very nice : ) After the dance I went out for tea with a buddy from the dance; he's a bit older than me and going through a very difficult divorce so I guess dancing helps him get his mind off that. I was doing my best to be helpful because I can definitely enjoy listening to other people sometimes and probably even have the occasional helpful thing to say; I definitely start thinking about the fact that I don't know if I'm the best person to be giving somebody else advice because look how I let myself become with games, but whatever, that voice is just me being hard on myself and it feels stupid to not allow myself to be there for someone else...what it comes down to is that there are always struggles in life and if we don't allow ourselves to support others until "we've fixed ourselves" or "we're good" then we will miss out on so much connection, so go me for not giving in to that bullshit It's a good reminder that whatever kind of pain you might be going in through life, other people's lives aren't on pause and they might be hurting too...allowing ourselves to see that is I think a necessary step in letting go of our own pain...stopping to be so selfishly preoccupied with our own shit and convincing ourselves we are so worse off than the next guy \ gal. If there is anything more addicting than computer games it's feeling sorry for yourself Anywho I'm just rambling here it's late and I better go to sleep before I write who knows what stupidity! Grateful for: - Having fun dancing with people and getting to dance with the "mysterious graceful girl" - Talking with the girl who organizes the dance a little bit and getting to know her better - Having some fun plans over the next few days to look forward to - WATER. YUM *glug, glug, glug* - Being this weird human thing in an earth suit body thingy

I think that's awesome that you took the time to question your relationship with gaming and realized it wasn't an unhealthy one. Kudos to you and I hope you can continue to moderately enjoy gaming without ever falling into the addiction trap...I think for someone like me who has developed such an unhealthy relationship with gaming it is very different and it is probably hard for me to even remember what it felt like to have a relationship with gaming that felt good...I totally think games can be a beautiful story-telling art form that some people pour a lot of thought and creativity into, and are most definitely not evil nor is there any evil intent put behind them like it is easy to feel when one becomes addicted...I'm glad there can be people like you who can enjoy that mindfully! As for me, I've had my pleasant times with games and then the very shitty binge times so I'm staying away...for a good long while anyway, each of us just needs to be mindful of the place we are in and how everyone else's experience is different...I feel like I couldn't in good conscience advise you to quit gaming while you're ahead just out of fear you might fall into a trap, because that's just disrespecting my belief in you as a human to be able to lead a healthy, balanced life; and I think humans are quite capable when we apply ourselves, so go you and do your thing I disagree with you @Alkan, I think you're coming into this with the assumption that gaming is somehow inherently bad for everyone, which I think is flat out not true. And even if you think that is true, you can't go around placing your own value system on how other people are choosing to live their lives, everyone has their own system of values. Of course we justify what we do, I think that's true of all our behavior, and it's really not a terrible thing to have little guilty pleasures as part of our life, I think it's in fact perfectly normal. We can't expect ourselves to be perfect, or more than human, because we'll just invariably end up being disappointed of ourselves when we do. Of course when these "little guilty pleasures" overtake our life and we can't control them it's a different story. Our narrative about what we are doing, I think you could argue, is ultimately what we are and how we create our reality, and I think if Primmulla's narrative about his/her relationship with gaming is a positive one then that is a good indication that he's got a healthy relationship with gaming.

Day 2.7 I already got contacted by the museum I applied for and I have a job interview tomorrow; pretty nervous about it I guess, ayee...I'm going to buy the plants tomorrow since the nursery is around those same parts. What'd I do today? I spent a lazy hour watching Lady and the Tramp haha, went out to the park and did some yoga, and in the afternoon I had a Skype call with my GQ accountability partner which was really nice. We spent an hour or so talking and it was very cool hearing another person's story. I think it's something we are both interested in doing in the future again. I've been spending some time reading about the museum organization and the details of the position and trying to prepare for the interview. I went to the community hot tub in the evening and chatted with three young people I ran into. One of them is a neighbor I've chatted with before; we got to talking about surfing and he invited me to use one of his boards if I'd ever want to go surfing together. Yay. I've been trying not to eat sugar and I've been pretty sucessfully avoided it for the last week or so, but I was getting some cravings tonight for sure...maybe I'll come up with a reward system like evrry time I go to a yoga class I get to eat a bit of dark chocolate or something

You were fantastic at it! I was so stoked you had one with you. Perfect perfect time <3 across the universe will have a warm feeling behind it now. Thanks Laney, glad you also got a lot out of the meetup!, hope to see you around! Day 2.6 I learned on Youtube yesterday how to make poached eggs and today I made my first poached eggs! They were very good and I look forward to many a poached egg breakfast. Last year was for me the year of omelettes because I was hunting a lot of chantarelles and other mushrooms in Oregon and SF Bay Area so I learned to make omelettes to eat my wild mushrooms with them; I fell for them so much I must have had maybe 50-100 omelettes last year but I've lately been getting a little tired of them finally so I guess I can switch to poached eggs when I am not eating soup or smoothies for breakfast. I feel like I've really expanded my cooking repertoire in the last year and I really don't find myself running out of ideas of things I LIKE to eat and are also healthy. I'm also a lot more confident trying out new recipes since the same principles apply to all things you cook...and exploring I've definitely found some recipe gems that I just LOVE eating. Definitely empowering feeling like I can feed myself what I like and feels healthy without needing to go to restaurants too often. The couple I became friends with recently is having a get together this Saturday for which I might also help with cooking. They also asked me if I would want to lead a short informal Tai Chi workshop to which I said yes! I'm by no means skilled at it but I've shown some friends a thing or two in the past and usually surprised myself at how decently I could explain it...just repeating everything my own teachers have said hehe I don't know how big the group would be and I feel somewhat nervous about it but the way I see it...1) I definitely could see myself teaching Tai Chi somewhere a few years down the line when I have more experience with it, I am pretty intrigued by it and wish to deepen my understanding 2) I have a few days to prepare something and actually polish it a little bit even if this is something completely informal 3) I don't suppose this would actually inspire anyone to learn Tai Chi but if it does they would actually look for a qualified instructor anyway, I just need to give a little taste 4) I'm mostly seeing this as an opportunity to challenge myself to prepare something I can present to a group and overcome doing something I'm not generally that comfortable with, so just doing it will give me some sense of accomplishment 5) the essence of Tai Chi is relaxation and an instructor really needs to embody that because maybe more is transmitted through looking at the instructor's body and movements than through the verbal instructions, so to feel kinda nervous while doing this would feel pretty funny but oh well haha I went to the chiropractor early this morning and felt like a lot of deep changes were taking place in my body; it was the deepest I remember breathing in a while and some things that have felt stuck for a while are definitely loosening up; I also feel a lot more aware of what's happening in my body and therefore feel even more aware of how much tension I continue holding in my muscles and the various problems in my posture. It just takes patience...LOTS of it! Got some groceries and spent the afternoon working on a resume and cover letter for a science instructor position at a local museum I've been looking at for a while. This felt productive and it was my main goal for the day. I had also called them a few days ago to see if the position is still open and today they called back and it is so I went over there and dropped off what I worked on, with a transparent cover sheet and everything all spit-shiny professional! I was also going to have a tutoring session this afternoon but the kid cancelled kinda last minute, saying he already understands everything. Guess I am just so good that last week was enough for a while haha! The museum is by the local harbor so I instead spent a bit of time climbing some rocks and watching the sunset. My mom was wanting to eat some eggs this evening after she went hiking so I taught her how to make poached eggs, fun times. I made a salad kind of thing with lentils for dinner and now I'm writing this a little early than regular, going to see if I can start working on my tai chi class in the couple hours before bed maybe with a lil inspiration from my Tai Chi book by master Cheng Man Ching : ) YAWN Grateful for: 1. My very compassionate chiropractor 2. Having a productive day and applying for a job (actually two different ones!) 3. I had this thing super stuck in my eye or more likely growing on the inside of my eyelid for the past five days and it was really bugging me but today it spontaneously went away. I was about to call an optometrist to make an appointment but no longer needed. YESS (maybe the hot compresses I've been doing once a day helped?) 4. Beet kombucha 5. Hummus and almond butter! yum (not together, ew) Main goal for tomorrow is to get some fresh dill, parsley plants for the kitchen and plant a few seeds to keep my growing baby avocado tree company

Day 2.5 I slept in quite a bit this Sunday to make up for going to bed late after dancing and waking up early for chiropractor. I spent the afternoon reading and just relaxing out in the sun, went to the park and had a really nice and relaxing yoga session, and a short hike at sunset to a spot the co-owner of my yoga studio told me about the other week. In the evening I went to read Lolita at a coffee shop and had some tea, and found a book called Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach that I perused with interest. I read a book by him called Illusions a number of years back that I really liked so I was curious about this one, it has a lot of the same themes. Spoke to a friend on the phone and now I'm quite sleepy gonna get my Tai Chi in before bed.

Haha we are pretty huggy in California WIP, maybe it is just a different culture...

Day 2.4 The highlight of today was definitely attending the San Diego GQ meetup! When I think about how long games have been a part of my life and how - even though my relationship with games wasn't always filled with negativity - it has been that way for a while, I feel that getting together with a group of like-minded people who were/are striving to free themselves of the same struggle, and having an honest authentic conversation about it FOR THE FIRST TIME in my life is a really big deal! So long overdue :D. So I'm very grateful to you all who were open to listening to each other and sharing your own story, it was very inspiring. Definitely a hard thing to do, but it feels like a big relief for me personally, and hope it was as helpful for everyone else. I feel like I have a lot of stuff to process and of course the road is open ahead : ) I recommend anyone who has the opportunity in the future to go to a nearby GQ meeting to take advantage if it! And Cam is not only good looking but funnier than he even comes off in his videos It was also fun hanging out on the beach after the main meetup with @kortheo and @laney. Thanks for putting up with my harmonica skills, it makes me want to learn to play better Other than that, went to my chiropractor in the morn which was gooood. The secretary is so nice, she gave me another squeezy hug today, it always brightens my day just to see her. And I ate soup for 3 meals today which is always great in my book! My new addiction I suppose, which I don't mind Grateful for: - people. connecting. yay - meeting someone famous (Cam Adair) - beach towels and blankets - taking a quick dive in the ocean for the first time this year - being on top of doing my tai chi every day this week (off to do it for today!)

My back pain was unrelated to this, but I've heard a lot of people with lower back pain say that abs too weak to support their torso and the muscles in the back of the body overcompensating for it was the cause for their back pain. Maybe working out helps because you are strengthening the front ab muscles? Just a thought for you to explore if you intuit it might apply to your case For falling asleep or general relaxation in the evening, I recommend trying out Yoga Nidra aka Yoga of Relaxation...it is basically a guided meditation while you lie down in corpse pose / consciously relax different parts of your body / focus on the breath etc. Here is a free 20 minute one you can download if you might want to try it out: http://www.blooming-lotus-yoga.com/yoga-nidra-unwind-1-download/ Take care!

Day 2.3 Really fun day today...spent the afternoon being productive sending some e-mails I've been meaning to send and looking at some local job positions and volunteer things I am interested in applying for. Ate soups from the fridge for all meals, predictably...chicken tortilla soup continues to be the best thing in the world pretty much! Went to the park nearby in the late afternoon to stretch a bit and read a bit of Lolita by Nabokov which I've started reading over the past few days. The writing is really good and captivating. In the evening, I met up with some folks I met at my local dance place who were all interested in joining me to go to a dance event in San Diego. It was a really fun evening and I enjoyed both the dance and connecting with these new friends in the hour long car ride there and back. Lots of giggles were had; and car games in the long line to In N Out. The guy I have been befriending for a couple of weeks also brought his girlfriend to the dance and I had a lot of fun getting to know her a bit and we both really liked talking to each other about books and cooking; looking forward to hanging out with them and doing some cooking / board games sometime in the near future, they are both really nice people. I had a lot of fun dancing with this one older very kind, rather attractive older woman at the dance; I think we danced together three times...she told me she was a dance teacher and she wanted to try out a move for a workshop she was doing tomorrow which is both people dancing on one leg and supporting each other for balance. I was glad to try this out with her as I fancy myself as having rather good balance (not sure where from but I suspect from climbing mountains and standing on the edge of a lot of abysses and cliffs...I think my balance became attuned because of this; sometimes I'm at a yoga class and I can balance much better than the instructors, though everything else I do is beginner level : D ) Grateful for: - getting to connect with some people through conversation and dance - eating healthy - finding a very cool dance place that could become a regular part of my life - being productive - sunny afternoon - having a comfortable bed So I guess I am going to San Diego two days in a row since there is also a GameQuitters meetup there tomorrow, looking forward to meeting some fellow GQs!

Day 2.2 More soup today! I went to my chiropractor and had a really good appointment, I felt like my shoulderblades became very relaxed and my posture felt more correct than in a long time; not a permanent change but I felt great for several hours, I was in such a good mood I felt almost high. I felt like today was more effective than it had been a few months ago, maybe because I have been doing tai chi regularly? Anyway, cool beans, I am excited to get back into this kind of chiropractic work, there was a time in my life when I was going to a similar chiropractor in the Bay Area regularly for a few months and I was doing yoga almost every day and it was the best I have ever felt in my body, it almost felt like I was stepping into a completely new body; alas, life happened, for various reasons I had to move away and I didn't continue the exploration so I am grateful to have this opportunity to regularly see another extremely talented healer. I went to get some ingredients to make some chicken tortilla soup, one of my favorite recipes and had a really pleasant little chat with an extremely cute checkout clerk about soups, also one of my favorite topics . I stopped for a bit on my way home to explore a park I found the other week and it was quite beautiful! Some recent rains have made the hillsides lush green and it almost felt like being in the open parts of the East Bay Hills I love so much where I have hiked a lot all through my 20s. There's even a creek in the park, which is very uncommon in my area where it is rather desert-like and the vegetation is mostly chaparral scrub. I sat for a little bit listening to the pleasant gurgling and looking at the sparkles on the water, it was very peaceful; I'd definitely love exploring this place more. Made a deee-licious chicken tortilla soup while listening to the passionate Jose Jimenez...Mexico day in my kitchen! My parents both liked it too, which I was glad for because my dad is probably pickier than most children and I enjoyed that my mom had some fun dancing to the music. Grateful for: - Mexican food, life would be so dull without it, and extra kudos to chipotle peppers in adobo sauce - the pleasure of chatting with pretty women - my chiropractor's secretary giving me a hug, she is about the nicest person I have met and melts my heart - eating soup - sunny day and beautiful creek music

Alrighty, gonna call this day 2.1 I guess Had a nice day today, woke up rather late since I guess I just needed to get lots of sleep and my sleep has been off for a few days. I cooked some soup in the afternoon, which I guess is becoming my regular breakfast thing...nice that one batch is enough to last for a few days and all I need to do is heat it up in the morning. In the evening I went dancing which felt really nice, folks got really emotional and personal with each other in the closing circle afterwards for some reason, which was interesting Then I had a long two hour phone conversation with a close friend that was really nice...I had my phone in my hand about to call him when he called me, funny timing considering we usually talk maybe every couple of weeks Grateful for: Having a really nice tutoring session the other day Connecting with people today and having a really good conversation Making a chiropractor appointment for tomorrow afternoon Making plans to go to an out of town dance event Friday night with someone from my dance meetup Eating healthy Tai chi

Ok so I had a relapse for a day or two I guess I had made it for 10 days with the detox then started watching some let's plays being bored with the books I had at the time...The big, big difficulty I was having was that I think in the 10 days of no gaming I overtaxed my back and it was really hurting on my 10th day and afterwards. The best way for me to keep away from games and such has usually by being physically active...that's just what I know has worked for me in the past: going hiking or backpacking and unfortunately it just isn't feasible with where I am right now. I was really trying hard to do yoga and tai chi every day and go for walks and just ended up feeling really stiff..."trying too hard" to relax... Anyway, I've really been totally careless with what I've been eating today and my sleep schedule last night...but it is just ONE (ok two) day, I was doing SO well for 10 days! So I will just get back on track with trying to be healthy tomorow, day 2.1 Sadly I missed a potential tutoring gig on Thursday even before I went to the gaming phase just because my upper back was in too much pain to even drive . So I'm trying to come up with a gameplan of what I need to do...I think I will start seeing the chiropractor I was going to in the fall...I never quite gave it enough of a chance despite that those were some of my better days back-wise...I think I also need to go to a doctor do some blood tests or something...I have never felt in my entire life like my body just can't seem to heal and feel on top of it again, it is very weird and disconcerting, and the main reason I have been going into this gaming spiral the last couple of months. Really a spiral because the gaming doesn't help but makes my back problems worse and then it just makes me more depressed...doesn't make any logical sense to keep going there and yet here I am again Something I'm learning is that MAN I have a really hard time staying with something that takes weeks or longer to see results, whether the chiropractor, a 90 day detox, or going through school or holding a job, it's like there is always something I'm looking forward to when "it ends." And unless that something is really well defined and motivational I have a hard time going through with the day to day grind...it ends up feeling like a grind anyway. I think that's what I always absolutely loved about backpacking...every day you sleep in a different place, you wake up in a different place, you become completely engrossed in your surroundings and have this wonderful feeling of exploration, whether you are finding some beautiful wildflower in some valley that you have never seen before, or retracting John Muir's footsteps on some mountain peak, or whatever : ) this is something I am really grateful for, to have this ability to think back on a day spent adventuring and be able to retrace my steps between dawn and dusk in my mind with so much clarity. interesting characters you meet along the way...etc etc. Out of all my life experiences besides maybe the most meaningful romantic moments, or really connected moments with friends, this felt the most where I "was present" or whatever and just enjoying things in the moment a lot. @wookieshark88 (uhm is this how you link people's journals or is there some other trick to it? ), about the quinoa miso soup: This is something I used to make with an ex-girlfriend and I don't use an exact recipe; we just started throwing more and more things in miso soup and discovered it was always delicious I will do my best to put it into a recipe, feel free to experiment with the quantities! Miso \ quinoa soup de chez Watermelon 1/8 - 1/4 of a red or white onion, diced 3 in. of a leek (white part), sliced thinly 5-6 white mushrooms, sliced 1-2 carrots, sliced diagonally or in small sticks as you prefer 1/8 - 1/4 of a red or orange bell pepper 1/2 cup quinoa 1 - 2 tbsp or more miso paste to taste a few dried handfuls of seaweed, arame and \ or dulse (optional but highly recommended, arame works especially well with quinoa) 2-3 bunches of baby bok choi or a few leaves of dino kale, chopped into bite sized pieces 1-2 eggs Instructions (sorry if they aren't super clear, I always just do it by ear!): 1. The onions and mushrooms can be fried separately and go in the soup at the end. Fry the onion in a regular skillet in olive or coconut oil until it starts browning then add the mushrooms until they are all cooked or nearly so. You can also cook them a bit in the soup when adding them at the end. Set aside. 2. While frying the onions and mushshrooms, boil enough water to fit all the ingredients. I would estimate this is somewhere between 2-3 liters but use your judgment once you've chopped everything. You can always add more from a kettle later if you don't have enough. Make sure to have a big enough pot to fit everything of course and add a dash of sea salt to the water as well. 3. Once the water is boiling, add the quinoa...I usually put in a whole cup and it is too much to call it soup, ends up more as quinoa food, so I think 1/2 is a good estimate for more of a soupy variety : ) Set a timer for 25 minutes for the quinoa. Do a low-medium simmer like you usually do for grains, with the pot covered or nearly so. 4. If you are using arame seaweed or any dried seaweed that needs to be soaked (check the package) soak it now in some water 5. If your carrots are cut in big chunks you can add them pretty soon, or if you cut them into small matchsticks you could hold off on them until the quinoa is nearly done. If you feel like experimenting with any other root vegetables, the same applies...[aside: I just remembered that for a while I used to be really into Jerusalem artichokes (aka sunchokes) in this kind of soup...soupy foods really bring out the flavor of this relatively little know and delicious vegetable! It looks superficially a lot like a darker ginger but the taste is like a cross between a potato and artichoke heart I would say, and you don't need to skin them.] 6.. Add the leek and bell pepper when you're maybe 10 min. from being done with the quinoa 7. Ladle out a bit of hot water into a bowl and stir in the miso so when you add it to the soup you won't be struggling to work out the chunks in the big pot 8. If you are adding egg(s) (eggdrop style), also break them into a different small bowl and mix them up thorougly with a fork. 9. The last step before taking the pot off the heat is to drop in the bak choi or kale greens a bit to soften them up and also right after SLOWLY pour in the whisked egg while SLOWLY mixing the soup with the other hand (having a friend to help coordinate the movements is nice). I'd say mix up the soup at maybe 3 seconds per revolution (correct units in case you are wondering, NOT 3 rev/ sec ). The goal is to create thin strands of egg as it contacts the hot water and cooks almost instantly. When I used to do it with my friend we had a couple of eggs from our housemate's chickens and I noticed a much nicer quality of thin yummy strands forming compared to more commercial eggs I buy at the store; might have to do with richer yolks that mix more thoroughly, not sure, but it is delicious nevertheless! Maybe I've just forgotten the technique... 10. Once the greens and eggs are in you can turn the heat off right away, mix in the dissolved miso paste, rehydrated (and drained) seaweed, and cooked mushrooms and onions. Feel free to experiment with spices, I usually find the miso adds enough saltiness and I'm not a fan of black pepper with these flavors. Edit: Oh yeah, green onions also work instead of leek and \ or onion. The way they are usually used in Asian Cuisine, you cook the white parts and then add the green parts fresh at the end...I just use whichever of these things I have in the fridge at the time Let me know if anything I wrote is confusing...I'm kinda tired right now so I might be pretty incoherent in my writing : ) And if you end up making this anytime I'd be very curious to hear what you think!

Day 9: Not feeling too wordy today, it wasn't an eventful day...I just read most of the day because I was really sore from yesterday and my calves felt super tight. I was going to go to a therapeutic yoga class but when I got there I found out the teacher couldn't make it and it was canceled. Oh well...gonna do some tai chi before bed even though it is hard for me to keep up this daily habit...or at least it is hard to be excited about it and then I doubt whether it's doing that much for me...but I may as well do it for a little bit just to see what happens if I keep it up I guess. I have never in my life managed to keep up a daily habit for a long period of time...except maybe brushing my teeth Almost done with the Great Gatsby, been looking up some words in the dictionary as I've been reading this one for sure...some words I like that I learned are redolent and echolalia. Cam I'm also looking forward to the meetup! How much longer are you in SF for? Have you already had a Mission burrito? ;O

Yes @WorkInProgress...funny how you're in a funky mood it feels like it will never go away even though you know from experience they do...felt like I completely slept off the funk from last night Yes Thich Nhat Hanh is amazing! Among many things, he's just a great example of a person who can extract so much joy from all the simple things Yes, he's alive and I believe spoke his first words since the stroke sometime a couple of months ago; I don't know more than the Wiki article says about it! Day 8: I woke up feeling quite refreshed and not tense at all this morning; I also invited a friend from my dance place to teach me some contact improv on the beach today, which he was into, so I had my day pretty laid out. I wanted to make another breakfast soup to last me for the next couple of days so I went to the nearby grocery store and got some mushrooms and vegetables to supplement what I had at home; what I ended up putting in it this time was: onion, leek, white mushrooms, bell pepper, too much quinoa (I keep forgetting how much it expands), miso, arame seaweed, dulse, bak choi, and two eggs. Excited to have something healthy and that tastes good for the next couple of days; enjoyed eating some soup and drinking tea in the sun. I went to the coffeeshop I intended to go to and got some useful things done even if pretty slowly. Still have an email to send tonight, no problemo! Had a yummy egg & potato breakfast burrito for lunch before heading to the beach (my journal is definitely part food journal!). Met my friend at the beach and we walked around for a while, checking out an interesting sea cave / arch; the beach we went to is a very beautiful one tucked away under tall bluffs and there are a lot of large rocks among the sand covered in green algae. My friend had never stuck his finger in a sea anemone before so I encouraged him to do so before we started playing with contact. Contact improv was a lot of fun, I had done it just a little bit before with an ex girlfriend; the sand presented both a challenge to having a solid base but also made falling rather harmless! We pulled off a couple of fun moves like twirling over each other's back and kicking the legs over to the other side. We also played around with a little tai chi push hands. I tried to be careful with my back but it felt good moving around mostly. Getting up from the beach involves climbing a set of literally hundreds of stairs and when I got to the top I realized I left my shoes at the bottom, so I had to do it twice! Quite tired after getting home after all that movement, really enjoyed eating some of the spaghetti squash dish I made last night. Got a Skype call scheduled with an ex girlfriend who is still one of my best friends tonight, so I'm excited to have some tea over Skype with her! A very good day! I definitely had a bit of anxiety from being out all day and in more social situations than I have been on most recent days, but it subsided pretty quickly, getting more comfortable with it now, and I had a lot of fun. I'm grateful for: 1. Starting week 2 on a good foot 2. Living in a place where yummy, healthy, warm food is so readily available 3. Living close to a beautiful coastline 4. Never getting tired of the scenery of rock and sea 5. Forging a friendship 6. Feeling capable of moving on from a bad place 7. Managing to stay on top of doing tai chi every day for a week 8. All the people who smiled at me during the last week

Snow outside and a stew slow-cooking on the stove...sounds like you know how to do winters