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Thanks for your reply Ikar. Right now, this is the path I am personally leaning towards I have little interest in the politics of talking with investors or managing a team or product, at delegating and assigning tasks, etc. Although yeah, you are right that the path is arbitrary. I would actually say it goes 2 ways. The first way being with what you said, in regards that my promotion won't be fully within my control. I know I can control my actions from here to now, how I handle my work, and how I strive to make an impact. I can influence how my manager and others higher up see me in this way. All this is within my Circle of Influence. I know too, however, that I cannot control ultimately if they decide to promote me or not. The economy goes through rough patches, and they haven't promoted anyone during those. And sometimes there's others who are also up for their own raises and promotions as well. Software development is competitive. Now I do mention these things to note that these are things within my Circle of Concern. Not to have a scapegoat to blame if things don't quite work out how I would want them. But the direction itself is also arbitrary in another sense too. As I grow in my roles (both work and personal) I will still have to learn about leadership, management, how to talk to others and better conflict resolution, and so forth. So even though I'm not interested in a "management" title, I still have to be effective at managing myself and eventually at managing junior employees too. I will eventually have to also hand down work to others, when I gain enough experience at doing a thing and feel it is time for others to learn how to do the thing for example. So even though that is not what I like about my job, I do still recognize these are skills I'll gain regardless of the path I choose, in my journey to become an interdependent individual. All that said, I'm still very much so leaning towards becoming an Expert in what I do, which is software development (more specifically database). The deadline I put for 2 years from now is for that first promotion moreso, and I'm hoping to work on a timeline (this is what the "Get it Together" step is about) soon. Thanks for your message, as it motivated me to think about that part on a deeper level.

Sat 11.16 No mobile games - 207 days No compulsive social media use: 45 days No compulsive research: 45 days No passive screentime before bed, first thing in the mornings, or during work: 48 days I felt so dumb this morning. So last night after I was done my journal, my baby was upset. So I went to rock him and soothe him, put him to sleep. As usual, that part I'm okay with. Well, I realized after that moment that my wedding band wasn't where I had left it; I have a spot in my nightstands drawer, that is my usual spot. So I stayed up a bit later looking for my ring. I couldn't find it, went to sleep, worried that I may have left it in the car or something. Losing stuff and misplacing stuff is ADHD brain... basically "brain fog" that never clears up, because ADHD; although I will say that cutting down on passive screen time has helped a lot with my attentiveness. But given that I had poor sleep the day before, I think this is a natural consequence. Not to be too critical about myself though. I will say that one thing I did do well, is that I wrote a note quickly on all the details I could remember before heading to bed for the night. Where I remember wearing it last, where I thought I took it off, etc. Then I woke up at 6:45am because my oldest was waaaaay too excited to go to his friends birthday party later today, and he was jumping on our bed (lmao), and then I went on another search for my wedding band... to no success. I was starting to get panicky at this moment, so I engaged in some meditation around being kind to oneself. Recognizing why I was feeling anxious, that this was all the weight of expectations I was putting on myself to keep things "in order" and not necessarily someone else saying that or thinking that of me. Excessive self-criticism on me from me, basically. The meditation really helped ground me and I spent a good chunk of time just sitting down petting my dogs. That was really nice. Then I shifted focus to something which would help me with getting a sense of accomplishment; I cleaned out some of my phone notifications, just to declutter and minimize the noise I get from things that I don't use. After that was done, my wife woke up, and I explained how I had lost my wedding band. Well... this is why I felt dumb. She went to my nightstand, and found it, right above it (not in the drawer). Yep... I just didn't even think of looking on top of it. Things I will do to stay healthy Sleep around 8h - I still need to get back into this. I realized that, after I had finished posting my journal, it was closer to 11:45pm. I am estimating I slept 7h, at best. So I will commit again to not compromise my sleep, and go to bed immediately after this entry is done. My wedding band is IN MY NIGHTSTAND (in caps for myself). Now this way I won't be going on a quest way late at night for it. Brush Teeth + Floss - brush teeth, check. Floss, check. Go for walks / Exercise - It's a weekend, so that meant exercise was more bringing my oldest to a birthday party and then bringing all of them to the park after their swimming lessons. Fun times playing with them there. My oldest is learning to do the monkey bars, I followed suit... and wow, is it just me or was that easier when I was younger? Really struggled myself. Shower + wash face - I had one just a few hours ago, before getting ready for bed. Meditate + Deep Breaths - Yes, see the beginning of this post Drink Water - yes although I did go through a long period of time where I didn't have much to drink. When we got back home from the park, I ended up guzzling my full water bottle. Nutrition Breakfast: I had leftovers from the night before, mac and cheese Lunch: pizza from the party of my son's friend Dinner: wife and I did takeout with the kids Talk to my partner - Had a lot of chances to chat today, and I took them all. Talk to my kids + play with them - yes, park and the birthday party, and more fun afterwards Read a book - ... Man. Today was so busy between the birthday party, the swimming lessons, the park trip, the impromptu decision to do takeout; just entertaining my kids. I didn't do any 7 Habits, besides briefly re-read the exercise. So that'll stay as a commitment. Tomorrow I'll aim to wake up as late as my kids let me. Instead, I'm gonna read a short story before bed. Practice French - not much Duo lingo but I didn't feel like I had to do a ton today, because my son goes to a French school and most of the parents at the party spoke French. Got a lot of my practice there. Journal - I am glad with the steps I took this morning, really grounding myself rather than overreacting. In hindsight though, I know I could have worked on my own 7 Habits workbook instead, and that's a note I can make for myself. I do not expect my kid to wake up early again tomorrow, and all kids should be very tired from the busy days activities; so here's to a good nights sleep. ------ 7 habits - proactivity test - day 29 28 Let's just keep it at 28. I will continue with my progress tomorrow. Commitments yesterday, and commitments I really need to keep again: * Go to sleep early! Now I know I don't have some thing I need to look for * Continue with the "Getting it Together!" step. ... Well, I will say that I'm not feeling great about having slacked on both of the above. I had a rough ADHD patch that really affected me, sleep-wise and then in terms of my commitment for my own self. I'll get back on track tomorrow.

Fri 11.15 (part 2) Oh yeah, I didn't mention this earlier, but my wife and I went to another couples place in the evening. Our in-laws helped with our kids tonight. They have had their own fertility journey like us, and they are expecting now, so a joyous time to spend with them 🙂They had a few board games we could've played, but we just ended up catching up and chatting all of the visit. It was actually quite nice. Things I will do to stay healthy (part 2) Read a book - 7 Habits was done this morning while waiting for my wife, and I completed this portion of the exercises. I'll document below. Talk to my partner - I am doing more of an effort to show my wife what I work on with the 7 Habits. When I started reading that book, it did tell me that I should make an effort to be a teacher of the content; and while this is partly why I share here, it's also something that I think I should be sharing with a person in my life. So that's the key thing I talked about with her. Oh and I also brought up more ideas about brainstorming ideas together for a novel / short story. Talk to my kids + play with them - I did my workout as I had committed to earlier today, with my kids, before heading out. The free Jump rope game on switch specifically. Practice French - I wrote up an extensive email to the schoolboard in French this morning actually, giving them good practices they should keep in mind. In addition to that, I also practiced after coming back home. Journal - part 2 of the entry is here and complete for today. ------ 7 habits - proactivity test - day 28 Commitments yesterday: Think more about goal 2 Well, I ended up reorganizing my goals. So goal 3 is now goal 2. And I ended up reviewing both of them as well. Goal 2 - Publish a work of our own (our being me and my wife). Be it a collection of short stories, a novel, or even a technical text. I won't go through the whole "how" exercise here, I'll just put the result: being for this one that I have to lean on my wife and set up recurring time on my calendar to do this frequently. How frequently, I will actually talk about this first with her. I still keep my 5y from now deadline, which puts us at about 2029. Goal 3 - Improve upon existing tools to empower individuals, parents, and guardians, in order to drive positive and healthy tech use. As I keep thinking about what I really want, it's to just have a healthy relationship using technology. After all, it is the reason for why I can work, among many other great things I'm capable of doing with my skillset. I just want to make sure that it is used with intention and with a purpose of enhancing my life. That's what I want for myself, for those around me and for everyone reading. And I actually am in a unique position here... I do work for a company that I could influence myself (working on my Circle of Influence) to eventually develop improvements over how we empower our customers. With that in mind, the how is going to happen with myself leaning on my manager and on my networking. These are two good action items for me. Let's give this a deadline of 2040, which is 25 years from now. This one is really, really longterm, because it will require me to work on expanding my Circle of Influence; it will also require me to work on Goal 1 multiple times (get promoted... and promoted... and promoted) to get to the point where I can drive this kind of change in the industry I'm in (this does not have to be with the same company necessarily). I'm also giving myself the time needed to make that difference I am hoping for. Commitments tonight/tomorrow: go to sleep early! Get back on track with aiming for 7~8h. Start now in the weekend. I'm going to go to bed early tonight, right after brushing my teeth and flossing. Possibly also after putting the baby to bed ( I hear him stirring just as I am finishing typing this. Continue with 7 Habits - next steps is "Getting it Together!" which is about putting all this together in a goal planning tool template the book offers. Good night everyone

Fri 11.15 (part 1) No mobile games - 206 days No compulsive social media use: 44 days No compulsive research: 44 days No passive screentime before bed, first thing in the mornings, or during work: 47 days Another day... another cyber incident. Yesterday, the school board for my oldest announced that they had suffered a data breach. I read about it after I had finished my journal post. ... suffice to say I stayed up fairly late setting up a fraud alert and scrubbing for my account data (and my wife's) on RSS feeds that scan hacking outlets. Yeah, this is not fun at all, but I did not want to ignore it until the next day. For those who just want a basic way to see if their accounts have been compromised, look up "haveibeenpwned" - if you are a millennial or older, then I'm sure you will notice the gamer term "pwned" there. Well that term isn't relevant in gaming anymore, but is actually now used quite often between hackers who steal and sell personal data. Nasty people out there. I may as well just share some basic things here which everyone should keep in mind: make sure your passwords are different everywhere you login to use a password manager to ease this never share passwords don't overshare information on social channels I am purposely vague when I type when on this forum for that reason enable multi-factor authentication when possible yeah it's a pain to scan your fingerprint or open up your phone for a code, but it does actually help stop someone who is trying to access your account without your actual self being there There's a lot more stuff that can be done, but since that isn't the primary purpose of this journal, I'll leave it at these 4 easy points to act on and remember. Ironically I ended up doing security training at work today, part of a mandatory learning course every employee has to do. So Security was top of mind yesterday and is still top of mind today. I can at least say that staying up late did help me with what I was doing at work today (well... kinda... I certainly could still do with the increased rest) ----- Things I will do to stay healthy (part 1) Sleep around 8h - I fell asleep at 12:25am, and woke up at 6:30am. So nope, this was a flop. I should've admittedly checked the cyber incident notification when I received it earlier in the day, even if it was while I was at work; that's where I could've done better myself. I know for a fact my workplace would've understood why I was taking time to deal with that. So I'm owning up to it here. Brush teeth + floss - Brushed in the morning and am planning on doing both at night. Go for walks / Exercise - My middle kid is off daycare today because of an absent educator, + this morning we also had a busy appointment. No chance of gym this morning, but it is Friday and I can make time for working out afterwards (even if it's just with my kids doing an active exergame). Shower + wash face - Will be doing this after the workout later. Drink Water - Yes. Until I get consistent about this daily, I'll keep it here. Nutrition Breakfast: Chili from yesterday Lunch: sandwich Dinner: my wife wants to try a new homemade mac & cheese recipe Meditate + Deep Breaths - I will do this after posting this. Need to take a pause in the workday. ---- I will continue later tonight with the other things, + my commitments. Will be back later.

Thu 11.14 No mobile games - 205 days No compulsive social media use: 43 days No compulsive research: 43 days No passive screentime before bed, first thing in the mornings, or during work: 46 days I keep confirming to myself that writing, just documenting even, is something I find really fun. I spent all of my work day doing that, which is fine, because I am hoping to push this stuff to another team in my workplace at some point (our team is basically the "cleanup" team lol, we got it in a trashfire state and we want to put it in an acceptable state). Anyways, that's that for my work stuff. I'm actually really enjoying it, and I'm not feeling dread like I used to back when I'd procrastinate all day. Obviously that was just not a healthy relationship I had with work before. More volunteering today for the Civic Tech Club as well. We're exploring another possible project; downloading the data from the hydro company in my city and creating mobile widgets around that. This will make it so that we can display usage warnings to all users in the city. I really like this idea, because the hydro app the company provides is awful. Unfortunately... so is the API that is supposed to get data from them. I am thinking that we might have to fix the API to begin with, it's an open source project that is kinda broken atm. ----- Things I will do to stay healthy Sleep around 8h - I fell asleep at 10:15pm, was fairly tired. Woke up at 6:30am. Both of the older kids joined us in bed sometime but I don't remember waking up lol, so a good sleep all together. Brush teeth + floss - I brushed in the morning, maybe I should floss in the morning too? Then again, with all the buildup from the day... yeah I'll leave the flossing part at night still. Go for walks / Exercise - Leg day. Wife and I did squats, leg curls, leg extensions, and weighted lunges. I did 2 sets of standing rows because I wanted to also do a bit of arm workouts today. Shower + wash face - I got back from the gym late this morning, I'll do both tonight after posting. Drink Water - Yet again a good reminder that I should have my water bottle near me when I work. I did have it while working out. Nutrition Breakfast: quesadillas with refried beans; the latter were leftover from last nights dinner, the former I made quickly Lunch: sandwich Dinner: my wife made chili which was delish, I had 3 bowls Meditate + Deep Breaths - Yes, as soon as I looked at this I actually went for it. It was about how things are always changing, including the world around us. The moon and its phases for e.g. and how they cycle in a predictable, yet always changing way. The meditation was about taking the time to stop, and notice the things which we normally just take for granted. Read a book - I did 7 Habits workbook exercises after all the kids went to bed. Talk to my partner - I discussed the volunteering I was doing today. We have another round of appointments tomorrow, so we'll have to wake up early. Talk to my kids + play with them - I gave both of them baths and helped get them to bed before volunteering. Then after finishing the coding part I was doing for volunteering, I helped put the baby and then my middle one to bed (my middle kid stayed up pretty late, we think it's because he's been napping 2h almost each day at daycare). Practice French - I practiced this morning with the green owl app and by talking with my wife. Journal - Successful day! ------ 7 habits - proactivity test - day 27 Commitments yesterday: Set up recurring events for step 6 of the Mission statement - recurring reviews and questions to ask myself The event was set up so that I'd review my Mission Statement on the 3rd Friday of every month. That's what the book recommends, to do it monthly or so. I actually edited it a bit, which you can read below: My mission is to be a confident, honest, supportive, patient, loving, forgiving and positive individual. I will strive to hold a balanced lifestyle in everything I do, for a balances lifestyle is the key to a variety of knowledge, and knowledge is the key to growth. I will drive a positive impact based on my values with everything I do, for that is the best way I know to make a difference. I will keep an open mind, seeking to understand before being understood; this will be my first action in dialogue with my wife, my colleagues, my friends, my family, my neighbors, and strangers which I meet. Overall added a bit more detail and moved the "improvement" point to the beginning I'm thinking this can help me with goal 2, which I'm feeling has to be something more specific with a better called out goal (an action item). Review my work commitments (tomorrow) calling this out here cuz there's a lot going on 😛 In a good, busy way The documentation thing I called out. Commitments tonight/tomorrow: Think more about goal 2 I'll keep it short as tomorrow is gonna be busy. Good night everyone!

Wed 11.13 No mobile games - 204 days No compulsive social media use: 42 days No compulsive research: 42 days No passive screentime before bed, first thing in the mornings, or during work: 45 days So at work we have this biannual period of manager -> employee feedback document that the employee has to fill out, and then the manager reviews and gives feedback. This is part of the "growth mindset" that the company I work for has, which is a good thing; this aligns with what I'm learning from Stephen Covey's 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. This is in fact, what Habit 7 is about; "sharpening the saw." Well sticking in line with that theme, something that I asked my manager about is what the mission statement is for the team; not the big org in general, but our team specifically. Covey in the 7 Habits talks about how multiple levels of an organization can have their own mission statements. It's something I'm planning to ask about tomorrow again. Also, something that was helpful for that biannual document was my journal. Yeah! This journal! Along with another work-specific journal I keep in a separate notebook. The work journal was actually something I started doing in May this past year, as a response to how tough I find this document to do is, so that I would remember what to write on it. Spending time doing this personal journal is productive too, even in terms of work; because it is what helps me identify areas of growth and also action items for that. My manager even told me that me and one other coworker were the only ones who submitted the document by the deadline; the rest of the team did not! (To my knowledge, she manages about 20 herself, me included). Gave me a pat on the back there haha. Not that I am making fun of the others for not doing this; as I said, I do understand how stressful it can be to take the time for that big document. It can be very daunting to put it together, as you have to reflect on setbacks and your opportunities for growth as well, and it's hard to remember the past 6 months. Again, that is why I started work journaling in the first place, and it's what gave me the idea to come back to this forum and actually stick to my personal journaling too. ----- Things I will do to stay healthy Sleep around 8h - closer to 7h. Fell asleep at 10:30pm, but my middle kid woke up at 11:30pm (he's been doing this a lot lately). It was after he went to bed that I realized I didn't post my journal entry, went to do that, then went to bed at 12:10am shortly after doing my hygiene for the night. Then I woke up at 6am for an early morning of appointments and dropping my kids off. So yeah my estimate is around 7h total. That said, I still don't feel like I'm a zombie, something I would frequently feel when I was on my phone at night. So yeah, really the advice Cam has given on his articles is real for me; stop screens an hour before bedtime for better sleep quality. Brush teeth + floss - I'm glad I have this here, because otherwise I think I'd be forgetting the flossing part. I've been doing that consistently now for 5 days. I'm going to make it 6 tonight. Go for walks / Exercise - Did a 60min incline walk this morning at the gym, I went to work later as a result, but I needed that to be productive today and move forward with the authentication work. Shower + wash face - After working out, got home and did both Drink Water - While doing the incline walk, I finished my 1L water bottle. I'll keep it filled during work. Practice French - This morning while I was waiting for my wife, I did about 28min according to my screen tracker with Duo Lingo (I'm going to say it was more like 25min though given the ads). I will be doing more later today. Nutrition Breakfast: Dang, I skipped this today. Busy morning. I shouldn't do that. I did remember to take my ADHD meds at least though. Lunch: I had the rest of the leftover pizza, we had quite a lot. Now that's done. Am snacking on fruit atm. Dinner: My turn to make dinner tonight, I'll make an easy Mexican meal of quesadillas and beans Meditate + Deep Breaths - todo, but I'm going to be doing some later today after dinner; at work I got sucked into listening to our quarterly updates and those are about 1h long. Read a book - This morning, I also did some of the reformatting for the following 2 goals I didn't cover yesterday. And I put a deadline for the first goal. I'll keep doing more tonight. Talk to my partner - I'm sure many of you here note she does the dinners mostly, and that's because she's on mat-leave. Something to think about though, is that she will eventually go back to work, and we'll need to discuss how we plan dinners... maybe even considering making something ahead of time and then freezing it or refrigerating it. This is one key thing we talked about. Talk to my kids + play with them - My kids are home at the time of writing this. I'm responsible for dinner tonight, so I'll get chances to dine as a family once it's ready and find out how their day was. Journal - here it is 🙂 ------ 7 habits - proactivity test - day 26 Commitments yesterday: identify a "when" for goal 1 let's start from here, and let me quote the 1st goal: Let's put this at two years from now; roughly by September 2026. Promotion here meaning I go farther in my career, not just a title change. The "hows" written in the quoted post are my action items for it. Re-review my two other goals Honestly, I'm not really satisfied with this one. It's not specific enough. I will need another day to reflect on it. I think the idea is good, but there needs to be some actionable item here. Maybe I'll try going with the "How" or I'll just come up with something entirely different and better, more clear. As I said, I need to think and reflect on it. I bolded the part that I'm thinking is the action item; the result. To publish my own creative project. I will reformat this at a later post, but for now I'm going to also set a deadline for this goal; let's make it for 5 years from now. That's definitely very far off, but maybe I need to do the "how" process first with it to get a better idea. I thought 5 years gives me the time needed to really solidify the idea though, as well as talk with my wife about it too. Review my mission statement again My mission is to be an honest, patient, loving and positive source of energy and support. I will strive to hold a balanced lifestyle in everything I do; my family, my job, my hobbies and creative pursuits, and my spirituality. I will drive a positive impact to the best of my ability, based on my values with everything I do. I will keep an open mind, seeking to understand before being understood. I will continue to strive for improvement, use the tools which I've been given and found successful, and always work on my personal growth. This is what I last wrote about my mission statement, and I have actually kept it in my notes on my phone. I review it frequently; it's on a widget in my home screen that I can flip to and read easily. This is actually what step 4 recommended too; "during the week, carry your rough draft with you and make notes, additions and deletions as needed each day" I'm personally pretty satisfied with that mission statement. I have it also on the About me section in this forum. Solidifying the mission statement is Step 5. So that is done 😄 Commitments tonight/tomorrow: Set up recurring events for step 6 of the Mission statement - recurring reviews and questions to ask myself Review my work commitments (tomorrow) calling this out here cuz there's a lot going on 😛 In a good, busy way -- Cheers everyone

Tue 11.12 No mobile games - 203 days No compulsive social media use: 41 days No compulsive research: 41 days No passive screentime before bed, first thing in the mornings, or during work: 44 days Well yesterday was a tough day; indeed it had its good moments, but still tough. It did end on a good note though. My wife has also been feeling pretty shitty (how she put it) and it helped a lot to just talk with her. We have had a couple of busy days together, with all of the birthday planning for my oldest, coordinating plans between her family and mine on top of that. And she also had a day full of errands yesterday too, so she was quite drained. We've fallen behind on chores overall, something we're going to work on together; what this means for me is to stay on top of chores at home, and actually respect my Pomodoro breaks. I often tend to work through them, I have to stop that honestly. I have noticed that this tends to happen with frustrating tasks at work. I'm only making it worse though by not taking my breaks. So that is how I'm going to do my best to help her. Another thing is that her parents tend to have a lot of background TV on all the time, something which really bothers me and overwhelms me; but on the flipside, my family tends to have music playing all the time and they interrupt a lot, something which overwhelms her. So we recognize that these are two things we can't change ourselves; it's how we deal with them at the end of the day. For me, I've thought on it and I think one thing that can help is to bring something to read, so I can tune out the TV when feeling overwhelmed. It is too distracting for me otherwise. She has her own strategy as well, but that's not up to me to share. Today was a much better day overall. I finally made some progress with that project at work; finally got past the authentication nightmare it was to set up the data pipeline, now I can finally actually start with the fun stuff. I am relieved. And I absolutely going to take a day off after this part of the project is done. I already told my wife that today. I'm gonna use that day off to do chores around the house and work on my 7 Habits exercises, which I've been slacking on a bit the past two days; I haven't been doing quite as much of them as I would like, I've been drained after work. Hence why I'm planning to just take a day once that component is done. ----- Things I will do to stay healthy Sleep around 8h - we were both tired and went to bed at 10:30pm. Woke up at 6:30am. Back to 8h sleep 🙂 Tomorrow is an early morning, so I best set off to sleep. Brush teeth + floss - I went to brush this morning, I'll be doing both after this entry. Go for walks / Exercise - I got a gym workout today with my wife, did bicep curls, tricep extensions, standing rows, and push-ups. Very good arm day. My oldest isn't feeling well today, he caught a cold. He was at home with us, and he accompanied us to the gym too lol. He tried lifting a 15lb weight by himself, which he did, but we told him not to touch. Other than that he was pretty chill. This only works because the gym we go to is part of the apartment we live in (for residents only), no other gym would've let that fly lol. Shower + wash face - After working out, did both. Drink Water - I kept this up, admittedly starting my entry early in the day still helps me alot with getting that reminder. Read a book - I just got done working on my Goals and finishing up the "How" I plan to tackle for one of these goals; I started working on these things yesterday, but I only got the "why" for the goals fleshed out. That part was covered earlier in the Oct 8th post actually, but I reviewed the goals to make sure I still felt excited about them. I modified all of them to have a clear objective called out; mostly Goal 2 was the one that was the most unclear imo. Really what it is for me is the Confidence in myself, seeking to gain that awareness and mindfulness I keep practicing through meditation, journaling, and the 7 Habits. So I added more details to that goal in my personal journal on my phone (this has been very helpful to have with me honestly, glad I went for another S-pen compatible phone for quick notetaking). For the How part, read more details below. Meditate + Deep Breaths - Another meditation about anger. Something I've been struggling with, but I think it's because I've been fighting my anger. Rather, I need to remember, as the meditation says, it's just a feeling; and it's one which can be witnessed and sensed, rather than pushed and drowned. We don't have to repress it, and equally we don't have to engage it. We can just be aware of it and let it go rather than holding on to it. That is how the meditation guides me into reframing the feeling of anger. Nutrition Breakfast: birthday muffin from yesterday, with coffee Lunch: there is more leftover pizza that I had Dinner: my wife made air-fried hamburgers Talk to my partner - yes, as per above I discussed the project at work and my plan to take a day off. She had another busy day today, lots of errands to run, and ofc unplanned time to take care of my oldest and the baby at the same time (she is still on mat leave). I gave her a hand today with cleaning out the sink, which had a lot of clean dishes piled up. Ofc, tonight it is about the same after having washed all the dishes from the burgers 😛 It never ends but that's ok, it keeps me busy. Talk to my kids + play with them - yes, after work I once again used all of them as my "weights" to do lifts while laying on my back. I was also in charge of baths tonight. Practice French - This morning I did a little bit, but I didn't think of taking time to do French practice in my work-breaks, as I usually do. As I said, I really have to start respecting my breaks again, this is part of why I feel less present and more irritable. Journal - entry is here ------ 7 habits - proactivity test - day 25 Commitments yesterday: post 7 habits workbook exercises (maybe do more too) The How is what I covered yesterday and today. The book only asks me to do this exercise for one of the goals for now, so that is what I did. Eventually I know I'll have to do it for all 3. So here's the "How" for the first goal I wrote for myself: Goal 1: Get promoted! Strive towards continuous self improvement in my career, taking the opportunities I am given, and also making an effort to create opportunities for myself and others. How do I plan to strive towards continuous improvement? By taking the opportunities I am given and looking for ways to create opportunities for myself How do I plan to take opportunities for myself? By speaking up about what interests me. How will I know when to speak up? By paying attention to the big team meetings and listening for areas that I can contribute to. How will I know an area arises that I can contribute towards? Listen for common pain points from the team that may require my knowledge, experience and skillset. How will I identify these pain points? By reviewing, documenting and logging areas of improvement in our shared backlog of work items. How will I know that something is already identified? By working with my teammates and leaning on their knowledge, asking for their feedback. How will I work with my team? Using our team retros and reviewing our backlog regularly, as well as my own notes from personal journal and 1:1s with my manager. How will I review these items? By scheduling time weekly on my calendar, to go through the above; one item for my own review, and another item later in the week to seek feedback from the team on those items and get their ideas so that they also feel included. In this way, I am not only creating opportunities for myself, but I am also creating opportunities for them to also contribute. ❤️ It was at this point that I felt very confident with this goal. Look at that, an actionable item at the very end, with clear values that I'm looking for. I think this can really and truly lead me to getting promoted; what I've been doing a lot of is working by myself. Not really as a team. By actually asking for feedback, and forgetting about being "criticized" or whatever, it will also help me with Goal 2 of gaining confidence. ... which is now making me think that maybe I need something more concrete for that 2nd goal lol. This is a lot of work! But I like it. I'm going to leave it at that for now. Remember to lean on top lines when getting frustrated This was helpful today as I wrote my entry, journaling is something that really helps me. It's tough especially when a child has a hard time going to bed. Commitments for tomorrow Re-review my two other goals identify a "when" for goal 1 Review my mission statement again -- As I said, this was a much better day overall. I really think this is a good take-away lesson; just because one day is bad does not mean I have to let it ruin the rest of my week. I can reflect on it, I can observe it, I can think back on it, I can talk to my partner as I did last night. Or as my wife put it; one shitty workday does not need to make a whole shitty day haha. K time to put this down. Night everyone!

Mon 11.11 No mobile games - 202 days No compulsive social media use: 40 days No compulsive research: 40 days No passive screentime before bed, first thing in the mornings, or during work: 43 days The busier it gets, the more tempting it is to shut down. It is how I've been feeling. I can only do so much by just myself. I need to lean in with my partner. This morning I forgot to take my ADHD meds and it affected me badly. I am now feeling the effects of it, about 2h into the workday. No es bueno, but I now know they have to be prioritized in the mornings when I wake up. I'm slamming my head against a problem at work, figuratively speaking. I really dislike the authentication work needed to connect a bunch of stuff together, but I recognize the importance. It's a pain though; I much prefer writing database queries. With permissions there's so many barriers in the way, that even get in the way of my own setup attempts. I have to keep asking someone to do something for me because I literally am blocked from doing it myself. So slow. sigh needed to vent... I know this is just part of learning and growing though, but it still isn't fun to do this work. ----- Things I will do to stay healthy Sleep around 8h - Went to bed at 11:45pm, and woke up at 7am this morning. I am glad I decided to still keep journaling last night, my meditation afterwards did help with sleeping. I still need to get back up, closer to 8h of sleep... I'll be working on that. Consistently being lower than my target is probably what has been adding up here, if I were to guess. Brush teeth + floss - Brushed this morning after waking, am going to do both brush and floss tonight Read a book - I had to do a car appointment in the morning, so while I was waiting in the dealership lobby, I ended doing more 7 habits exercises from the workbook; brought my Kindle, and used my phone to take handwritten notes with the stylus. Meditate + Deep Breaths - This was hugely helpful in the morning. I was experiencing a lot of anger, for having missed something so crucial this morning, a lot of self-doubt too. So I sat down in the middle of the day (I wasn't being very productive) and the meditation on anger (todays topic) was just really helpful to have. Anger is something we all experience, in one way or another; it's not saying that to normalize it or say it's okay to react in it, but just to be aware and observe that anger in others throughout the day, as a way of empathizing and knowing that it's part of what makes us human. Sufficient enough as a grounding exercise for me today. ... my work day was still pretty challenging though, so reflecting now... I think I should lean more on meditation. It is a top line for me after all, and I think it would've helped me after work as I was still a bit irritated from it. Go for walks / Exercise - after my workday was done, I did some push-ups, planks, and used my kids as part of my weight exercises haha. Shower + wash face - Will do that tonight before going to bed. Drink Water - I drank like 3 water bottles on the work day alone Nutrition Breakfast: I had 2 pieces of toast with cheese and jam Lunch: rest of the leftover pizza Dinner: tbd, my mother-in-law is making dinner Talk to my partner - During my lunch break was my plan but instead I helped my wife build an easel for the kids; part of the birthday gift for my oldest, but all kids will be using it. She needed my assistance putting the middle of it together, and I helped her fix the alignment of the legs as well. Instructions were confusing to follow but we got it done. I was a bit irritable after work and tried talking with her, but I'm going to try again tonight... I feel like I can articulate myself better now that I've calmed down and the business of the day isn't there anymore. Talk to my kids + play with them - I involved them as my "weights" for my workout lol, and we celebrated my oldest kids birthday (yes again) with my in-laws this time. They also got to try the easel. Practice French - I still need to practice tonight, will do that later. Journal - Todays work day kinda sucked honestly, I'm actually glad I took the lunch break to build the easel with my wife. It gave me a sense of accomplishment to build that easel. ------ 7 habits - proactivity test - day 24 Commitments yesterday: Review my work plan first thing after I check-in to work tomorrow, and make notes for my future self continue with 7 Habits workbook My notes are all in my calendar, which is private cuz work. As for the 7 Habits... I have notes on my phone, but I am gonna leave posting them for tomorrow. I have other priorities I'm going to work on tonight (hygiene, talking with my partner) Commitments for tomorrow post 7 habits workbook exercises (maybe do more too) Remember to lean on top lines when getting frustrated -- ...Tomorrow is a new day, so I'm not going to let how annoying work was today get me down. Night everyone!

Sun 11.10 Yet another busy day, because my family wanted to celebrate my oldest kids birthday. Lucky kid gets 3 birthday parties, he has another one after school with my in-laws. 😄 No mobile games - 201 days No compulsive social media use: 39 days No compulsive research: 39 days No passive screentime before bed, first thing in the mornings, or during work: 42 days A short one again tonight. ----- Things I will do to stay healthy Sleep around 8h - To sleep at 11:15pm after having a quick hygiene routine. Baby woke up at 12am, then I went to bed at 12:30am after that. Woke up at 7:30am. So all around a good sleep considering. Brush teeth + floss - I brushed again upon waking up, and will be brushing and flossing afterwards. Go for walks / Exercise - It was pretty rainy today, so I focused on some indoor active games with my kids while my wife made cupcakes for my oldest kids class (for his birthday). One being a jumping rope one which gets me sweating in less than 5 minutes. I hit 500 jumps on that, not consecutively, doing 100 per turn. Shower + wash face - I had a shower after doing the active games, cuz I sweat a lot during those. Meditate + Deep Breaths - ... I should've really made time for this earlier. At least I got the shower part done earlier today. Drink Water - I drank an entire bottle of carbonated water, that soda stream thing has been a very good investment. Nutrition Breakfast: Lunch: leftover pizza Dinner: at my parents, my dad made hot dogs and burgers with an air frier, with frozen fries from the oven... I stuck to just the first ones, don't like the freezer foods a lot myself. Talk to my partner - We got some time to chill out while my kids were at my parents, and also after they went to bed pretty zonked. Well, mostly, because my middle kid ended up falling asleep in our bed; he was wired from the sugar of the cake he had. But he was chilled out in our bed and fell asleep pretty quickly. Talk to my kids + play with them - Yeah, active games aside, my parents have a big piano and tons of keyboards (my mom plays and sells instruments) so they had fun playing with them to their hearts content. I supervised the baby mostly, as my parents have a long flight of stairs at their place, now that the baby is crawling it's a risk. Read a book - I read 1 short story from Hemingway before I got to typing this, again following his character NIck. Practice French - Oui, avec le hibou vert et ma famille. Journal - I'm pretty tired, I'll have to talk to my parents about maybe making cake-time a bit sooner than 6:30pm, specially with it being a Sunday and tomorrow being a school day. But... well I get that it's my oldests birthday and they did want to celebrate it a day where my dad doesn't work. So then again, maybe it's fine. It's not like this happens often. ------ 7 habits - proactivity test - day 23 Commitments yesterday: Continue to review the ADHD Coaching strategies Earlier today I set up my phone for work status, which is a strategy that my coaching document details; set up your devices so you can access the details you need, and also set up reminders for yourself on the date you need them. I'll keep a note of that and review my plan for work tomorrow morning first thing, then make notes for my future self as appropriate. The other things that have worked fairly well from that doc are journaling, silencing unimportant emails (and unsubbing from them), practicing Pomodoro at work (timers) and creating a list of commitments for the next work day. You'll note that is also what I've been doing with this journal since starting that 30 day proactivity test. I don't plan on stopping those little commitments to myself. (if time allows) continue with 7 Habits Real busy day today, that's why I just called it as a stretch objective (i.e. if time allows). I'll commit to these tomorrow. Commitments for tomorrow Review my work plan first thing after I check-in to work tomorrow, and make notes for my future self continue with 7 Habits workbook -- Night everyone. Will be meditating and brushing my teeth now 🙂

Sat 11.09 Today was a really busy day, what with my oldest having a birthday party. I also traded in my phone today (it was running out of lease time), and I brought my oldest and middle kids to swimming lessons. No mobile games - 200 days No compulsive social media use: 38 days No compulsive research: 38 days No passive screentime before bed, first thing in the mornings, or during work: 41 days Gonna keep it short, well short for me anyways. ----- Things I will do to stay healthy Sleep around 8h - went to bed at 11pm, woke up at 7:30am. None of the kids joined us, which was a first! Although I did have to go to my middle kids bed to comfort him (he had a bad dream). Brush teeth + floss - upon waking up I brushed my teeth. I still have to do this for the night + the flossing part too, so I'm gonna do that after I journal. Go for walks / Exercise - I was so busy moving things out of the car to make space for all the presents that my kid was going to get. We packed a wagon as well in the car. And I chased 2 kids and watched over a baby in the party... so I'm going to consider that my cardio and workout for the day. As I've said, weekends are always pretty busy, so I'll take what I can get during those. The gym time is a lot more important to me on weekdays, that I prefer to not skip during weekdays. Shower + wash face - I'll do this after or before brushing my teeth. Meditate + Deep Breaths - Oh yeah... today was so busy I didn't even think about it. Okay, I will do some meditation after posting to relax. So order will be meditation -> hygiene stuff called out above. Drink Water - throughout the day, I brought my water bottle with me when going out. Nutrition * Breakfast: cereal * Lunch: mac n cheese * Dinner: pizza dinner - which my oldest got sick on actually. My wife and I think he may be lactose intolerant, he also doesn't like milk or cheese snacks anymore and he used to up until last year. It's explaining why now. Talk to my partner - I talked about my commitments and what I set out to do as part of the Proactivity test. I've told my wife about the 7 Habits and do my best to discuss the material, but I am going to keep up talking about those little commitments I make for myself. Talk to my kids + play with them - Birthday party... so yeah haha. Read a book - While my kids were doing swimming lessons, I actually read a bit more of the 7 Habits workbook and transcribed some of the answers I had done. I put my mission statement into a note on my new phone, so I can easily access it. Practice French - I did about 30min when we got back from the party, after all kids were asleep. Also at the party all of the parents spoke French (as my kid goes to a French school). Journal - Feeling sober and alive :) ------ 7 habits - proactivity test - day 22 Commitments yesterday: Download copy and go through the ADHD Coaching document on cementing and post-coaching retention strategies. I've downloaded a copy onto my phone as of the morning, but with it being so busy, I've only reviewed a few of the strategies given. One which I practice often is booking things in my calendar, to the point that I will write it down instantly now. This is the main reason for why I wanted to have a phone with a stylus, so I could also take handwritten notes on a whim. It helps me to manage my forgetfulness, partly which is caused by my ADHD brain. Well, I guess it's not necessarily forgetfulness; it's also hyperfocus. I notice that I'll be super into a task sometimes, whether it is work or personal. My wife will then ask me to do something, but even if I am attentive at that moment, I will forget about it as soon as I go back to work or the personal task. So writing things down helps me. Talk to my partner about my commitments that I achieve and set for myself. Yes, I talked to her about the ADHD coaching goals I got, and how I was going to download the document. All of the above that I wrote down, I also mentioned to her, this is why notetaking and journaling in detail helps me. (if time allows) continue with 7 Habits No, but this was a stretch. I will probably not be doing this tomorrow either, as my parents invited us over so they can celebrate my oldest kids birthday as well 😄 I won't say no to that. But I will still put it as part of my commitments, if time allows. Commitments tomorrow: Continue to review the ADHD Coaching strategies (if time allows) continue with 7 Habits -- Night everyone. I'm now going to meditate -> shower -> brush my teeth (or some similar order) -> finally go to sleep

Fri 11.08 No mobile games - 199 days No compulsive social media use: 37 days No compulsive research: 37 days No passive screentime before bed, first thing in the mornings, or during work: 40 days Earlier today, I took some time to write a post here on this forums general section; (Don't think of Moderation as the End Goal; Think of Sobriety as the End Goal)[https://forum.gamequitters.com/index.php?/topic/11173-dont-think-of-moderation-as-the-end-goal-think-of-sobriety-as-the-end-goal/]. I wrote about where I am coming from, and that gives background on why I have those specific day counters for the goals I've set up for myself. I also shared the link to the worksheet from ITAA which helped me get that clarity for myself. My last ADHD coaching session was today, the last one my company is providing anyways. That has been so helpful honestly, and it's been what really motivated me to start journaling again. And she was very pleasantly surprised when I told her that I've been journaling for 43 days straight now (since Sept 26th). She told me to keep doing it too, because journaling is very helpful for reflecting and maintaining the good habits I've built so far. All around great feedback to get, and I'm glad she's been seeing the difference too. This helped a lot, I did talk about yesterday how I might be less productive today; and for the first hour it seemed that was what was going to happen. Talking with her really gave me some good action items to maintain the habits I've formed and to not fall into this trap of "settling back" after a good accomplishment. ----- Things I will do to stay healthy Sleep around 8h - To bed at 11:45pm and woke up at 6:45am, all around about 7 hours again. I stayed up working through the 7 Habits workbook. My last journal entry was posted shortly after I finished those exercises. Partly, I think the lateness is because I forgot about some of the plans I had committed to; errands with my wife and volunteering online. So if I am to maintain these things that I want to do every day, I have to also make an effort to note down commitments in my calendar, check it as well (not just waiting for alerts) and then communicate them with my wife earlier in the day. Stretch - upon waking up, before the gym workout and afterwards too. ...I've been pretty good about stretching, so next entry I'm going to remove it from this template. I feel confident enough to have baked this as a good habit, and I regularly don't say much about it anymore. I'll keep doing it, and if I have to mention something about it, I'll put it under the exercise objective. ...But I'm also gonna add an objective; Brush teeth + Floss. I have noticed that I tend to forget the flossing part some nights. And tonight is gonna be the night I will commit to making both of these a thing. I'll brush AND floss after this entry is posted. I'll make this a night habit. Go for walks / Exercise - My wife and I did quite a bit of arms; bicep curls, tricep extensions, lateral lifts, flys, and overhead press. We finished with planks. Very good workout today; despite waking up a bit late, I did get my kids to school fairly quickly this morning, which helped get more gym time before work. Shower + wash face - got both done after the workout. Meditate + Deep Breaths - At work today, there was actually a guided meditation that they set up for employees to do during a break. That was mighty kind of them! They invited a meditation coach to do it for us. It was great! The theme was about taking a moment to check-in with ourselves as a way to expand our perspective and achieve our goals; we often show up for other people, but we don't tend to make time to show up for ourselves (to check-in with us). So we tell ourselves 3 times; "may we be safe and secure, may we be peaceful and at ease, and may we be kind to ourselves in this moment." Drink Water - yes. I will still keep this even though I don't say much about it, because it is a helpful reminder for me :D Nutrition * Breakfast: 2 banana muffins my mother in law brought us (very kind of her) * Lunch: omelette with spicy peppers and cheese * Dinner: quick pasta dinner Talk to my partner - I was told by my ADHD coach during our final session to use accountability partners for my commitments; so that helps me explain for why I find journaling on this forum to be effective. One thing she mentioned was to also mention my accomplishments to my wife, and letting her know what my commitments are for the next day. I'll keep that in mind and do that, and moving forward. Talk to my kids + play with them - Tonight I read more books with my kids, which also serve as good French practice for me. Read a book - The 7 Habits workbook, see section below. Practice French - I posted on NewHopes intro topic en français, did Duolingo earlier, and practiced with my partner and kids. Journal - I am grateful that I've stayed logged off all social media besides my Messenger account for 37 days now. I like this feeling of being more aware and mindful with what I do. ------ 7 habits - proactivity test - day 21 Commitments yesterday: * Post my paper exercises in my entry tomorrow * Do more exercises as well; maybe see if I can finish Habit 2s exercises (I'll make that last part a stretch though) Reviewing my personal mission statement first: I will strive to live a balanced life in my creative pursuits, my job, my family life, and my spiritual life; being honest, patient, loving and driving a positive impact based on my values with everything I do. I'm going to modify it a bit to this; My mission is to be an honest, patient, loving and positive source of energy and support. I will strive to hold a balanced lifestyle in everything I do; my family, my job, my hobbies and creative pursuits, and my spirituality. I will drive a positive impact to the best of my ability, based on my values with everything I do. I will keep an open mind, seeking to understand before being understood. I will continue to strive for improvement, use the tools which I've been given and found successful, and always work on my personal growth. I feel that this better represents what I want to be and strive for. But I'll keep doing edits to it and revisit on the 13th to do steps 5 and 6 from that workbook. I'll update the About Me section of my profile for now with this statement. Roles and Goals The workbook asks me to write my roles in life, limiting it to seven or less just for this exercise. Also write the statement of optimal performance in role. What sticks out to me: ==Father== Be patient, kind, loving, an active listener, someone to make good times with, and a good role model. ==Husband== Never compromise honesty. Be an active listener, spend quality couple time together, working together to raise successful children and have a lifetime of great experiences together. == Software/Database Engineer == Be interdependent in my work, driving and achieving a greater impact with my team. Continue to work towards self improvement with the techniques I picked up from ADHD Coaching. == Friend == Spend quality time with friends regularly, being a good listener and supportive with them. == Writer == Write readable and understandable documentation. Express my creative ideas through (short) stories and prose, review my journaling for my self reflection, with a goal of publishing later in life. == Volunteer == continue to volunteer with the online tech club, find a physical place in my community to also volunteer and/or donate which I'm passionate about **Goals** Goals are what give your mission statement momentum; they create a plan of action and help measure whether or not you are successfully living your mission statement. Three Long term goals to support my mission, along with solidification reasons for why they matter to me: Goal 1 - strive towards continuous self improvement in my career, taking the opportunities I am given and making an effort to create opportunities for myself and others. This goal is important to me so that I may continue to grow in my field. A year or so back, I actually called out that I wanted to get promoted on this forum as one of my goals. But in hindsight, I think I just ended up hoping it would happen to me, rather than actually taking up my ownership to work towards that goal. Goal 2 - Continue to work on my awareness and mindfulness, sticking with these seeking to first listen to others before being understood. I tend to blow up a lot and let my emotions control me. By practicing the 7 Habits, along with meditation, that has helped visualize situations which are usually stressful in which I can choose a better response. Goal 3 - Remain committed to journaling every day and reflecting on my entries frequently to aid me on my growth. Publish my own creative project, be it a collection of short stories or a novel, or even a technical text. This has been really helpful for me, as I've mentioned several times here, for my own reflection. It also really helps me in the sense that I can focus on what is important to me; the things I will do to stay healthy, for instance, and my mission statement here. As for writing, that is something I do really want to explore in my own time. -- I did not finish all of Habit 2 yet, but I'll continue either tomorrow or Sunday; I don't want to commit for tomorrow because my oldest is having a birthday party, so that will keep me busy. The next part is the "How" I plan on accomplishing these goals. Commitments tomorrow: * Download copy and go through the ADHD Coaching document on cementing and post-coaching retention strategies. * Talk to my partner about my commitments that I achieve and set for myself. * (if time allows) continue with 7 Habits Good night everybody!

Hi GQ, This post is in regards to all the other conversations I've seen here, in r/stopGaming, along with other discussion groups, about achieving moderation. I wanted to speak to this topic because, as someone who has been successfully sticking to important things first for 30+ days now, while having kept casual gaming as a hobby for several years now, I do feel a sense of responsibility to not give the wrong impression. I do personally believe that we can do anything we want and set our mind to. But I do also want to point out that, in my experience, moderation by itself isn't what helps me; rather, it's Sobriety which lets me maintain a balanced lifestyle. Sobriety is what I would say we want to achieve and maintain, and I think it is much more helpful to think of that as the end goal. Sobriety is what lets us truly be clear of mind and aware, letting us do and work on the things which matter most to us. We are all different. Maybe it's only a few types of games that are addictive for you, maybe it's a majority of them. Or we all may even have other addictions we aren't even aware of yet. Maybe it's just gaming for you, or maybe you could also addicted to gambling, drinking alcohol, smoking weed, social media, overeating, overworking yourself, and so forth. You have to be willing to explore yourself and discover these things. If you want a good resource for finding out what your Sobriety is like, I suggest you check out the Discovering Your Sobriety Worksheet from Internet and Technology Addicts Anonymous (ITAA). For me, gaming isn't as a whole addictive; but I do recognize that gaming can be triggering for me still, as it can cause me to crave other much more destructive and addictive behaviors. For example, some games can make me want to hop on social media to look for more stuff about that game. Often times this is what has turned a seemingly innocent 1h game session into an 8h doomscrolling session. This is an example of a middle line for me, a trigger. I would say that gaming, majority wise, is a middle line for me too; there are other handfuls of games that I can still play and stick to limits with, but it's definitely not necessary or a priority that I play them. That said, there are also some games which I am way too compulsive with, so much so that the effort to try "moderating" those just isn't a good use of my time; it's simply too much effort and it's just not worth it. Mobile games are particularly bad for me; I don't have a single game on my phone for that reason. They are bottom lines for me. Similarly, the majority of social media is also a bottom line, because I am way too compulsive with my use; jumping from subs in Reddit, to different channels on Discord, to endless reels on Instagram, to doomscrolling for Tweets. It is just too much effort for me to try moderating it, for what is very little benefit in comparison to the effort required. Think of bottom lines as deep dark swamps you get sucked into, very hard to get out of; we abstain from even getting close to them. So, even if you can achieve moderation, it may not be with the games you're hoping with now; be honest and ready to cut out those which you are too compulsive with, those which are too much effort to stay balanced with. Personally, I do not see myself ever moderating Empires & Puzzles; this is a game which I was way too addicted to in the past, failed too many times to moderate it, and thus is too much mental effort for me to get to that state for very little benefit. I abstain fully from it instead because it's a much more productive use of my energy, I can instead focus my energy into things that bring me more fulfillment rather than on sticking to a schedule I can hardly maintain with that and similar games. To maintain your Sobriety, you want to lean into your top lines; activities and behaviors you identified that allow you to live a healthier and positive life, and which get you closer to being the person you want to be. This can involve minimal, healthy, positive technology use too. One example I can think of for myself in regards to video games is playing an online Scrabble game with my grandmother who lives far away from me. Intention is the key thing here; in this case, the intention is to foster and grow relationships with people I care about. The game is simply the environment we meet in to accomplish that. But again, this looks different for everyone. In summary, it's not about moderating; it's not even about whether cold turkey vs moderation is better necessarily. Instead, it's more helpful to think of achieving and maintaining Sobriety as the end goal. This is a state that looks different for everyone, and that is why I am sharing that worksheet; I really recommend doing the exercise yourself to discover what your Sobriety looks like.

Bonjour NewHope! De même, j'ai joué pendant 12 heures consécutives, et avec les temps, j'ai atteint moins de 2h. Bienvenue! J'habite au Canada Ontario. Maintenant, j'apprends le français avec mes enfants et ma femme; elle est franco-ontarien, et mes enfants vont a un école de le consiel français. Je pratique avec ils tous les jours. C'est l'une des raisons pour lesquelles je suis ici; parce que je veux me concentrer sur ce qui compte le plus pour moi. (Apologies in advance if I made mistakes; I am still learning French. I currently speak English and Spanish fluently as well)

Thu 11.07 No mobile games - 198 days No compulsive social media use: 36 days No compulsive research: 36 days No passive screentime before bed, first thing in the mornings, or during work: 39 days Today was fairly busy, moreso than I remembered it would be yesterday; had to go pick up holiday presents that were pre-ordered, and also did volunteering; for the latter, I got thrown off due to not volunteering last Thursday (because it was Halloween). I'm going to keep this entry short as a result. The most notable things from today to call out in this reflection part were at work and volunteering. At work, I FINALLY got a script working to deploy a resource to Azure. Man... it is an absolute pain to work with Azure. So many IDs to keep track off, all of them called something else depending on where you are looking. I felt almost "drunk" after finishing, and I'm making a note of that; it's almost like all the work research I did and the final pay-off elated me. It all was very productive though; so I'm just watching myself to make sure I don't go on a "hangover" after success (as per the meditation I did today; details on that follow). This also aligns with the 7 Habits, particularly the 2nd one of beginning with the end in mind; what I'm doing is more like devops work, even though I'm a database engineer, but I'm learning a lot and taking this opportunity to expand my skillset beyond my comfort zone. Volunteering today was more research heavy more than anything. I looked through a massive city budget document to find data that was missing from the govs public files. This is exactly why we are working on this project, it's very confusing to make any sense of this data even if it is public. Our goal is to get a dashboard that can easily filter this data and isolate key points, and have boxes which can quickly be checked on or off. Say to make sense of the Police budget, or the Parks and Recreation budget. This is info that I had no idea was made public until I looked into it myself with this volunteering activity. ----- Things I will do to stay healthy Sleep around 8h - Closer to 7h today, went to bed shortly after my update yesterday around 11:10pm, and then I got up at 6:30am. Today was a two coffees kinda day Stretch - after waking up, before the gym workout and afterwards. Also I've been using my standing desk on the stand setting throughout today, to make in-between stretching easier (also easier on my back) Go for walks / Exercise - This morning, my wife and I did squats, ab twists, and planks. I'm glad we worked out together. Shower + wash face - after the workout I did both of these Meditate + Deep Breaths - after the shower. Todays guided one was about this idea of a self-doubt hangover; after a really successful project, I've noticed myself that I tend to then come down from that high and think thoughts like "I could've done that instead" or "maybe this didn't drive the impact I thought it would" and so forth. It's my inner saboteur doubting my success. But the guided meditation also reminded me that this is just our narrative; not necessarily what others really thought, chances are it's better than what our mind makes it out to be. ^Hence why I'm keeping an eye for tomorrow on myself. Gotta make sure I carry this feeling to keep succeeding and moving forward with the project, not to hide away from it now that the "hard" part is over. You'd think now that I have easy things to do for work tomorrow I'd just do them, right? Well... ADHD is a funny thing, I often leave things unfinished as soon as they get easy. The fact I'm aware of this is a good sign, and that is why I'm journaling about it; so I don't fall into procrastination tomorrow. Drink Water - I did stay very well hydrated today, I made some carbonated water in advance. Nutrition Breakfast: cereal Lunch: I made some quesadillas for myself Dinner: my wife and I had to run an errand, we packed up the kids and then we just picked up take-out because it was getting late Talk to my partner - during gym workout, running an errand later in the day, and we spent time together at night after all kids were asleep. She likes horror a lot, one thing she likes to do is watch horror movies / series together. We stopped at 10:15pm which is a bit later than I would've liked, but I'm not going to be anal either about 15min. Talk to my kids + play with them - I totally forgot I had civic tech club when writing yesterdays entry, not only that but also forgot about having to go out with my wife to go pick up some holiday gifts. I did get to spend some fun time with all my kids after though, I took over the bath time for the kids and got them dressed for bed, and I read stories in French to the baby. Read a book - Children's stories aside, I did do some 7 Habits just now before getting ready for bed and transcribing this out. Practice French - I only got a chance to practice while I was holding the baby; I forgot about me volunteering today for the civic tech club in my city. Children's books are helping me too haha 😄 Journal - short entry today ------ 7 habits - proactivity test - day 20 Commitments yesterday: * French practice with story and younger kids Yes, as per above. * Read more 7 Habits workbook and get through more exercises As I said, I did do these. But I'll be posting them from paper -> typing tomorrow... That will be a commitment. It's already pretty late and I should prioritize going to bed soon rather than transferring more from paper to computer in this entry. Commitments tomorrow: * Post my paper exercises in my entry tomorrow * Do more exercises as well; maybe see if I can finish Habit 2s exercises (I'll make that last part a stretch though)

Keep up your detox, and focus on discovering other things you like doing; like with that creative talent of yours you've described (love to hear it!). You want to lean into those positive things that bring you true fulfillment. On my end, I used an exercise called "Discovering your Sobriety Worksheet" from the Internet and Technology Addicts Anonymous website to help me with finding what truly matters for me. It helps with identifying your bottom lines (most destructive and compulsive behaviors, abstain), middle lines (triggers, where you can go with caution but should not prioritize), and top lines (what you lean on, that which brings you true fulfillment and what you aspire to be). You can find the link to the worksheet in my profile, on the "About Me" section. What I personally discovered is that the "state" of moderating games isn't really a goal; the goal instead is maintaining sobriety, by working on self-improvement and focusing on what matters most. From there, it becomes a lot more clear to see if there really are any behaviors with technology that are positive and in-line with my state of sobriety. But that said, this is a personal document; it's going to be different for everyone what we each discover in our lines. So I really recommend doing it yourself, as your answers will be different from mine. As long as you are honest with your answers and with yourself, the sobriety worksheet is a really powerful document you can keep with you for life to help guide you.

Wed 11.06 No mobile games - 197 days No compulsive social media use: 35 days No compulsive research: 35 days No passive screentime before bed, first thing in the mornings, or during work: 38 days Recently, I've had cravings resurface about going back to Reddit, Discord and Twitter. These were the worst time wasters for me, and probably still are (I'm not going to go back to test that just to find out). I journal about these cravings because it is so far the best way I have found to redirect my desire to write (that is the root). Just write it out, like I am doing now. The craving eventually does its thing, but I don't engage with it; I feel it out, and let it pass. Then, after writing about the craving, I meditate to think about why I'm feeling a craving, and practice writing to myself. Then I detail about the answers I think of to those questions I asked myself, my own conciense (or Higher Power). This is called 2-way prayer, which is the thing I do at the meetings I attend on Tuesday mornings. If it's alright, I'll take a moment to detail the 2-way prayer practice I did. Through meditation, I did start thinking; am I satisfying the craving with writing? Or am I supressing the craving? Is it a bit of both? Is journaling compulsively something I should be worried about? These are the questions I asked my higher power. And here is what I got back: There is improvement I can still make; but do not give up journaling. Better to spend 30min broken up through the day writing this entry out, than it is to waste an entire 8h workday browsing endless topics on non-essential forums. But keep working on my sense of self, my compass in life, and in managing my time; as long as I keep a balance with the other important areas of my life, journaling can be an effective tool to let me refocus and then return to work. Keep doing that with a Pomodoro timer when cravings arise, then practice 2-way prayer. Finally, I ask myself, if this is really my conscience, or if this answer is justification and rationalization. Important to make sure that these are honest thoughts and not coming from an alternative center, rather that these thoughts are based from how I understand correct principles. And I think this is a good and honest answer I got back. It even touches upon the 7 Habits there, in regards to the principles and paradigms content that the book starts with (the sense of self, compass in life and time management part). Yeah, this can be an overwhelming process indeed... but I am satisfied with the answer I got back. It gives me direction, even if it lets me know that striving for quality is a life's worth of work. It will take practice and consistency understanding correct principles and reframing my values and mission statement to align with them. It's not going to get done in a day, but that's ok. ----- Things I will do to stay healthy Sleep around 8h - I went to bed at 10pm, but then woke up at 11pm because the baby awoke. After he was asleep, that is also when I realized I didn't submit my part 2 yesterday, so I did that and then went back to bed by 11:35pm. My wife took most of the night shifts with the baby, and I got up at 4:30am to do one, which he then fell asleep by 5am and until 6:30am thankfully. All in all... about 7h of sleep total. I'm feeling a bit tired, but not as much as I felt it on Monday. Stretch - upon waking up, also before and after my "workout" today (will explain shortly...) Go for walks / Exercise - My wife had an appointment this morning, so I did some exercises while waiting for her in the parking lot; my middle kid and the baby both in the car, the middle kid was there because daycare closed due to not enough educators. For working out, I did dips, using an open door in our car to support myself, and I did inclined push-ups the same way. 4 sets each. That's all I did with the environment I had; I do wish I could've done weights, but it's fine! I feel like I made an effort. I did get quick looks from passerby's, but I paid them no more attention than they did with brief glances. Meditate + Deep Breaths - I meditated in the car while waiting for my wife. And then again later in the day. See the intro to this post. Drink Water - in the car I also brought my water bottle with me. Good reminder again for me to keep it full. Shower + wash face - oh yeah, I should have a rinse actually. I'll do that after posting, we got back late from the appointment. Nutrition Breakfast: yogurt with nuts. Lunch: leftover chicken that my in-laws gave us. Dinner: air-fried burgers with salad on the side after work. Talk to my partner - throughout the car ride. We talked about how my oldest is struggling a bit with sounding out some words; my wife got a message from his teacher about things we can do right now to help practice at home. His teacher is optimistic about improvement though, and she's understanding that being born late in the year contributes for why he's not as far ahead as other kids his age. So we'll work on it, we got resources from the teacher. Talk to my kids + play with them - I was with both the baby and middle kid so my wife could focus on the exercises with my oldest, per above. Also read a book to all 3 of them Read a book - I will be reading more of the 7 Habits workbook and see how far I get tonight. Practice French - I practiced French lessons while waiting in the car. I forgot to do the French story though, so this time I'm making it a commitment; I'll do it tomorrow with and go through those steps indie_rok gave me. Journal - Here is my entry for the day, and I'm grateful to keep journaling. I feel like I have boundless energy to keep doing this every day of my life! ------ 7 habits - proactivity test - day 19 Commitments yesterday: * Keep writing my journals on paper first Okay so I wrote my mission statement exercises on paper. Not so much the entire entry though. I will be honest about that. I did stick to writing on the computer Notepad though, and I have found it to be more effective; because it does keep the actual personal stuff separate from the work stuff that I do in Notepad++. So I'm getting good results there. What I got out of this was; workbook exercises on paper, and personal journal (the template part) on computer are both okay to do. Then combine after. * Continue with Mission Statement exercises The ones I did on paper first were these ones. What stood out to me was the way these questions were written in steps: 1. Brainstorm Ideas: spend about three minutes on each question. Identify an influential person Define who you want to become - Imagine it's twenty yers in the future; what is your list of accomplishments? What do you want to do, have and be? Determine what is important to you today 2. Take a breather. 3. Gather your thoughts; review what you've written and circle key ideas, words, and phrases that you would like to include in your Mission Statement. 4. Write a rough draft; during the week, carry your rough draft with you and make notes, additions, and deletions s needed each day. The things I circled in step 3, which became the basis for step 4: * live life, maintain work-life balance * be a role model with good morals and values * be a patient, honest and loving partner and father * positive impact; promote and drive positive experiences, and make a difference at my job and my home life * stay healthy and fit * explore and commit to fulfilling activities, like my creative writing pursuits For the rough draft, I suppose it's something that I did a while back. So I am going to review my summary here: I will be an honest, kind, supportive and loving husband, coworker, volunteer and friend. That is what I said, but now I'm going to tweak it; I will strive to live a balanced life in my creative pursuits, my job, my family life, and my spiritual life; being honest, patient, loving and driving a positive impact based on my values with everything I do. Few more steps after that, which I will be doing throughout this week: 5. Complete Your Mission Statement - at the end of the week, write a final copy of your mission statement and find a permanent place for it where you can easily access it. I plan on keeping it in my whiteboard, and also on my profile's "About me" section of this forum. 6. Periodically Review and Evaluate - Every month or so, ask yourself the following questions: * Does this mission statement represent the best within me? * Do I feel direction, purpose, challenge, and motivation when I review my mission statement? * AM I living my life according to the ideals and values that are incorporated in my mission statement? So that is something I'll be working on throughout this week. Commitments for tonight/tomorrow: * French practice with story and younger kids; see if I post about it this time * Read more 7 Habits workbook and get through more exercises

Hey Torch, if you still feel this way, it's a feeling that will pass. I can't speak to quitting all games myself - I cut out the most problematic ones only, and that is what is working for me - but I know the feeling from having played a lot of Empires & Puzzles and quitting that game. This is a mobile game with alliances, a daily set of quests to do, players work together to take down a daily big boss, get and share loot, there's private guild chats and public global ones, and there's alliance wars too, etcetera... All of these social elements were very addictive to me; it felt like I was part of a big mission, it enticed me to grind and "keep up" so I could contribute to my alliance. I even became a senior member of my alliance, helping out players with game things and resolving conflicts when they arose; and eventually, the games company asked me to become a moderator for their online forum (which I was quite active at too). So I really get this feeling. In particular, I understand how you feel in regards of expectations. I was quite well known in the games community. I had quite the reputation for putting together a big data spreadsheet and condensing it into a quick reference for all players. And ofc I was a moderator for the community so that gave me a bit of a spotlight. We may not be able to hold or touch things like fame and reputation, but they are very much still possessions; intangible possessions are just as temporary, and just as easily lost, as physical possessions. I say this because this feeling you have right now, it's also partly coming from you, your own sense and attachment to your game identity. You are severing that from yourself now, and yeah it's gonna feel weird for sure. It's almost like an identity crisis of sorts, almost like saying goodbye to a job you had for years. This weird feeling will pass though. I went through it with E&P, and now I'm going through it again, a similar "identity" loss from quitting social media and compulsively researching (fandom/wiki editing, in particular). But being able to be aware of this is helpful, because it then lets me figure out how to redirect that energy towards other more fulfilling tasks. For me, what has worked best is to focus on self-improvement and rediscovering my identity. I've been reading the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, as well as engaging in my daily journaling. Cheers!

Tue 11.05 (part 2) I've updated my journal's template, and I'm going to start including how many days it has been since I sobered myself up from mobile games. No mobile games - 196 days This dates back to April 23rd, 2024. The worst games for me on my phone I quit waaay back 4 years ago, so that date is to call out when I quit all mobile games for good. Before that point I had thought that it was only with those games which I was struggling with. Wasn't until that day when I realized that I was binge-playing anything on my phone; even just casual matching games, even a simple Solitaire app honestly was bad for me and could lead to hours of wasted time chasing the fastest and best solvability (yah lol seriously). The time I had spent playing them felt super wasteful. That was the day which I uninstalled every game off my phone, and it has stayed that way since. I decided to start tracking it because, in one of my earlier posts, I did note a temptation to install a really basic looking matching game on my phone while checking the weather (saw an ad for it). It will motivate me to keep my phone clean from games. 7 habits - proactivity test - day 18 Commitments yesterday: * Work on the Personal Mission Statement questions from the workbook * Review my journal posts here to aid me I'm not going to post this today, but it's all on paper. I'm getting pretty tired. The next section was basically a rapid fire brainstorm that leaned on the first few questions we covered, and it was exciting but also the book had a note saying to "take a break" after finishing it haha. I think it's similar to what we do in ITAA 2-way meditation, where we write what we talk about with our higher power, but we also take a moment to examine and review what we wrote; to make sure it is honest and coming from our HP. * Commit to writing my next entry on paper I'll continue this tomorrow as well. * NOT check the news for election stuff tomorrow (I will be strong, and I will live!) Have not checked 🙂 Not compulsively anyway, I did get a peek of the start of the results from the bar downstairs in my building, but that was while I was bringing my dogs out. And I know there's no use stressing about what I saw, because things are going to be clear tomorrow. Commitments for tonight/tomorrow: * Keep writing the entry on paper * Continue with the 7 Habits Mission statement exercises

Yeah the days get a lot shorter here, I'm in Canada. With the fall-back time change, it's bright at 7am but dark at 5pm. And it's going to keep going like that. That is probably why sometimes I'll also put sugar in my coffee. It wakes me up quicker. But I do notice the crash hits me hard sometimes at noon, and I need another coffee. And it certainly doesn't help that my kids got quite the candy horde from Halloween haha 😄 Temptations!

Tue 11.05 (part 1) No compulsive social media use: 34 days No compulsive research: 34 days No passive screentime before bed, first thing in the mornings, or during work: 37 days Early part 1 post because I need to get something out which has been frustrating me since the morning... couldn't focus on work much. Journaling is one of those things that helps me though. Things I will do to stay healthy Sleep around 8h - I slept better last night; to bed at 11pm, and woke up at 6:30am. The baby also slept through, which surprised me because he was asleep at 7:30pm last night (quite early). So he's got great sleep too. Stretch - morning and before workout. Also after workout; I found I had some tightness around my right shoulder. Today my wife's brothers girlfriend, who is a physiotherapist, told me that I should always stretch before and after workouts; active stretches before working out (movement focused), and static stretches afterwards (standing still). I noticed that my shoulder was not in pain afterwards, so I'll keep in mind to stretch after working out. Meditate + deep breaths - Short meditation in the morning. I will do another after posting this to refocus on work. Go for walks / Exercise - good workout by myself today, as my wife is volunteering at my kids daycare field trip today. Standing bicep rows, shoulder press lunges, overhead press, dips and vertical knee raise (for abs). Drink Water - reminder for myself to keep this close to me during work. It's easy to forget, but that's why I like doing my journal in bits throughout the day. Shower + wash face - after meditation. Nutrition: Breakfast; cereal lunch; sandwich probably dinner; tbd, I'll check-in with my wife to see if we just do takeout or cook something easy Talk to my partner - okay... venting time here. My wife and I are fine, firstly. It's not her, it's her brother. So him and his family had said several weeks ago that they would be making the trip here for my oldest kids birthday. Well last night, they cancelled; and we didn't even hear this from him, but from my mother in-law instead. Hence our frustration. I found this out after my journal entry was posted yesterday. Writing this now, I am still peeved about it. My mother in-law was going on about how they have busy lives with their courses that they are doing, how they also have two young kids themselves. And I mean, yeah I can relate, but I am not satisfied by that; we're busy too! Myself with my job, which can be very demanding - sometimes requiring me to be on alert during weekends to fix crucial system issues - and I volunteer once a week online with the civic tech club. My wife too, even being on maternity leave, has been doing quite a bit to help my in-laws when they travel up to her great-uncles place to get it cleaned out; and yeah, this is the same great-uncle who passed away about 3 weeks now, he hoarded a lot of stuff! That's why it's still going on. And on top of all that, we also have 3 kids ourselves. We've also made efforts to go see my nieces dance recital, and we've attended both their kids birthdays this past year. Pretty disappointing that they aren't reciprocating the same efforts we've made. The worst though, is that they could have at least sent a text directly to us, saying they would not make it; not to find out through my mother in-law. All of this makes me just not want to make any more efforts with him and his family ... *sigh* well anyway. As disappointing as it all is, it's not within my control. They can make their choices, as I can make my choices too. I can focus on the good things; my oldest kid is still getting a very fun birthday party, a lot of his friends from school have already confirmed their attendance. He'll have fun, which is what matters. I am definitely glad I wrote about this though, I needed to vent; but I will not hang on to this, and will focus on what I can do and influence instead. With that in mind, I'll talk with my wife some more after this entry, and focus on the excitement coming this weekend for my oldest kid. Talk with kids + play with them - Last night, I read to my kids a few books, some in English and some in French. However I completely forgot about using indie_rok's suggestion! So I'm going to revisit these books again tonight. This time, I've copied and pasted the steps into my digital notepad, which I'll be writing in my physical notepad later. Read a book - In the afternoon yesterday, I did my workbook exercises. I will post them later today. Last night, I read a short story by Joe Hill, called "Ushers." It has some fantasy elements, it's about a suspect who is interviewed by two cops, because he avoided two major catastrophes that he knew about in advance. It takes quite a good turn towards the end of the story. I won't spoil much more 🙂 Practice French - As per the kids entry, I'll focus on French later. Journal - I feel a lot less stressed now after writing that, like I can focus on the things that matter instead of hanging on to anger. ------ After work, I'll post my 7 Habits and follow up on yesterdays commitments:* Work on the Personal Mission Statement questions from the workbook * Review my journal posts here to aid me * Commit to writing my next entry on paper * NOT check the news for election stuff tomorrow I have been staying off the news, btw, and plan on continuing that. Not much good is going to come out of me just obsessively refreshing any campaign pages.

Mon 11.04 No compulsive social media use: 33 days No compulsive research: 33 days No passive screentime before bed, first thing in the mornings, or during work: 36 days Didn't think that this was an issue until last night, but I'm going through cravings for candy! Yeah, I found myself quite restless yesterday night; I only had 2 cups of coffee at the breakfast restaurant, but maybe the sugar from the skull (cup)cake kept me wired. And hey, eating candy should get added to my Lines too. I didn't even think about that (chocolate mainly) being a compulsive bad habit of mine at the time of going through that worksheet. Something else too... elections in the USA are coming tomorrow. And I'm in Canada, I can't even vote there! So this is very much so a Circle of Concern item for me; I cannot influence what happens. So I'm calling it out now, because obsessively checking the news is a compulsive behavior. So I'm making a strategy to not check the news at all tomorrow. I will be focusing on my circle of Influence; the things I can do and control, the things over which I can make a difference in. Things I will do to stay healthy Sleep around 8h - I really tried going to bed at 10:30pm, but I was mostly just tossing in bed. So I got up, paced to the kitchen, and realized I kept reaching for candy frequently. I stopped myself and used deep breathing followed by meditation to process why the heck I was getting candy cravings, of all things. I ate well yesterday from the pizza, so I wasn't hungry. I became aware of that through meditation. I also think that I was seeking comfort food due to being awake and feeling like I had to be doing something with my time. So after meditating and mulling these thoughts, I started doing workbook exercises for the 7 Habits in order to keep busy; and that greatly helped with the cravings. ... not so much with the sleep part, because I went to sleep at midnight instead. I woke up at 6:40am this morning. So not really that close to 8h, a bit less than 7h of sleep in fact. And I'm feeling it today; that said, I know it could be worse from past experience, if I had ate candy or gone on my phone. So I'm also recognizing the positive of not indulging in my bottom lines. Stretch - Upon waking up and before my workout. Also through my standing breaks. Meditate + deep breaths - After my work meetings (Monday is always busy like that) I will do some meditation to refocus. I'm always mentally worn from these consecutive meetings, most of the time I'm just doing chores while listening and chiming in when my work is involved. I have a headset that can flip the microphone down to unmute myself, which is convenient. I only do multitasking like that while in these general meetings too, just to be clear. I recognize the value of these team-wide meetings, but I also do not need to be in front of my computer all the time to get what I need to get from them. Go for walks / Exercise - Gym with my wife, we did chest, biceps and triceps today. I really like the walking lunges that wheatbuscuit suggested, they are very effective at making me sweat. Drink Water - Right, I should drink some more. I had quite a bit during my workout but I am feeling parched now; been a bit since I drank water last. Good reminder. Wash body + face - Yes, after the workout. Nutrition: Breakfast; fruit bowl lunch; sandwich nice and quick dinner; tbd Talk to my partner - during the workout, she is volunteering tomorrow for my kids daycare. Going to a field trip to a jungle gym. Tomorrow I'll have to workout at the gym by myself, either earlier (before 8am) or during lunch (sometime around 12:30pm), due to the field trip she's going to. Talk with kids + play with them - Will do after work. The kids love their new room though! Both beds are now opposite of each other in the room, and the dresser moved against the wall where one of their beds previously was. This made the room feel a lot bigger now! And there's no way for the kids jumping back-and-forth between their beds, so that's a safety issue removed too. A win-win! Read a book - I'll do more 7 Habits tonight, I'm feeling pumped about the exercises. Practice French - This morning before bringing my middle kid to daycare and after the workout. I've been hopping between English -> French and Spanish -> French lessons on Duolingo, and I've found I am actually learning more with the app by doing it this way. I've already highlighted this in a previous entry, but you do get some different phrases in the app by doing this, even words that you don't normally get in the English -> <language> course. Journal - grateful for prioritizing first things first better! Saw a lot of improvement from last month. See below. 7 habits - proactivity test - day 17 Commitments for todays proactivity test: ==== Post more 7 Habits workbook exercises here ===== What fills my soul? helping others being a loving husband and a role model for my kids Spending time at my job Staying fit at the gym Expressing myself through creative (poetic, narrative, rhyme, etc), technical (analytical, logical, etc) writing After answering this question, I actually looked up how to sign up for a creative writing course with continuing studies. They aren't offering any at my university, but I did sign up for their mailing list. What can I do well? What are my unique traits & strengths? I think I am quite good at writing, even the senior engineers at my workplace have highlighted that for me. Some of them being very appreciative about my code comments, detailed pages, and diagrams for systems This covers the technical writing I mentioned above I do have a fairly rare skillset, being a double major in Computer Science and English. And I am also unique in how I read, write, think and imagine things. I am going to embrace that. The next section has me go through guiding questions, using the answers from the previous section "Checking your Vision" to apply what I wrote to my Mission Statement. So what I'm going to do tonight is write the answers from those on paper (I'll be reviewing my last few posts here), which will help me with readability outside of screens. ==== Share reflection on my screen time summary from last month (October) ==== I did this for September last month, and it turned out to be a really good exercise for my own self-reflection and improvement. For my previous reflection, refer to the October 2nd post. I post these stats for my own accountability only; to stay healthy, mindful and intentional about how I use my passive screen time. For those reading, I do crop the images, since they do include casual console games (I'm not going to mention any either). If you want more details for my bottom, middle and top lines, you can read my Sobriety Worksheet that I posted on the October 2nd entry (linked above) To condense the readability of the post, I have put all the screenshots in quote blocks. == Computer screen time == Stay Free - covers my phone, my work computer, and my browsers (both on computer and mobile). I do exclude some work applications (my coding IDEs, the Edge browser which I only use for work). My overall personal time went up this month, although my passive screen time is down; no more Reddit at the top 5, since I started abstaining from it and other social media. | Month | Top 5 Most used Apps | |--------|:-------:| | September 2024 | Notepad++ , Reddit, New York Times, Duolingo, Messenger (Facebook) | | October 2024 | Gamequitters forum, Notepad++, Facebook Messenger, Zoom, New York Times | There is more in-depth functionality I've discovered. Included in screenshots below, with a reflection that follows. 1. This forum (Gamequitters) Good things Journaling is a great thing for me, it has led to some really helpful reflection periods and realizations. I didn't even know that I was so excited about writing, hindsight it seems obvious given these posts (lol). But there you go, sometimes it's a lot easier to analyze others than yourself. How can I be better? My time overall increased since last month, specifically time spent on the computer overall. I still don't necessarily think it was a bad month though, but I could instead be journaling on paper and THEN transfer it to the computer. Or at least journal on my Notepad app (not the Notepad++ one, but the Windows default one) to be separate from the web browser. The reason why I mention this is because I am suspecting that my cravings are partly coming from being on the web more, even if it's not me engaging on bottom line behavior. I do still "browse around" sometimes in this forum when I get notifications; not that I'm discouraging that, but it's more of a me thing to stay focused on my writing. Write my first, then check after. As for the Notepad program, it is to separate my personal typing time from my work time. One will be for personal use (Notepad) and the other for work (++). Also, the most important thing, I really should just NOT increase my time and stick to my limit. Some days I felt it necessary to get the points I wanted to get across. So what should help with this is the above; paper journaling ideally, but Notepad is a backup option too when I type it out. I'm also going to say that I wrote most of this on Notepad today, to stay accountable. 2. Notepad++ Good things: As mentioned earlier, this is m work pad. I have some coding language extensions and plugins to help me with work. How can I be better? I do still want to separate it though, as I did use it for personal use in the past month. So I'm splitting the personal stuff to the basic Notepad included in Windows. Also something which I mentioned above. 3. & 4. Google Messages / Messenger Good things: Most of my time on these two comes from calls, not all of it is spent sending messages. The calls I make are with friends, on group chats we have. This is how I've been staying in touch with them during the nights that I've mentioned. I also stay in touch with my wife. Oh and with the Google Messages app, I also schedule texts to send at a later date. It helps my ADHD when I remember I want to talk to someone about a topic, but realize halfway through that the topic could probably wait until later in the day or week 😄 How can I be better? Muting chats when I find them too distracting during work hours. I've realized that late in October, but noting it here to keep improvement going. 5. The New York Times Good things: I can tell the times I helped cook and find recipes lol 😄 How can I be better? I should think about getting the specific apps for the behaviors I engage in which are not news browsing. Otherwise, it's hard for me to tell if the "Web" time is also cooking time or not; for all I know it is probably the wordle, crossword and sudokus. But the usage overall is pretty low, so this is a minor improvement. == Console screen time == | Month | Average time per day | Days played | Days over 2h | |--------|:-------|-------:|:------:| | September 2024 | 1h 35m | 20 | 6 | | October 2024 | 1h 05m | 13 | 2 | Good things The average amount of time is significantly lower in October than September. Natural drop as I started doing the "things I will do everyday to stay health," reading and practicing Covey's 7 Habits, attending ITAA meetings, and journaling all about those here. In the words of Stephen Covey; "Innocent pleasures in moderation can provide relaxation for the body and mind and can foster family and other relationships. But pleasure, per se, fosters no deep, lasting satisfaction or sense of fulfillment." As I have mentioned at the very beginning of this journal, I know this isn't a typical "gamequitters" objective; it's something I've been truthful about since I started writing. I am keeping myself accountable with this screen time app though; in fact, I do owe this site a lot of credit for this. Even though the site is called "gamequitters" there are a lot of good articles on the main site about just getting gaming under control. I've been following up on a lot of the advice in those articles, in terms of keeping gaming a hobby. This drop in screen time is partly also attributed to the great advice found here. I am also staying away from any competitive games, and no games on my phone at all either (you would be able to tell in the StayFree section if I was overindulging on them) Improvement One thing I remember calling out was to avoid playing on weekdays. Well I'm mostly sticking to that, but I am not being super strict in the sense that I do see it being okay with some exceptions; when I'm doing a treadmill walk, or when I'm playing socially with friends and family. That said, I can tell that a few of those days (specially near the end of the month), I just turned on the system out of boredom, not even playing for that long either. This is behavior I do want to avoid, as it's a slippery slope for me to isolation. Now, none if that happened during inappropriate times; I am still strict about not playing before bed, first thing in the mornings, and during work. But I will make an effort to do something else instead, I could for instance have read more of the books I'm currently reading. Mind you, it's not like I lost a ton of time, I'm also aware of that. This is a small improvement in the grand scheme, but a small improvement is good nonetheless. Otherwise, I will be happy if I see my dashboard look similar next month for November. --- Once a month, I'll allow myself more time to make this monthly reflection. It's highly valuable for me, because I have a ton of action items to cover. For commitments tonight and tomorrow; Work on the Personal Mission Statement questions from the workbook Review my journal posts here to aid me Commit to writing my next entry on paper NOT check the news for election stuff tomorrow (I will be strong, and I will live!)

You are not a bad person at all. Your wife and your son are your family now; you live with them! So it's okay to prioritize your direct family over your extended one. It's up to you and your partner whether you do let your grandparents meet your son, but they are not entitled just because it's "their" grandkid. If you do, then I highly recommend you set up some boundaries before hand, be very clear about them, and have them agree to them. I can relate here to my own experience with my parents. Both of my parents are alcoholics (they drink every single day), they used corporate punishment on my siblings and I growing up (and they'd tell stories about this to my wife thinking it is totally okay to punish kids by hitting them with belts), they are bigoted and racist, and they react poorly with anger and frustration often. After I stopped playing mobile games obsessively, I learnt how to deal with my parents and the interactions they have with my family. I couldn't escape into games anymore, but I couldn't change them either. So I dealt with them with boundaries. I asked them for 4 things when the kids were present; to not drink when we visited with kids, to stop taking pictures of them and sharing them on social media without permission, to keep politics off conversation, and keep child raising advice to themselves. I still think that these are pretty reasonable requests. But they didn't at first; they thought I was "being unfair" and acted like I never wanted to see them again. They blew up, and so we distanced ourselves from them. Almost a whole year passed since I saw them again. They eventually came around and started respecting those boundaries I placed. I did not force them to change. I instead "placed the ball on their court" with these boundaries, and they've made an effort themselves to improve over the years. We still don't see my parents that often, it's about once a month give or take. But they eventually learnt that my boundaries were worth respecting, much more worth it over possibly never seeing our family and their grandkids ever again. All this to say, that if your grandparents do want to meet your son, you and your partner can do so with your own boundaries. So before agreeing to a visit, you can be clear about what parameters are acceptable; parameters meaning things like behavior, how many people are there, topics of conversation, and for how long you'll be staying. Be firm, and stick to your boundaries.

My wife and I were told in the hospital to not do bed-sharing until the baby was not at risk of SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome). We used a bassinet for all 3 kids until they outgrew it; they would sleep in the same room with the bassinet, though not in the same bed as us necessarily. I do remember sharing our bed with my middle kid, this was when he was 12 months though; and that was finally when he slept well. He also slept very well on his own bed, which we got with guardrails initially when he was only 1yo. I suppose he just hated the crib. But that said, I would recommend checking with a doctor before considering bed-sharing, to make sure that the baby is old enough and not at risk of SIDS or suffocation from blankets / pillows etcetera anymore.

Sun 11.03 No compulsive social media use: 32 days No compulsive research: 32 days No passive screentime before bed, first thing in the mornings, or during work: 35 days Things I will do to stay healthy Sleep around 8h - So funny thing about this. I did actually get a good nights sleep! Went to bed at 12:45am, the baby woke up at 5:30am, then I stayed up until 6:30am with him; my wife took over at that point and let me sleep until 8:15am. Now if you did the math, you might be thinking that looks awful. Well, there's also daylight savings time ending today! Yeah, I completely forgot about that! 😄 So I got 7.5h altogether. That worked out! Stretch - I woke up to my kids being noisy, stretched out, let my dogs out later. I've been moving a lot today too. Meditate + deep breaths - Okay, later today I have to focus on this. It hasn't been a very stressful day, but I will be doing some meditation after dinner. Go for walks / Exercise - We went to a farm today, and got family pictures done. The kids loved it, there was a Santa Claus which gave each a gift; a tree ornament for each! Fair amount of walking as well, as we took a tour through it and saw some animals out. Nice way to start the morning. Drink Water - I did bring a water bottle for the drive, which I was glad about. In the afternoon I've made sure to also keep it filled up, because we've been rearranging the kids room (as I said in an earlier entry, this is something my wife wanted to do). I'm taking a break now myself. Wash body + face - Technically I did after midnight... yeah okay, just joking 😉 I will have a shower + wash my face tonight, at an earlier time. Nutrition: Breakfast; leftover muffins from yesterdays cake lunch; we went to a really nice breakfast place on the way back from the farm, it was an early lunch so they were still serving. dinner; pizza is in the oven, awaiting it to finish cooking. Talk to my partner - On the road, we actually brainstormed the ideas for writing a story together. She has some really good ones; she likes horror, and I like sci-fi. I'm thinking we'll be putting together the ideas on a whiteboard or board of some kind. Personally I find it easier to start "zoomed out" first before I even write, to arrange the key events and get an idea of how characters relate to each other. We're excited to start! Also, we cleaned our kids room, and moved their furniture. Talked throughout that process. Talk with kids + play with them - Yes, fun at the farm, and also fun cleaning their room. They did help... to an extent. My middle child mostly just wanted to play, but he did copy us putting their books away. Read a book - Tonight I'll do more 7 Habits workbook exercises, which I will post tomorrow. That'll be part of my proactivity test. Practice French - Yes, this afternoon I did some French lessons with the green owl. I've also been talking with my kids and wife in French when the opportunity arises. Journal - Exhausting but fulfilling day overall. 7 habits - proactivity test - day 16 My commitment yesterday was to brainstorm ideas with my wife, which we did in the car. I'm not going to share our ideas here, because we do want to give publishing them a try when they are ready. Can't be too careful posting online. But I will be sharing the process, as how I did above, when we do work on them. After dinner, I'll actually put them in my whiteboard, to ease that "zoomed out" perspective for laying out the story. It will at least be a start to the process. We're not putting pressure or deadlines into this necessarily, it's something we want to do for fun. Aside having a Computer Science major, I also have an English Language major; this somewhat unique thinking style is why I probably excel at technical writing. I will admit that my wife has some really high creative potential though, and were it not for her ideas, I don't think we'd have as solid of a starting point. Good question! My personal and short answer is no, I wouldn't take that option, because I don't want to. The detailed answer; I am able to cut my hours if I want to, but I don't want to do that because of these reasons: My company would handle it as reduced hours; which means I would be paid less. I do have to think of my family costs and needs. Money aside, I also like the 8h work-day; as someone with ADHD, it gives me structure. I can plan my wake-up routine, gym time, meals, hobbies, social life, bedtime routine, etcetera around my work schedule. And it makes weekends something special to look forward to with my family. As much as I like the balance, I do also like to do my job; the problems are tough but rewarding, and I feel fulfilled by it. During covid lockdowns, the company I worked for back then reduced my hours to save money; it felt like I could barely get anything done, and I felt unfulfilled. To be honest, I think that actually contributed to my mobile gaming addiction back then. So reducing my hours would, as a whole, probably just make me feel like I am not accomplishing much. I think this is where journaling has been very helpful; I probably spend a lot more time journaling here than the average user, I do recognize that, but I don't see it as a waste because it has helped me with reflecting on how I spend my time, and focusing on the positive stuff. All this to say, that I think it's better to look at cutting out the time wasters first, before considering things like my work hours. And I believe this is what Habit 3 also focuses on from the book; Put First Things First. I'll be posting more tomorrow, but I did review my screen time apps today. My passive screen time has significantly taken a turn for the better, and that is just from one month of working on the 7 Habits, journaling daily, and abstaining from my most compulsive and addictive tech uses. So that will be my commitment tomorrow; share my reflection on my screen time from the previous month of October. --- Commitments for tomorrow's proactivity test: Post more 7 Habits workbook exercises here Share reflection on my screen time summary from last month (October)