phpsmith

I've thought about the unfiltered journaling as well, it may give more of a self reflection than this. But, I do like the community and support that this forum brings. If I had to choose one or the other, I think I'd lean more towards the forum for the support. But if you feel like writing a bit more, a personal journal might allow for unfiltered thought Great job so far and keep it up!

Great work so far, Mhyrion. I feel I can relate in that I have problems with moderation as well, not just with gaming, but with other things - such as you said, with drinking. I've never considered that I drank too much until I had to go to the hospital one day, they asked "How many drinks do you have in a week?" I usually had 2+ per day, sometimes 3 or 4. When I said this, they were surprised, I also got surprised. The reason they asked was to make sure that I didn't have any withdrawl symptoms during my stay in the hospital since obviously, I shouldn't be drinking. After they seemed shocked at the amount, I did some reading and my wife and I have tried to limit our drinking together. We use a system we call the "Coin" system, we are allotted an amount of drinks per month that are a stack of coins. I get 40 drinks a month, my wife I think is at 36. We've been on the coin system for a while now, and I can say it's really helping us. Each time I have a drink I put a coin in a bowl, it kind of makes me think more about having the drink when I do this. Sometimes I still have 3 or 4 drinks in a day, which is fine, you'll just need to realize that having more drinks in one day will limit you another day. I would say that exercise has helped my mood the most in quitting gaming. Even just going out for a walk feels good, but having a more difficult exercise helps release endorphins that just generally help when gaming doesn't fulfill that void. Keep it up!

Nice job starting the journal, I enjoyed reading it and I'll be looking forward to reading along. Although it seems you do find John to be a good friend, those are some odd and weird interactions in my personal opinion. A person to exclaim that they do drugs, to not be thankful for a free basketball ticket, and to have some of the issues he seems to have, I personally wouldn't want to involve myself too much with that person. Of course I'm sure he has his good qualities as a friend, I would like to say if I were in your position I would remain a good friend but perhaps not go out of my way to spend any more time with him.

Thanks @WorkInProgress Day 7 - Boy, 7 days sure does go fast. It's crazy to think just last week on this day I was playing video games throughout the day (Saturday was my Day 1). Today, I'm feeling very productive - as I felt yesterday as well. Yesterday I did all the goals I had set out to do for the day, and then on top of that my wife and I drove a trailer full of junk to the dump that has been sitting outside for weeks, we had a nice night out and worked on some christmas gifts. During the day, I didn't do much for billable hours, but I was able to work on my business for a good part of the day as well. It makes me feel good to finally do some good for the business, it's been neglected, and one things for certain - if I don't get my butt in gear, I may as well just look for a job, because it won't make sense to run the business otherwise. What some people don't realize, although I'm sure it's pretty often taught, but running a business itself actually costs quite a bit. On top of the additional taxes I need to pay up, I also need to pay for insurance, tax accountants, and other fees. It all adds up and makes you quickly realize when that although you charge a higher rate, it dwindles down pretty quick. Mind you, the business I run is classified as a LLC and taxed as a corporation, this is because if you do business in your own name (sole proprietorship) you need to pay additional taxes, but then you don't need things such as insurance, and a few other fees. It's kind of a hard scale to balance when starting out, whether to be a sole proprietor or an LLC. I chose the latter because I have high hopes that the business will grow. Anyways - enough of the business talk. I was going to actually reach out to a couple of companies today, I feel I need to grow my business network a bit more and I feel I could do that more easily by reaching out. I was also going to update my professional website/resume, as I was going to apply for a job. It's kind of counter-intuitive, I'm very driven to have my business succeed, but applying for a job. The thing of it is, in my position I may be able to use my weight as a founder to entice a lucrative offer. I need a situation where I can work from home. A few months ago I was contacted by Facebook to see if I would like to interview with them for a Production Engineer role, I did over the phone because I was interested in the position of course, Facebook is well reknown as having the most appealing benefits package in the tech. industry. I went through the interview, but came to realize that the position would not be remote - although there would be a stipend for moving to the west coast, it didn't interest me. I like being where I am in the midwest, close to family and it's quiet. A good friend of mine works for Adobe, and I was going to head to their satellite office to interview with them. Obviously being a technology company, their benefits package is pretty great as well. If anything, it will be good practice to sit down an interview. Ok, really, that is enough business talk. I worked out yesterday, it felt good. This 5x5 app is really nice and user friendly, I can see why it's so highly rated. My wife actually downloaded it as well to use, she's in much better shape than I am. Oh, yesterday another client called me, one I haven't talked to in a while. They have some work for me to do, so that is wonderful news because I sort of just left them by the wayside. They don't pay nearly as well as my primary client, but a job is a job and I shouldn't be picky right now. Some goals I have for today will be to work out again, I'm feeling sore today, and I want to continue this good feeling. Maybe it's my lack of video games that's making me enjoy a work out more? I actually have a bit of desire to do it, which I haven't in a long time. I will be working on my business more today too, I would like to get a few things that I believe make me look unprofessional polished up. I'm currently only acquiring clients by word of mouth, but I need to change that. If I am to grow, I need to generate new business. My wife is taking a half day today so we can go look at a dresser on Craigslist that she likes, as well as make sure we can finish the Christmas gifts and wrap presents. Tomorrow is Christmas Eve, and although both of us aren't religious, it is recognized as a day you gather with your family. Tomorrow we will be gathering with her family, the next day (Christmas Day) we'll be gathering with mine. We will both be taking off the 26th, although, as a business owner, you never really "take time off". I'm sure we'll spend time up in the office, but it's always really nice when she gets to be up here with me. So 7 days down, I would say it hasn't been so bad. It might be Ula that is helping me, or GameQuitters, or maybe it's just that I've gone 7 days or more without games plenty of times before when my wife and I go out backpacking? I feel, for me at least, the real test will be to make it a month without games. If I can make it a whole month, I think that might be the longest I've gone without games since I can remember.

Welcome back! I feel ya on being long winded. Good luck on your detox, if anything will getting your novel to a publishable level, it's probably the focus and time you'll have back from getting away from games

Good job on the 3 days! I didn't experience any dreams like you did, but I really expected to. I feel the journal really helps me, it feels good to self reflect publicly. Keep it up

Great job on 15 days game free! Enjoy the quiet, it's refreshing to be able to hear yourself think.

Thanks @dandielionous Day 6 - A bit later start to the day today, but that's ok. I was still up at the same time, I just spent some time writing a few friends an email and working with Ula. She is doing well with some of the training, it's a fun and enjoyable thing for me to occupy my time. It's also rewarding to see her actually learning some things. Yesterday I did really well, I'm pretty proud - I put in 4.5 billable hours in and completed my project (albeit, I wish I completed it a while ago). I have some more time today that I will be able to spend on it too, and tomorrow. It was nice getting into the swing of things, this is an important client for me to keep, my business relies nearly completely on keeping them happy, so I feel like finally having some deliverables will be a good omen to them. I also did some weight lifting, I found a neat app called "5x5" which focuses a bit more on strength training. I would like to do more cardio, but I feel I would enjoy it quite a bit more when Ula is ready to run too. That should be next week about when her spay should be all healed up. A few things I didn't do yesterday that I want to do today are shave, cause the beard is getting a bit long and itchy, call the construction company for our insulation which I neglected to do yesterday, and a few "dog keeping" things with Ula such as giving back some feedback to the humane society and sending in a rebate. I plan on doing more strength training today, I feel a little sore but not too bad because the app started me on very low weights to start. I also plan on working on the business today, luckily I have a few clients that keep me busy but if I'm going to grow at all I need to set a few things in motion. With that said, keeping an eye out for the future of my business brings me to my quote for the day - this one by John Galsworthy, who said "If you do not think about your future you cannot have one."

Day 5 - I'm starting to feel more motivated and focused without gaming. I did a few things that I have been ignoring for my business yesterday, and it felt great to have some progress. Took Ula for a couple of walks, one during the day and another in the evening with my wife. It's nice to bring her out and get some fresh air ourselves too, I love the cold dry air that winter brings. It always feels refreshing to take a deep breath. I didn't do much for my client yesterday because I was distracted doing my own work, which I feel a little guilty about because my deadline is today. But I'm going to try to focus and get the work complete today in order to hand it off and move onto the next project. Also, it'd be great to have some billable hours for my next invoice, it has been pretty pathetic lately. I feel if I just get started, I will pick up where I left off and suddenly be completely involved again - so that is my goal for this morning. Some other goals I have for today is to do some weight lifting, it's been a while since I have and I don't have that solid, grounded feeling that comes with strength. Strength helps a lot with some of the activities I want to do in my free time, such as climbing, more cardio exercise, and my crafts. Also I want to call a construction company that came out to our house earlier this year, we need more insulation in our attic as it's laughably low. In the cold winters we get where I live, that's just money out the window. They came out a few months ago, hopefully the quote they gave is still good. Ironically, there was an automatic email I got from them today saying, "5% off quote" if I move forward with them, which I was going to anyway. I always like looking at these coincidences as more than coincidences, but signs for me to just do it! As an aside, I've always enjoyed good quotes. Short, sweet, to the point but also thought provoking. They help us remember the great people who have said them - often individuals who have had such an impact on the world it's hard to imagine they were just one person. So, as part of my daily posts, I would like to also include a quote for the day. This one from Nelson Mandela, a man of no short resolve - "It always seems impossible until it's done."

Sounds pretty cool @Cam Adair I'm not sure what sort of stages you are looking at, if you would be looking to integrate the two systems before creating the app and what ideas you had the app would have, but for a forum I run (mind you, not nearly as active as this one) I've tried this solution called "Tapatalk". There are varying degrees of service they offer, I tried the free version and basically what it does is it makes your forum acessible through an app. There are higher level features such as a "Branded iOS & Android App" that they offer for a monthly charge, that might be something to check out. When I integrated it onto my phpbb forum it was incredibly easy, just a few scripts and you're off running. I eventually took it off the site though because of a few things: 1) I like being a little more in control of my software, that's a personal preference and 2) I felt it could annoy people because when you visited the site, it would always broadcast "Download the App!". Some people don't like downloading apps for privacy issues. Also the free "App" you download is Tapatalk, which is just a big list of all the forums using Tapatalk instead of your own, so it could be a little confusing to users as it wasn't specific to my forum. I haven't touched it in at least a year, so I'm sure they have had great improvements. Here is the website.

I'd like to maybe add my two cents to this topic. First, looks great. I think it would be cool to see where everyone is coming from. I agree it looks a little cluttered in Europe, that may help by reducing the size of the pointer a bit and adding a marker outline around the arrow part so it's not so much a red blob. Of course, the alternative to the clutter is the ability to zoom in on the map, which is why Google Maps API is often used But given the work that's been put into this so far, it'd be a shame not to use it. I've attached a quick example of how I think the pins could look a little different to maybe reduce some clutter/size without losing the gamequitters logo to the pixel war. Another thing is that although Europe looks very busy of course with all the countries, US, Canada, and other larger countries seem a bit bare. It may be cool to separate the pins into the states and provinces of those larger countries, of course that is more work as well. Finally, I'll throw a big stick in the spokes - what's been done set aside, what would be cool to see is an option for people to list their location on their forum profile, there could then be a server side script that accesses the database and generates the Google Maps API JavaScript cooridinates based on the locations. It would remove having to place the pins when a new person comes on board from a new location. That's a pretty big stick though, and as the late and great Bruce Lee has once said, "If you spend too much time thinking about a thing, you'll never get it done."

Thanks @dandielionous Day 4 - It feels a little better today, a lot of yesterday I was distracted. I went easy on myself, letting my mind continue to be distracted by some things as long as they weren't gaming related of course. I used to watch some LetsPlays, mostly of horror/scary games because I enjoyed the reactions from the LetsPlayers, I had a bit of an urge to watch them but stayed away. I think I need to be sure that any and all gaming related things I should be avoiding, it will lessen the urge to "Just play for a little bit". Unfortunately, yesterday I also noticed that due to my browsing history and my profile acquired by advertisement companies like Google and Facebook, most of my advertisements are actually gaming. It's a little distracting when reading through articles and seeing a little preview or cool screen shot of a fun looking game - boy they really can determine what people will look for. The games are ones I'm more interested in (fantasy/RPG), rather than sports or other types that never really drew me in. Anyway, yesterday was great - even if I didn't do much for billable hours, I felt looking back on the day I was actually quite productive on a personal level. I sat and read one of the couple of dog books I got for a while, played with Ula who is fitting in very nicely (and learning how my wife and I like things around here), did some more Christmas shopping I have been putting off in lieu of gaming, ordered up a couple of blacksmith tools for myself for my own Christmas gift (from my wife, of course :P), and did a lot of article reading about dogs, some reading of Respawn, and of course on these forums. I also took Ula for a nice walk/run yesterday. I did need to take it a little easy on her, she got spayed last week, and this morning I brought her into her first Vet. visit where she did very well and learned we should be restricting her activity a bit more to help her surgery. So no jogging until she is recovered, which I guess I'm fine with just because I'm so out of shape the bit of jogging I did yesterday I could swear I Ula thought I was joking about the speed. As for today, I'm going to plan on doing a bit more work than I did yesterday. I do have a deadline to meet tomorrow that I set for myself, I'm hoping I can make it and not get too distracted. In order for me to do good work, I need to be in the right mood - that's the same for a lot of people. When designing, developing, and testing software you need to be focused on the task at hand but also it's fairly imperative to be sure to step back once and while to review what you have done, make sure it makes sense from different perspectives (will the user understand this?). I'm hoping I get my focus back in time, it's part of the reason I even have a business. And speaking of the business itself, I finally checked some of my ignored emails. Looks like one of my clients emailed me last week, asking if I could help with something. This is one of the clients I have been ignoring, unfortunately. It's completely lost work, they pay well, the work is good, I'm just not doing it. I'm a little scared that they may get tired of my unresponsiveness/laggard delivery and move on, but it doesn't look like I have reached that point quite yet. This week I would like to try to do some work again for them, it's been months since I last have, and I still have things on my plate that have fallen by the way side. In addition, there is one client in particular who has a rather large bill on them that is dependent on me finishing one small bit left for them before they send it my way and we sign off on everything. I don't get why I don't just do it, get it over with, and get paid for all the work I have done for them. Again, I feel it's the problem that gaming actually became more interesting than making my business and myself be successful, which is weird. You always picture entrepeneurs as go-getters, people with a handful of ideas and are pumping them out almost like candy to kids on halloween - it's an image I try to appear as to my clients and other people as a status portrayal and confidence in giving me their business. The fact is that when I do win a bid, I've been just sitting on the work, letting it fall by the wayside and be forgotten, while I dive deep into a virtual world. These journal entries are nice, they kind of help me focus my mind for the day and also to self-reflect. If I didn't grip a pen/pencil so hard my hand cramps after writing a paragraph, I might enjoy continuing to do it in an actual physical journal. But for now, baby steps. Time to do a little TCB.

Thanks for the warm welcomes Day 3 - Today is the first "work day" of my detox. It feels a little weird, to wake up and not start up a game. Last night, I uninstalled all of my games from my computer, a suggestion from my wife that I should have them all removed before today which I thought was a good idea. It feels pretty good to not have that temptation even existing on my computer any more. I feel distracted though, of course. It's a little hard to focus, and I'm also a little lost on my work since I have not put in the time I have been meaning to. I'm thinking it's just because I am so used to when my wife leaves for the work day, I would shut off for 8 hours and get involved with games until she gets back. It will take me a little bit of time to try to get a handle on where I was with my work, as well as get my motivation back, I'm sure. I plan on putting some time in for my client today, partially because I have a deadline at the end of this week as well as a video meeting today, but it probably won't be a whole lot given my focus and taking it easy the first day. I will try to get a few other things in my life straightened out that I have been putting off, starting with some basic cleaning of my piled up desk and catching up on my ignored emails. Music and Podcasts seem to make me feel a lot better than game sounds, so that is helping. Ula is keeping me distracted as well, which is also helping.

I certainly do Here she is in all her adorable glory, she is a rescue German Shepherd mix that is 11 months old, her birth day is 2 days from my own.

Thanks @Cam Adair, glad to share. It's obviously a little weird but liberating at the same time. Joe has a great story and I can draw a lot of similarities in that story. Thank you for pointing it out to me.

I figure I better participate in this daily journal thing, because I feel it will be healthy. I'll catch up the past 3 days. Confession - The day I confessed that I have an addiction to my wife it was an evening, since I had gamed that day, I'm not counting it, I also said I was going to do a 90 day detox. She has been very supportive of me, and very happy with my decision and realization to do so. Over the past couple of months we have been talking about getting a dog. I love dogs, and I haven't had one since I was a kid. I work from home now, so I have very little social contact besides virtual phone calls and video conferences. These are NOT the same thing, I realize, as good social interaction. I'm hoping that the dog could help me with that I had been keeping an eye out over the past couple weeks, and we went to the Humane Society today to look at who was available. We were lucky to find one dog that we both really liked! She had a deposit on her already, but it was expiring that day, and any other deposits on her would just be made into a donation if she was taken otherwise. We wanted to be sure to have our name on the list with her, so we put a deposit on her. It felt good, donating to a Humane society, and also finding a dog who was very kind, quiet, and cute. Day 1 - We got a call that Rachel (our dog we found yesterday) got passed up by the previous people with the deposit! So we had the option to pick her up, we were excited and went out and got some things to be ready for a dog (a stake and a braided line for her to go outside and not run off, treats, dog food, and a Welcome Home bone). We went to the humane society and went to see her to make sure she was the one we wanted, she recognized us right away leaned heavily into our petting, something that we liked about her. We went to the front desk and went through the process of acquiring her! We brought her home, she got acquainted with her new home, and she only had one accident (luckily, #1). We renamed her to Ula, meaning Sea Jewel in celtic/german. We didn't really pick it, but as we were saying names outloud, once we said Ula she came over and jumped up on us happily, so we figured that was a sign It's nice and a little different to have a noise maker around the house. Day 2 - I had some gaming craving today, but I started off the day right in that I did a lot of things I've been meaning to - I finally did some Christmas shopping, Ula is getting more used to being home, and I feel pretty productive in the first day in a lot of days. I started uninstalling all my games, there are a lot of them uninstalled. I was a little worried that some of them I would be losing "Saved Data", but I feel like that is healthy to just let go of it. Getting it out of sight out of mind is very important, I feel. My wife is really liking that I am "Being responsive and not 'Shutting off'" while on my computer, which is what I have been usually doing because gaming is all I was doing when I was in the office. I feel having Ula is going to help me get through some of the harder days to come, so I'm pretty fortunate to find her right on my starting day. We took her for a walk out on a frozen lake and around the neighborhood, it was a balmy -10 F today, she had a blast and the freezing air felt incredibly good (that's why I live where I live). Enjoying some Christmas movies, tea, and making my computer void of games.

Hello, I'm a 30 year old married man that has always enjoyed gaming, but believe it has reached unhealthy addictive levels. I have always loved gaming and first got really into it in my younger years playing RPGs on playstation like Final Fantasy. I got into MMORPGs as a result where my addiction went next level with the games like Everquest and WoW, Final Fantasy and other RPGs would take 40 hours to complete and then I'd be done but these MMORPGs would suck up a LOT more time (infinite, really). Most recently I have gotten more into competitive style games like LoL, CS, Overwatch, Heroes of the Storm that have taken me even beyond now, spending at least 8 hours a day throughout the work week and sometimes 10 or more if I play in the evenings too. I didn't always play as much as I do now, working full time just didn't allow for that many hours of gaming, but over the past year there were some changes that allowed me more hours. To give a little back story, this year is the year that I determined after a career in IT and Software Development I would start my own business. This came after I butted heads with the CEO of a SaaS (Software as a Service) company, I was the VP of IT/Development. I decided if this guy can run a SaaS company, I could, and so far - I have been successful, albeit I do a lot of consulting rather than selling my own software. But as I found I was more and more in control of my own time, not at an office and social setting, and no one holding me responsible but myself - I started to spiral into some heavy gaming sessions, which has been a huge detriment to my business. Over the past month I have only put in 20 hours of billable time to some of my clients, and hardly made any progress on my own ventures. I believe my career has suffered because I no longer find programming as passionate as I did, and that's partially because I feel more of an urge to game. Each day, as my wife would leave for the work day, I would head to my computer and start playing games until she got home. When she got home, some nights, we would spend it in the office and I would game more, acting like I worked all day so the gaming was a way for me to "unwind from work". My wife helps me with the accounting side of my business, and she was noticing that I wasn't putting in many billable hours to my clients, but she didn't say anything at first. At one point though, I believe a week or week and a half ago, she asked about it. I got very defensive and argumentative. She asked me how many hours I would game in a week, I lied and said maybe 2 hours a day during work hours, and she was surprised by that amount. I felt terrible lying, because my wife and I have a very tight and close relationship, but I stuck to it and eventually after more arguing I literally broke out in tears because she was "making a big deal about just a few hours of gaming". After the argument she apologized profusely and felt terrible since I busted out the water works which she has only seen me do at funerals. I went back to my usual gaming routine, but slowly began to realize that this is not healthy behavior. I was not just playing a couple of hours a day, I was playing 8 or more. As I said my wife and I are very tight, so immediately I felt why on earth would I lie to win the argument, and also, why would I shed tears about it when I knew I was lying? Also, I was purchasing games without informing her (keeping secrets). These are all things I would normally not do, and she mentioned "addiction" during our argument and I have had the fleeting thought that I was addicted to games a few times before (after very heavy gaming sessions). I typed signs of an addiction in google just last week, and as I went through the list I could say "Yes, I do that" to everything in the list. The realization set in, and I came out truthfully to my wife about my lie, what I found out about my addiction, and what I plan to do with it. She is obviously extremely supportive, and I believe this is the first time in a very, very long time that I am on the right track with attempting to end a bad habit. I'm looking forward to working through the steps, doing the 90 day detox (Day 2!), and ending my gaming addiction cold turkey so I can focus on the more important things in life. Thank you, @Cam Adair for creating this website, forum, and your TedTalk which is how I found out about it all. It has helped me realize that I'm not alone, and that gaming at my level is an addiction. And thank you everyone for reading/listening to my story, it feels good to speak it truthfully.