Phoenix

It's true that it's easier to quit gaming when you find other hobby's. I find spending time on activities other than gaming regardless if it's work or not is important to fulfill time. At least I have other hobby's like running or guitar I can pick up again. Thank you for your wise words on friends. I guess friends that do not share my values are not friends. If they don't want me to quit gaming because I don't want to in order to grow, then there is no other way around it. I have to be bold in my decision and cut them off completely, even if it they may be nice persons. Now I must admit things weren't going very well between us, we had a bit of an argument and I haven't spoken them since. I thought that would be a good time to quit gaming. I ignored their skype calls and texts to game for 3 days now. This is my third day without gaming so far. I´m glad I don´t even have time to game as I´m busy with other things like work and sports. I picked up my guitar again, playing for at least 10 minutes a day. Maybe I should expand on that and make it a true hobby instead of just 10 minutes. I also filled your survey and will try to post daily journals again, even if they´re mundane haha. I also read some of the posts on the 90-day detox thread, they inspire me to keep going and refrain from gaming!

First post since a long time. Please understand it takes immense effort to write a good post as English is not my first language and I consider my words carefully. This may explain my inability to submit my 'daily' journals. Anyway, here goes. I'm sorry to have kept you waiting for an answer Cam, to address to your point: keeping up with my friends other than gaming is quite difficult. They aren't local friends, so that takes away daily communication if I wouldn't game. Second, there isn't really anything different we do other than gaming to keep up contact. We once went to a theme park and went bowling, but that's it. So cutting away gaming would kind of fade the friendship over time. It´s sad really, cause I don´t have many friends other than my sport club friends and some other people. They are really my friends you know. I don't want to be alone either, so it's a tough decision to make. I still game every now and then, when I have nothing to do. I did quit WoW, but LoL and other games replaced that. I'm afraid to go all in again, what if it won't work out? I would lose everything I've worked up for. Maybe I can sell my accounts, I don't know. But I would get bored as hell and feel depressed, especially on lonely saturdays. I do however have less time to fill for games, that's a good thing. It's been reduced significantly since I have my internship. Yesterday I went to a workshop among elite students just for the sake of it. It was an interesting experience and I'm glad I went out of the box to try new things. I also keep up with running, 3 times a week for now. Only guitar isn't much of a priority at the moment, but I will continue to play. Either way I still have my gaming issue and I just can't find any reason to delete my games at the moment. Do people really notice difference in their lives taking away gaming? Because I did not when I first quit, wasting my time on the internet anyway and even feeling horrible on saturdays. It's tough, sigh.. Edit: did not game since yesterday, am considering cutting off gaming friends and everything alltogether

Don't have much to add for the last few days other than I'm super busy at school. Though I did relapse a bit at some point but deleted the games. I still have issues with resisting playing games with friends, but it's the only way I keep contact with them, it's sad really. I picked up my guitar again after a break of 20 days and played it for 9 consecutive days in a row now. So far so good! I'd love to make more progress though, but I have to accept it takes time so I just keep on practicing daily and keep this habit. As for reading, I've finished chapter 3 now and I realise most of my distractions come from signals. I know that when I turn on my game computer I will most likely be distracted during studying than when I turn on my school computer. I still turn on my game computer unconciously, it's crazy. Like it's ingrained into my brain to turn on the pc even if I have nothing to do. My knee injury is almost healed, I can run again! I talked to my coach and we're going to start weekly training in the forest on sunday mornings again. This is great news, because I used to have the habit to train at least 3 times, mostly 4 times in a week. We're bringing this back now and I'm more than pumped up to start training again. More time for sports = less time for gaming. As for the next few months I will be busy working on my internship. Days will consist of waking up early, then going to work and coming home at the evening. The time I have left will most likely be spent on practicing guitar, school, running and reading books. So there I have my pattern!

Interesting story Primmulla. You remind me of someone who also studied to be a teacher (also went to university), but never really made a career. That person ended up doing low wage jobs while people with worse education got a job at schools. She was basically too smart for the job, as these people are harder to manipulate. Even in the low wage jobs she got replaced by even worse jobs, mostly because she was older. It's really a sad story and I hope you don't have the same fate. I'm not sure how the job market for teaching is in your country but here in the Netherlands it's quite volatile. I would love to have good grades like you did, especially your work ethic. Maybe it's not the most important thing in finding a job but I do believe that instances look at your grades. However, there's are soooo many factors than just grades when solliciting. Take a look at the admissions of Harvard school http://collegeapps.about.com/od/GPA-SAT-ACT-Graphs/ss/harvard-admission-gpa-sat-act.htm Notice how there are green dots (accepted into Harvard) with less SAT score and less GPA than those with more? Mostly it has to do with their motivation or personality. You can have nearly perfect scores but get denied. So that leaves the questions: what are your key competences? Are you someone that can stand before a class and teach kids the needed knowledge? How do you handle stressfull situations? I can go on forever but you get the idea. You said your colleagues who did worse off got teaching jobs. Do you wonder what skills they might possess that you don't have? You need to be very honest and clear about yourself and think what you could have done differently in order to get that job. If you were solliciting for that job and got denied, ask them WHY you were denied and why they chose for the other applicant. Good luck.

f.lux is an amazing app, I downloaded it on recommendation by my sister and it works great! My eyes don't feel used up at night so I don't look more tired next day. That isn't an excuse to stay up late at night though. I like hycniejsy's suggestion to remove computer usage one hour before sleep. Could read a book for example instead of that. I generally fall asleep at 11.30 pm. A human needs about 7-8 hours of sleep a day. So that leaves enough time to go to work/school the next day. But the thing is, most productivity comes in the morning. So if we go to bed earlier, let's say 10.30pm and sleep for 7-8 hours, you should be awake at around 5.30-6.30 am. That's alot of time in between you can use for school/work/other things. I myself find it hard to implement that because I went to bed late night for years, that's a bad habit to change. But hey, it's possible to change that pattern over time.

Thanks Tom, happy new year too! Relapse has given me more insight in things I do not want. As Cam mentioned in one of his posts, remember why you quit in the first place, is one particular quote which is stuck in my mind. I have the book right beside me, should definitely read again! You ran with an injured knee? Impressive. Don't rehurt it though! I once had a nasty ankle on my left foot from running through the pain, and it took me ca. 10 years to fully heal. Good luck. Concerning quitting. I had resolved to following multiple goals through 2015. With mixed success. For example, I managed to have cold showers every morning, every day. But I did not manage to stay off sweets. So how did I manage one and not the other? Cold showers are not exactly pleasant, especially in the New Jersey winter. And at any time, I could have switched to warm water. But I didn't. Yet for snacks... I always caved in. Why? I think one difference was that I only shower in the morning and that is it. If I was only tempted to skip snacks for breakfast, that would have been no problem at all. But I eat more than breakfast. I am tempted multiple times a day to break my vows with eating. Would I shower multiple times a day, I would probably have to cut off the warm water supply for my apartment. So the first solution is to - of course - get rid of your games (or sweets in my case). Even if you brave through the presence of games, it takes energy away from your willpower. We have discussed this at length here in this forum, I believe. But here is the new point I found, and it is an extension of the 'Slight Edge' principle from Jeff Olson: aim for not playing for the morning. At lunch, pat yourself on the back you did not play in the morning. At 6 pm, celebrate the victory for not playing again. And before you go to bed, make another x in your calendar for not having played. Don't focus on a single day when you are tempted to play. You are tempted more than once during that day. Focus on single stretches of hours during the day. If necessary, focus on each hour you withstand playing. Hour for hour. Celebrate each one. Sometimes when we have trouble conforming to a larger goal, we really have to take it step by step. A day without gaming can seem too much. But an hour without gaming we can probably do. Celebrate yourself more often during the day when you are quitting gaming. Concerning my knee injury, I really want to run again. The moment I felt it was healed I did some interval training and it worked out pretty well. Despite that I still feel my knee, so I guess I should slow down a bit. I really like that quote of Jeff Olson by not playing in the morning. I feel like that whatever you do in the morning, will have its influence throughout the rest of the day. Let's say if I were gaming in the morning, then I would most likely game in the afternoon as well. In the morning you're the most bright, so I will use that momentum to its fullest. In the evening I find it harder to do dull tasks as homework, so these are things I'll most likely do in the morning. If we're using that logic, going earlier to bed will only bring positive influence as A. You're getting more energy and B. New start of the day, more likely to do your tasks. Guess I should try that. Oh and once I finish Power of Habit my next book will be Slight Edge. Not having to game was generally not my problem, it was the boredom. The hours go by fast when you're doing other things, sometimes the day is already over. But I can't expect deleting games will solve all my problems for me. That was never claimed in the knowledge I acquired. It requires a proactive approach to change bad habits and to create new ones. As for taking goals into smaller steps, that applies for almost everything. For instance, I started a 100 day challenge by playing the guitar every single day for 10 minutes. The end in mind, a beginning/intermediate guitar player, is the goal. You can't just expect to be a great guitar player right from the start, that would only disappoint even more. So although today isn't really over, I do know what's yet to come. I worked this morning at my local shop, was fun and all. This afternoon I will be doing mainly homework. This evening I will be going back to work shortly. After I come home I take a shower, maybe read a bit and go to sleep before at least 12 pm!

After 1,5 months of gaming I figured out I should probably stop. The moment I have relapsed I have been playing games every single day. It gave me a temporary escape to feelings of boredom, stress, anxiety and cruel reality. Now what would be a better way to start 2016 game-free, as cliche as it may sound. I must admit I am not even fully prepared as I was just playing games this morning. The past few days just felt so.. empty. With many people out there having the time of their lives while you're at home I wonder where did it go wrong? Maybe due to having no other form of entertainment. Fortunately, pain is temporary as certain events are merely snapshots and will fade away. That doesn't however justify the continuing cycle of binge gaming, thinking it's okay. I found out that in order to quit games I need to be prepared. You don't just quit out of the blue, you need to have a plan. Suddenly games are cut out of your life and you have to find a replacement for that. If you suddenly quit and have not plan, then you'll soon go back to gaming. Therefore I hope things will turn for the better this time. Unfortunately I cannot change back the time, but I can move on from games and move forward. I'm still young and I have a bright future ahead. I know very well what I need to do in order to succeed in life. The first step would be cutting off games. Imagine the amount of hours, days, months played in games to be put into something productive. Not just by one individual, but by everybody. There would be no war, everything would be perfect. But Utopia does not exist, and I am not perfect either. This relapse has proven that not just every journey goes perfect. Success without struggle would be boring, wouldn't it? Anyway, today I met up with my family. It was great seeing them again. After that I had my first 10k run of the year. I'm still not fully recovered of my knee injury but I am making great progress so far and I can run again. I also deleted a game of my computer to fight the urge so I could spend my time on more usefull things.

Awesome, you're taking cold showers as well Tom? Cold showers are... well.. cold. But they come with great benefits. Haha yep, every day. As someone taking daily cold showers I can confirm this

I'm still at relapse at this point, in fact I'm playing right now. Ever since quitting games nothing really has changed, at least that's how I feel. At start my focus went from playing games to browsing the internet in my free time. Yes, I did learn to play guitar a bit but I'm currently at a stage where practicing feels like work. I've been switching from A to D chord over the past weeks but I can't make 60 chord changes in 1 minute. Maybe 40 at MAX and even then they sound bad. So if I spend my time mostly browsing the internet what difference does it make if I game or not? A week ago my old classmate contacted me if I wanted to play a game, so we did play a game as that's the only way we're keeping contact. That was another game by the way, but we're playing that one casually. The fact that I have a knee injury for a few weeks is contributing to me playing games as I don't have an outlet and I'm missing social contact. I missed the sense of joy, and not feeling alone every time on saturday nights. You can't blame me on that. I'm not the best role model I know that, but replacing something you have done for years with something else is really hard. When I first quit I was unprepared and couldn't find something to replace it with. I appreciate your video's Cam, I have watched them several times but it doesn't come through to me. I need to figure this out, untill then I'm still gaming. Despite everything there are some positive things. I am still doing cold showers. I have been showering cold since 16 november every day (except 1 day) and almost finished the 30 day cold shower challenge! Next week there's an event I have created for my sports club (~15 people attending) and we're really excited! (we go karting, lasergaming and bbq after). I've made preperations one month in advance to get this done and it's going well so far. This is the first time I do something like this, it's good for my leadership skills. There are a number of things to think of: budget, availability, transportation, reservation etc. I also submitted extra available hours for my work to fulfill my time with, so I can make money instead of playing video games. Next week I work 10 more hours so yay for me! As for reading, I haven't done that in a while. I still need to read Powerful Habits. The rest of my time I spend on school/homework. Yesterday I had a pretty productive day by doing my homework for the whole afternoon, I'm proud of myself for that. Today I have been gaming all day, not all too proud. When my knee injury is over, I will most likely run 4/5 times a week again. Running will ALWAYS have priority over gaming, even back in the days when I was gaming. So that's my journal from the past week. I'm interested in your thoughts on this.

Thank you for your responses. Switching chords correctly does take time to master, there really is no other way to it than to keep practicing. I like that song, it's much easier to play than the current song I'm practicing (Het is een nacht by Guus Meeuwis). I have some unfortunate news: I relapsed (oops!). Yeah, I'm not gonna lie about it. There are days that I'm so bored and last weekend I couldn't take it anymore and I installed wow again. Not even playing the guitar or reading a book could have prevented me from doing that. I don't have anything else to add really other than that I'm ashamed? I felt like I deserved some entertainment and I know it is not a good reward but that was the only thing I could think of at that moment.

Yesterday was a really good day, I did not once start up my own computer. Was pretty much whole day on school and joined an after-school discussion between students and teachers for the heck of it. It's interesting to see which students join it as it's not a mandatory event. You can immediately see who's motivated, good way to seperate the wheat from the chaff. Same thing applies for other area's as well. Notice when people go to the gym in the evening or the morning, most of them are ripped as hell. Or the people who show up for running while it's raining. Today I read the first chapter of The power of habit. It's really inspiring to read how an overweight woman in financial trouble changed her life by changing her habits. I'm still practicing guitar. Basic chords are not a problem, but my speed is. I guess it takes more practice. Day 5 out of 30 done from cold shower challenge. It's tough in the beginning but it gets better once the body becomes fully cold. I notice I sleep better, my blood circulates more and my skin looks healthier. As for the social side: I'm currently organizing the annual fun event for 15/16 people from my sport club and it's going pretty well so far! We used to organize it in the past but nobody really bothered to organize it anymore, so... I took the task of doing it! I learned from past mistakes of organizing events so this time I'll do it right. I do everything: plan 1 month ahead so people can take a day off, managing transportation methods, what will be the schedule for the night, how much will it cost, who will join the event, choosing between alternatives etc. Great way to develop leadership!

Why not accept the current state you are in right now and stick to small but reasonable goals? If I were to start playing guitar with my goal to be as good as Jimmy Page then I would be demotivated as well. Learning anything takes effort and practice, from my experience. Stick 10 minutes a day to whatever you want to improve at for 100 days and you will see results over time. I'm pretty sure you can make 10 minutes free of your time. You see, you have to get rid of the instant-gratification. I know it sucks, but if it were easy everybody would do it. As for moving out, I can somewhat relate. I don't want to live my life in the current place where I'm living. I want to meet new people as well and experience new things. There's this idea in my mind that my surroundings is full of jocks, but I know there are likeminded people, I just have to find them. Unfortunately I'm at college at this point and nowhere in the financial position to move out of house for now. But you have a stable job which I by the way recommend to keep for now. You can put your curriculum vitae online of course and see where it gets you. As long as you don't quit your job BEFORE you got a new one. I'm nowhere in the position to tell you what to do but don't make irrational decisions based on impulses. For example: my sister got herself a pug when she was recovering from a broken relationship, but now she's stuck with the dog. The decision was based on impulses and now she has to deal with it. Best of luck progressing, I think you're doing great so far.

Nice going!

Good to see you're doing great! I was reading through your journals and was wondering how reading affected your life so far. Did reading for instance help you become more sociable? I recently picked up reading as a side hobby. I bought 'The power of habit' by Charles Duhigg, you've heared of it. I'm also considering buying The Slight Edge, since it had a positive influence on you. I will use your experiences as a framework to improve myself. Thanks for being an inspiration!

Hi Joe, I'm sorry to hear about your grandma. There is a time of joy and a time of grief. There's a certain quote I remind myself when I'm suffering: "Pain is temporary. It may last a minute, or an hour, or a day, or a year, but eventually it will subside." Cherish the moments you had with your grandma and remind yourself that she is in a better place. I wish you the best of luck.

Procastination is a serious issue for me. I got all the time in the world yet I find myself watching random youtube video's or reading useless trivia on reddit. I don't know what's wrong with me, why can't I get things done? I should be doing homework. Gaming was a form of procastination but what I'm doing right now is basically the same. After two months of not gaming I feel I'm still not am making progress towards anything. I wish I could meet more or new people, but I don't know where to start. A problem is that I'm not putting myself in social situations. Either way I just NEED something to fill my time with. Despite all this I am almost 25% through my 100-day challenge of practicing guitar daily. Switching chords is going better as well. Once I develop speed I will start to learn barre chords. The past week I've been practicing with my sister and it was fun. Can't wait till I get to a better level. I've also picked up my cold shower habit, which I'm doing for 3 days right now, hoping to beat my old record of 10! Tomorrow I will receive my first book 'The power of habit' by Charles Duhigg. Let's see if reading helps.

So since my last post I have been playing guitar every single day for at least 10 minutes and I must say it's working out pretty well! I've followed Cam's advice on joining the 100 Club. The idea is to devote at least 10 minutes a day for 100 days to become decent at any skill. Recently I've learned new chords and just started a bit on fingerpicking. Yesterday I recorded several chords each by each and played them back so it sounded like I was playing a song. I made my sister guess what song I was playing, that was awesome! Now I am no where near the level to play different chords afer another but I'm getting there. My fingers also hurt less while playing since I developed calluses on my fingers. A long term goal would be playing basic songs or even playing in a small band, but these are far away goals for now. What's important for now is that I'm practicing every single day. Start small and definitely don't try this as a starter In other news, I've had trouble keeping up the habit of meditating. I just don't have the motivation currently to meditate at the start of the day. What's the point of it anyway? What benefits come with meditating? What are people's experiences after they started meditating? I'm not feeling slightly different after meditating, it feels more like an extended sleep session. Maybe I'm doing it wrong, I don't know. I've also dropped the habit of cold showers. I still managed to do it for approximately 7-10 days, without really having the intention to make it to 30 days when I began. Maybe I'll try the 30 day cold shower challenge again one day .

I remember the moment I first quit gaming cold turkey. I was generally not satisfied with my life and stumbled upon the article How to quit video gamings forever on Kingpin Social. There were no external factors whatsoever to help me quit gaming. It was all my intrinsic motivation. If it were not for the first article I stumbled upon googling how to quit gaming, I probably wouldn't be there. That being said, I do think marketing is an issue. As kortheo mentioned in his post, we have to move gamers from group 2 into group 1. I don't really know to reach these type of gamers. The article on Kingpin social definitely hit home to me. Sure you could post an article like 'Unhappy with your life? Read this?' on gaming sites, but I doubt there would be positive response. You would directly approach hundreds or thousands of gamers though, maybe it's worth a try? I'm suprised there was such a constructive discussion on Teamliquid forum. I feel like approaching gamers in group 2 would be a hard task. I think it has to come from themselves. These are my thoughts on it.

Happy birthday Cordharel!

That's an awesome idea, I signed up! 10 minutes a day should definitely be doable. I just have to commit doing it. It reminds me of the quote '80% of success is showing up'. I've actually played the guitar today for about 3 hours and learned different chords first day. There are so many good guides on youtube, it's like there's a teacher ready at any moment. The moment I first hit my chord correctly I felt ecstatic. Sure it's just a simple chord, but it means alot to me getting it right Thanks for the interview, I feel priviled. I have listened to it for approximately 35 minutes (had to cut it off because I need to go, will listen to it later). At 10 minutes he talks about top 5 values and making decisions based on them. That's quite interesting, because if I understand it correctly, making decisions on what your core values are will make you more happy. Everybody wants to be happy, so that means I should find my core values. There's a whole list of them, I can't choose haha. At 32.00 he talks about removing distractions, which are so true. When I do homework, I move upstairs because there's little to no distractions there. 32.40 having the mental state is hardest for me as well. When I'm at the gym it's easy, then it's like "oh, I'm at the gym. Let's work out". But at home you have to move yourself. 34.40 is some on point advice for learning the guitar! Hmmm.. I have to make a rule for myself to get the most out of the activity. I think I'll practise every chord every day before I start, that seems like a good rule.

I haven't posted anything in a while so here's a recap of the past few days: My week has been pretty decent, some days were ok, some days were boring. This is probably due to having nothing to do (still haven't really found a hobby). This is temporary though, because school is starting next week so I will have enough stuff to do. I have recently taken the habit to take a cold shower every day. I do this since thursday last week. Sometimes I even wonder why I do this, but I remind myself this is healthy and it makes me tough. I also (try to) mediate every day in the morning whenever I can for 5-10 minutes. First time I did that my mind was filled with random thoughts. In my recent mediation sessions I became a bit more peaceful in mind. I'm still learning how to meditate, but practise makes perfect! I've also been training for 7 consecutive days, I've never done that before! Today was a rest day due to early work, but tomorrow I will be training again. I've asked other sport mates to come with me and we got a little group so we're making the habit to train every day in the woods! The last time I trained in the woods it made me feel... alive. You will understand when you walk in the woods in the morning, with sun shining through the trees with fresh air and an inspiring environment. Can't wait to go again! As for hobby's, I asked my sister who is pretty good with the guitar to give me a lesson in guitar. She said she'll help me so I will soon try out a new hobby! There are still things I want to change. - Purchase and read a book. I really should do that. - Change eating pattern. If I want to get to the next level and win competitions, changing my eating habits is a must. I find this one of the hardest habits to change. - Finding a new hobby. I am still searching for a new hobby, I'm going to try out playing guitar tomorrow - Getting things done. Seriously, I have had so much free time but I still find myself browsing the internet when I should be sending letters or making homework. Overall I'm pretty happy. I do have the occasional craving but I remind myself there's light at the end of the tunnel. So, that's it basically. Theres work to be done!

Hi Florian nice to have you here my dad is a scientist as well haha. You've come to the right place, many people on this forum are here to improve themselves, it doesn't matter if you have a gaming addiction or not. I watched the video, you seem like a pretty cool guy. I am an introvert as well, but I'm working on it thanks to the information provided here. I'd say social skills are one of the most important skills you can get. If you haven't already, I recommend purchasing Respawn. It contains information on getting your life back together. Also, check out other journals if you're interested in how other people are doing to improve their lives. This is something I struggle with as well. Often I find myself going from one site to the other, while not progressing with my daily acitives. I believe change doesn't happen over night, it may take weeks or months which may vary to individuals. I'm interested in how you will handle these issues. Looking forward to your next journal!

Hey Tom, it was nice meeting you . We had an interesting conversation about all topics. I find it awesome that this site connects people, makes you realise how small the world is and how connected we are. I did take a picture, I will message it to those who are interested. (I won't post it publicly for privacy reasons). Will definitely meet again some time!

Hey Cordharel, Awesome you got yourself a threadmill for running while you watch tv, talk about multitasking haha. Spending 40 euro's on an addon is crazy I know. Better spend it on something usefull. League of legends is a dangerous game, cause it's so addictive. Actually pretty much like any other game, but it's very popular. I know cause I used to play it for 2 years. There are ranks you can build up to but it takes time to develop the skill needed to get there. Stay strong and don't relapse

Phoenix reporting in! So I didn't have anyone to go out with, I wanted to go anyway. Before I went I gathered tips about going out alone, it was very helpfull. I NEEDED to do this so I thought to myself 'fuck it let's go'. I went out saturday evening to the local club. I didn't know what I could expect but my mission was to have fun and socialize. I got in and first thing I thought holy shit there's loads of people here, nobody even notices if I'm alone or not. First thing I did was ordering a beer. I scanned the environment for people to talk to while I drank my beer. I saw one of my old colleagues from work I haven't spoke to in years, I approached him, greeted him and had some small talk. I noticed he was with his group of friends and I didn't want to cling to that guy for the rest of the night so I quickly moved on to maintain my momentum. Then I saw another old colleague of mine, he was glad to see me. I've talked to him, asked how he was doing etc. and had a drink with him. He was also with a group of friends but it was more spread out. Over time I went from sober to a bit more loose. I approached random people with this random joke I had in mind that makes everybody laugh. It worked, so I introduced myself and had some small talk. Sometimes people asked where my buddy's are at, I told them I was meant to meet them up at the bar but they cancelled it, so it was all good. I felt accepted within the group, this is what I call 'the homebase'. From there on I approached more random people, same method. Someone even gave me a free drink. I saw some old classmates from school, we don't have much in common but I approached them anyway. I greeted them, showed interest in what they were doing and revived the connection. There were more acquaintances around than I expected. I moved a bit around over time and got back in the homebase. I got two free shots from there. People are so much more nice and approachable with some alcohol. EVERYBODY is having a good time. Now I got to the point where I had to kindly decline more drinks. I experienced once in my lifetime when I was drunk and it didn't feel good the day after. I am a rookie when it comes to alcohol and partying so I toned a bit down as I don't want to do stupid things. It was almost 3 AM so I was there for almost 3 hours, which was to my idea more than enough. I got myself some new friends, so I might have a group for the next time I go there. To sum it all up: - I approached about 10 people and had 6 drinks. - Alcohol is key - Going out is expensive, drink beforehand - Plan things beforehand - Don't overthink too much I did the right thing by leaving, as I'm sober and not hungover at this moment. I faced my fears by moving out of my comfort zone and had a really good time. This has been a very interesting social experience for me and I will do this in future to further develop my social skills.