Streuselsturm

I also used to have these visions like you mentioned, for me it was even worse for example I was thinking about hacking things (not people) with an axe. Not because I was angry or wanted to kill someone I am a very peacefull guy and could never hurt anyone, but that thought was just satsifying for some odd reason. I got rid of them when I started to do yoga and focus on my own mind more. Maybe its the way of my brain to empty the trash bin? ^^

Damn thats quite a story to read. Like you I also love to write and my gaming was always an kind of an excuse to get "inspiration". You will not regret this step And dont be hard on yourself. You made this decision with your heart and this is going to be a very strong reason to stay true.

Your are not alone buddy Wow we share quite some similarities. We both like to write, both have a dog and we both dont really know what to do when wife/gf is not at home. Oh also both german Keep it up after one week I started to feel the a lot better and could actually appreciate the time I won. Also very interesting read about the willpower @Workinprogress could explain why my hunger for chocolate went crazy after I quit (still fighting with that sadly)

Dont feel bad about it. You already got 17 days behind you. We all have our weak moments. You did not relapse that is something to be proud of! Now look inside yourself and think about what else you can be proud of (hint you continued your journal for example ) You are doing great!

Boy was I looking forward to this day. One of the most anticipated games was going to be released one day before my birthday. Wow! It hurt for a while thinking about that. However I asked Cam about this too and he told me the day he decided to quit gaming forever was also around the time where Starcraft 2 was released ( and he was a SC pro back in his old days) That opend my eyes, if he can do it I can do it too. So, a few months ago I decided - out of my very own will that this was not the future I was going to pursue. A life of insignificance, always the feeling of living under my potential, stuck wasting my energy on video games. Today I remember the BAD old times I had with gaming, how I was often angry when there was no good server with my favorite playmode, how I got frustrated when others who even spent MORE time on games were better than me, how my worst nightmare was my computer/internet not working, how I actually was often bored and swapping from game to game in search of that sweet sticky bit of entertainment and gratification. While all the time the true key to happiness was out there in the real world. 2016 was big for me. I married, turned 30 as of today and I decided to pursue bigger goals and dreams in my life. You - Cam and the community have been the best birthday present I could have wished for. The road is still very bumpy ahead, I am still in need of finding hobbies, still my day needs a lot more structure but I learned a ton about myself in these 71 days. Mostly I learned how to get a new perspective! I also didn't have a single (bad) argument with my wife since I quit. None of the "you don't have any ambition" "You never stick to your word" and "you never get any of your stuff done" That is already huge for me! So in retrospect I AM looking forward for my next birthday 2017 and what I will achieve then. Thank you everyone for just being there and being awesome

Are your most creative phases druing the night? Because its the same with me. During daytime whenever I have time to write I always feel kinda "meh" but once its getting dark and I SHOULD go to bed then the ideas drop and I could sit infront of the PC for hours writing. (Bonus if the weather is shitty and I have important stuff to do tomorrow) The problem with this at least fot me is I need to healthy sleep routine otherwise I loose my structure and without structure I get into the "I dont care" mode which very quickly leads to cravings etc. Still working on that problem as of today But congrats you finished your pic. Take the praise! Instead of feeling guilty try to use that energy to start earlier next day and remember the praise next time you want to procrastinate. Just a few ideas! Im glad you are starting to feel gratful! Stay strong

Great work starting your journal! Be sure to also read your older posts from time to time since it will help you develop perspective and a more meta view about your own feelings. I have a daily journal (but only in german). and sometimes I just read about my old problems and think. "Hey wow I overcame this challenge now" Measurement of grow you know

Haha thank you. Australia is definitely on the list especially the north. Currently my problems have shifted since I must have trapped a nerv in my back somehow. No sports for today unfortunately

The patchnotes were a funny idea but ultimately they lack that little bit of seriousness a journal should have, also writing them took too much effort and stopped myself from even starting. 12.10.2016 So since I came home from a very awesome trip in indonesia (from 5th of september until 29th) getting married there and coming home to germany I noticed: 1: I really really REALLY don't like the weather in germany 2: It is for some reason pretty hard to gain momentum back. Currently I feel super weak after I come home. Work seems a lot more hard. I DO work longer too (home care service for elderly) my shifts now start at 6 and i hardly get home before 3. Last week I was sick for 3 days. Still recovering from that the energy is just not there. During my sick days I didn't feel like sport at all. yesterday I was finally able to hit the gym again and only because my wife dragged me along. My biggest issue at the moment is that I do have a lot of ideas and ambitions. Goals oh yes I have them . I wanna start something like a business and I want to find a way to move into some tropical country and live there for the rest of my life. That is an awesome goal and I enjoy thinking about it a very much. It puts a huge grin on my face thinking about checking the weather and seeing its wonderfull 30 degrees on an october afternoon knowing this weather will stay for the whole year. But when I come home and my wife is still at work... I just don't get the energy to DO anything towards this goal. I try to break it down thinking i need to be patient and to take baby steps. Learning a few things at a time but the amount of stuff I want and should do I so overwhelming that I don't know where to start. And then I do some small housework, stopp that listen to some music, stop that, browse the internet, stop that, go into the city to buy something stop that to go back home to finish cleaning up so wifey is happy when I am home. It’s frustrating. Good thing is I have only little crawings. Mostly during the morning when I work and my mind is often restless. I get most of my creative ideas when I sit on my bike in the morning driving to work. Lots of good ideas in my head, also crawings since most of the writing ideas I have stem at least to some extend from gaming or listening to game soundtracks. I can write a whole scene in my head just from listening to some piece of music but later when I am home most of these are gone. I can deal with these crawings... at least I think I am. There was no urge to go back to games in the last 2 weeks I am far too stubborn for that luckily. I am also starting to believe that gaming was only part of my problem and there is something else that bothers and blocks me. Maybe it's too much internet. I decided to use my cellphone ONLY for work and organising meetings with friends from now on until next week and check how that turns out. Otherwise I tend to always check it or watch videos during small breaks, Very unstructured but felt good writing thís.

Hello Kiki Welcome to the community I absolutely know this feeling of " just getting inspiration" Whenever I stopped writing to game I gave myself the same excuse and to some extend it was justified since games gave me a lot of ideas to write about (mostly things I did not like and wanted to write better) - they also took away my writing time however by the way, your name reminds me of one of my most favorite childhood movies "Kikis delivery service"

Maybe try to write something? Like create you own setting and story and just write the story of and elfen ranger? I know its not the same as gaming but ´for me this helps a little with my crawings as I get to a point were my interest is suddenly used up and I can focus on different stuff again, Also ave you considered pen and paper rpgs? Those are okay arent they?

This is something I am trying to do too. My goal is it to become wealthy and independent enough to leave my current country and go somewhere warmer.

Greetings fellow community Octobre the 25th will be the day where I will have to wisdom teeth removed in my left jaw. I postboned this decision for years but now my dentist made it crystal clear that the consquences would be quite dire if I continue to do so. The thing is, i made the decision before I quit gaming and the idea behind it was that a certain game would be released at the same time, I game I WAS looking for alot and I was hoping I could play said game during the time where I was sick- clever I know. Now with me quitting games and being half way through my detox (horaay) this is of course out of question. What I am asking you is, what can I do during that time? I cant really do work out, I cant take long walks like usual, I could read and write I guess but most of my hobbies at least for the moments are outside. I am a little scared it might get boring. Also I am terrified of the operation itself but thats a different story althogether.

What a coincidence I had a blood test done just this morning for the same reason.

Welcome abord I have the same problem its not so much the gaming but the thinking about games all the times. Even during work i catched myself checking certain subreddits like an addict in a 5 minute tact just desperately hoping for something new to appear, i think my gaming time was around 40% gaming and 60% checking forums and reddit. I still check reddit from time to time but I do my best to minimalize it and.. getting out of touch with the material certanly helps. What also helped ME with that hole of boredom was setting up very ambitious goals in my life for which I have to work hard. My dream is to live in singapur one day and considering the fact that I have 0 of the neccesary skills for that (aside knowing english) I think that is real life hardcore mode, but strangely even thinking about it makes me forget my crawings and focus my mind.

I can relate to this in a different way since I don't drink alcohol and believe me where I live it is awfully hard and annoying to always explain and even justify this behaviour. This decision started in my early teens when I was in a phase where being different than everybody else was of uttermost importance for me. I got pretty lonely in school since people didn't invite me to parties after they found they couldn't convert me. I stayed sober but also got lonely and that brought me into video gaming. I was a very strange kid during my puberty - where others tried to test their limits i became clingy and stayed at home. Today I have a lot more friends… and they all have no problem with me not drinking. In fact most of them don't drink too. I met most of them through my wife who is from indonesia. I never met a bunch of more friendly funny and open folks in my life before. Now I don't know what you should take from my experience to be honest. I know you don't want to patronize anyone so did I. I never wanted people to stop drinking… but I also wanted to be forced to drink at the same time. Still people got outright defensive and insulted even aggressive to some point.:/ Maybe you also should try to look for new friends. Friends who aren't even in that gaming scene at all. Do you go rock climbing on your own? As for s.o. My wife plays a lot of candy crush when she is bored. It used to bother me but after some time I somehow adapted to it. Maybe it's more easier since I never really was into mobile gaming to begin with? *shrug* We also talked about this and she absolutely supports me in my decision. She tries to only play when I am asleep and I don't try to tell her to stop. It works pretty well but she is also a very determined person and she doesn't have a gaming problem. Sorry for the confusing messy text, i slept really bad (still in jetlag :P)

For my coloring mandalas helped. I combine it witch watching tedx talks or other more passive activities. It keeps me from going for chocolate all the time since I used to eat when I was watching videos.

Wow same problem here, went to Indonesia for one month had an absolut blast over there. Felt in love with Singapure in during my 8 hours transit there. Now after returning home to cold emptý rainy germany I feel like I lost all my momentum. Had super strong game crawings and even watched some material on youtube. Only the thought of "after the 10th of November you got the detox behind you and can try it again" keept me sane although I know how stupid and wrong that is. I guess during my stay there I got alot of positive reinforcement and rewards. My brain once again got kinda addicted to the constant stimulation over there. I already found out that setting new goals and getting motivated about them helps against the crawings. ( wanna live in singapur one day that would be my dream) Now my mind is busy again with finding solutions to this porblem, and the crawings vanished mostly. Still my momentum is not really back yet. I am open for further advice Oh yes and your video was extremly motivating and helpfull as always cam

I dont know your husband but that is like the default addict answer in my book. However you need to be sure about your goals and what you want to achieve. If you can deal with him playing than that is totaly cool, if his behaviour DOES indeed irritate or even obstruct you on your way something will have to change at some point. Just my 2 cents of course.

Maybe you could start by asking your hustband to just quit gaming for one week as a test. One week where you would fill your days with a lot of different activities. Is there anything else fun he likes to do which is not related to just hanging out or playing games? My wife is totaly understandable and very VERY amazed by my progress and much more positive attitude, once she noticed I would actually pull through with my decision. Maybe he will notice something like that too and maybe it will also have an positive effect on him.

Good to have you here ashley. My wife also plays candy crush sometimes and I noticed how seeing her playing is one of my triggers. A relationship partner can be you worst enemy but also your greatest ally when it comes to addictions. I wish you good luck

You are on the right track Be sure to leave a link for that youtube video once you did it

The part about your mother brought tears into my eyes. I am glad you dont punish yourself and instead choose to forgive yourself!!! We are imperfect beeings and addictions can have so much power over us BUT we can also decide to fight them and we can win this fight! I am sure she would be proud of you taking this step now! Glad to have you with us here! Stay strong and be welcome!!!

always helps me getting "my stuff done" Procrastination

Yes it's these old patterns I still fear that is why I try to stay away from home along as possible. Part of me is telling me that I am just running away but I believe that to be just my own cravings trying to trick me ^^ Thanks for all the answers means ALOT to me