kortheo

Awesome start man! Keep it up. If you journal daily you will see great progress :).

Hey Duncan, welcome to the forum. Props for deleting your accounts already - that was a huge step for me and I didn't manage to do that until 90 days of not playing. You seem to have the right mindset so if you commit to this I'm sure you'll do fine. Definitely post daily if possible, you will find a lot of support, encouragement, and solid advice on the forum. It's somewhat ironic that South Korea, perhaps the place where video games have the highest status out of any culture that I'm aware of, is the place that you're going when giving up gaming. Haha, not that it matters much. Just interesting coincidence.

Hey man. You're going to get through this! Day 63 is awesome progress. Even if you're not doing anything "productive" you must still be healthier mentally from not playing 10 hours of games every day. This can be a serious addiction and it takes time to move past it. It's normal to struggle with finding replacement activities. What have you tried? How long did you stick with them? Why did you stop or what didn't you like about them? Have you taken a look at Respawn? It might give you a bit more structure to approach the problem with if you're struggling.

Day 241 Routines I met up with Cam yesterday and had a particularly good coaching session. I think it was good because I thought ahead about it more than I usually do, and brought a list of specific things to talk about. I have not been great about my foundation habits lately. By this I mean: sleep, meditation, food, exercise. I have been okay at them, but that's not enough. I've not been sleeping well enough, so I'm tired during the day. I'm not meditating consistently enough, so I'm not getting any compounding effects from it. I'm eating okay, but eating out too often, so I'm spending too much. I'm exercising, but not as often as I have in the past. I'm having to relearn lessons about these things over and over again, in a variety of contexts. Hopefully, eventually, they will stick. Until then I have to keep learning. In contrast to foundation habits, I also have projects I am working on. I'm thinking of these as things I do 1/week or so for a limited period of time (a few months to a year maybe), in contrast to foundation habits, which are things I do usually daily, and for a lifetime. The main project I have right now is my podcast. In a sense this journal is also a project since I'm not going to do it forever and ever, probably . Knowing that I need to recommit to my habits to get momentum again, and double down on things that are working in my life, I sat down last night to sketch out my daily routines and clarify what's working, identify what I can experiment with, etc. Cam and I talked about experimenting, which is basically the idea of just making small changes here or there in your life or routine and notice what works. This can take many forms. Here's a simple example I made this morning: My morning routine looked like this up until today: Wake upSnooze 10-30 minutes (yikes)5 Minute Journal (groggily)Meditate ShowerDressBreakfastDrive to work, frequently lateThere were a number of problems here. The most important issue had nothing to do with the morning routine itself, but actually with my sleep hygiene the night before. I was way too nonchalant about when I got to bed, and looked at screens to much before bed; I frequently had trouble falling asleep and thus would wake up groggy and snooze too much. Last night I was very good about turning off devices 1hr beforehand, winding down for a while, and reading fiction in the last 20-30 minutes before sleep. Fiction reading in particular is actually really effective for me because it shuts off the analytical parts of my brain before bed, making it easier to drift off. One mindset shift I made was also that it wasn't my job to fall asleep by a certain time (I can't control this, only influence it), but just that I had to do my routine and get in bed and read by a certain time (something I can control). This way I avoid feeling stressed or guilty about not being asleep. One final hack I've implemented recently is wearing a sleep mask when I go to bed. This blocks out ambient light that can affect your melatonin production and keep you up. Unless you have a pitch black room already, a sleep mask can help if you struggle with this. These changes worked, and meant that I slept better and didn't have to snooze this morning, which kept me on track. But I made a couple other important changes to my routine. To avoid trying to journal and meditate while I was still just waking up and not thinking clearly, I reordered my schedule so that I showered first, which gave me time to wake up more fully and get more benefit from the journaling/meditation. I also added a step for making my bed, so that I had could come home to a tidy bedroom instead of one in disarray. Cam also pointed out that if you have a messy bed, a messy room 'matches' it, so you're likely to leave both messy. If you have a tidy bed, but your room is messy, you're going to notice the contrast and want to start cleaning your room up, too. My new schedule looks like this: Get in bed on time the night before, turning off screens and reading fiction before bed. Sleep mask as needed.Sleep 8 hoursWake up, no snooze necessaryShower5 Minute Journal (awake)Meditate DressBreakfastMake bedDrive to work, early or on time.These routines are something I've been tweaking for a while now. It takes a while to figure out what works for you. But I present this to you as a case study in experimenting and also in the importance of morning and evening routines. Sleep is CRITICAL for your health and optimal physical and mental functioning in EVERYTHING ELSE YOU DO in life during the day, so an evening routine is very important and often overlooked in my experience. Starting the day off on the right foot can make the difference in your mindset and what you accomplish that day, so it's also critical for setting yourself up for success each morning. Your routines may not look like mine, but you will almost certainly benefit from experimenting and finding what works for you. Framework That was a lot. But, I have a second topic for today as well. Back to foundation habits and projects. A Tim Ferriss question that's been stuck in my head lately because of how brilliant it is: "What would this look like if it were easy?" For me, easy often means simple. It's very easy to overcomplicate things in our lives, which makes them unsustainable. Last night I sketched a simple framework for tracking habits and projects that I'm working on in my life right now. This is itself an experiment for me. Here's what I have: Foundation StandardGoalSleep8 hours / nightWaking up feeling rested with enough energy for the whole dayMeditationEverydayBeing focused and present throughout the dayExerciseBJJ 3x / weekGet my first White Belt stripe, stay in shape, build confidenceFoodEat Slow-carbFeeling healthy, cooking rather than eating outThe Foundation is what you're working on. The Goal is what you want to experience in life. The Standard is what you have to commit to and apply to get to the goal. The Standard is the part that needs to be as simple as possible, and it should be measurable and easy enough that it's sustainable. As an example, keeping sleep to a simple 8 hours a night is simple because it's just 8 hours, no exceptions. Not, "7-8 hours" - that results in me getting 6 hours 45 minutes and saying "close enough" when it's definitely insufficient for me. Even though I actually sometimes need 9 hours, it's difficult for me to consistently do that, so I'll aim for 8, which is sustainable for me and works with my schedule. For meditation, it's even simpler. My measurement is a simply a binary pass/fail. Did I do it? Pass. Did I not do it? Fail. Not, "meditate for 20 minutes everyday in the morning" or fail. That's my ideal, but even though I make meditation a part of my morning routine, sometimes I will wake up late despite my best efforts and not have time to meditate then. So, I'll find time at lunch or in the evening, and I can still feel like I'm succeeding - which I am, if I do it. It's more difficult to sustain a habit if you feel like you're failing at it, and feeling that you're failing because you're not consistently measuring up to what's ideal for you is going to set you up to fail, in my opinion. Thus dialing back your standard to what is truly, actually "good enough" or realistic is a good way to build momentum and feel like you're winning the day. You might ask, what about depth? Like, according to this I could meditate for 1 minute a day and still succeed. True. While meditating for longer periods is obviously beneficial, I think that this naturally happens once you get the habit happening consistently. You don't need to force yourself to meditate for X minutes - too much work, too much forcing yourself to do stuff with willpower. Exhausting. Just do the thing and don't stress about the details too much. You'll enjoy it more and naturally do longer sessions as you notice benefits. You'll do more because you want to, not because you think you have to. Finally, this same framework will work for projects; examples: ProjectStandardGoalPodcastingCreate 1 episode/weekCreative expression, community feedback, personal growth, enjoymentCoaching with CamMeet with Cam 1/weekContinuous personal development, with specific subgoals Phew. That's all I have for now. Have a great day everyone.

I'm so glad I inspired you to start podcasting! Definitely link me when you get one up

Welcome! You are in the right place, and setting yourself up for success in the future. You might feel things are rough now but they'll get better if you commit to quitting games and improving your life. You have time on your side!

Day 240 I had a great weekend. Friday I had a lunch date and a dinner date, and also met up with Cam for a bit, so I was plenty busy. Saturday I got my oil changed, did laundry, went to a family birthday party thing, recorded a video thing for Cam, and then went swing dancing with friends. It was a really busy day, too. Sunday I drove two hours into the mountains for my friend's birthday and we climbed to the top of Mount Wright (some 5 hours of hiking roundtrip). It was awesome and a sorely needed change of pace for me. We ate lunch at the peak. According to my fitbit I climbed around 3000 ft, and took 20,000 steps. Then, I came home and had dinner and hottubbed with other friends :). Things fizzled with one of the girls I was dating. It's fine though, it kind of ran its course, and I learned enough about her to know that we aren't really compatible. It's weird how we can sometimes want something to work with someone even if they're not right for us, but I'm at the point now where I can see the incompatibility and realize that no, I don't want this to "work" anyway, because it would be miserable if it did, if that makes sense. I'm grateful for the learning experience; onward to new things! Actually, I have a feeling that things with the other girl I'm dating may fizzle as well, and I'll just be totally single again, which would be nice haha. I put in a lot of effort into dating for the past 1.5 months but it's kept me very busy and I haven't had enough time for myself at all. Learning to find balance is a valuable skill. I think I need at least 2 nights a week, or one solid day, per week of alone time, which I haven't had for a while now. I feel like I have a lot going on in my life right now and I'm kind of ready for it to slow down and let me rest. In any case, I will keep working to find the sustainable balance that allows me to keep growing.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Documentaries Great stuff here, especially if you sort by Top posts.

Day 238 Today I was walking around my neighborhood under the lovely overcast skies I enjoy so much. They happen most days here on the coast and it's great. Most people come here for the sun, but I enjoy the clouds even more so. I stop and wonder how long I will continue the day count. At some point, I will have to let it go, because it's a number that begins to define you in some way. The purpose of the journal becomes the "number of days without gaming journal" rather than just a journal of my thoughts and personal growth. I know that I will at least take it to 365 so that I can have a full year of not gaming documented here, but I wonder if I will go beyond that, or just drop it and implicitly accept not gaming as my normal state of being. Not like it really occupies my mind much, but just a thought. As long as I have it there, I'm still defining myself by it in some way. The past few weeks I've felt pretty great, but this week has been atypical for a few reasons and I've felt a little down, a little less confident, etc. My first response to this is to think that I'm failing or falling short some way and that it's thus my fault for feeling that way. But the reality is that we can't always feel awesome all the time, haha. Or at least I haven't found out how to do that yet - @Cam Adair, any protips? Even if we're doing all the right things, we're humans with emotions that will inevitably fluctuate no matter how well life is going. We adjust to a new normal and then our emotional set point re-calibrates. And that's okay. I feel like so much has happened in my life recently that I have a backlog of mental Stuff to process. Like, on some levels I haven't even fully processed that I've quit games. It was a part of my identity for so long and now it's not; even though it's been over 6 months that's still not that long compared to the 20+ years that I played games regularly (I started playing quite young). Cam asked me to make a video talking about my history with gaming and I'm finding it surprisingly difficult to talk about, despite doing this journal for so long, but maybe doing it will be a good step in processing a lot of this. On the surface it's easy for me to say that I'm done with games and it's no big deal now and I'm fine blah blah blah, but I think the truth is I probably have some buried emotions here that I'm not facing yet. I'm sure it's the same for all of us - how could it be otherwise? This is big life-changing stuff, you guys! There are many steps on any GameQuitter's journey. I've gone through a lot of them. But just because I'm a ways out from the 90 day detox and don't have cravings much anymore and am overall doing well - none of that means that I'm done. It still makes sense for me to be here and post and process because I'm still affected by my history of gaming and I still have more steps and stages to go through. As an example - in the early stages of quitting Cam advises people to try new things out so that you can find activities to replace gaming. Great, excellent. But this is only the beginning. I feel like i'm just now getting to the point where I've tried a lot of stuff and I can finally select the activities that give me the most value from all that experimentation. I'm choosing where my focus will be and doubling down on those things to get the greatest benefit out of life. If you'll allow me a slightly cheesy metaphor, compare your growth as a person to that of a tree. Trees grow slowly, and day to day it's difficult to see the difference in the size of the tree. But the accumulation of growth, maybe 1mm per day or whatever, over months and years, can lead to enormous, hulking, gnarled and impressive trunks with branches like a canopy. It's like the slight edge - small growth each day add up to huge gains over time. Also, the roots also stretch out underground even wider and more impressive than the branches above, yet we don't see them because they're below ground. When you quit gaming and do this sort of work on yourself, there are results that others see above ground, but really, the greatest results are all internal, invisible to other people. Have a good day, everyone.

Thanks! Yeah I'm going to try to do a better job of doing 1/week. Haha I was a bit tired when I did my most recent one so sorry if it's a bit monotone. Glad you like them though! Haha no worries man. Read or don't read whatever you want. Hope you find something useful in it. Glad to be back.

Hey everyone! I just put up a new episode of my podcast. Hope you enjoy. Episode 2 - Connection https://soundcloud.com/travis-kirk-992919435/episode-2-connection

http://forum.gamequitters.com/topic/1523-i-kind-of-dont-know-where-to-start/?do=findComment&comment=10071 I made a detailed post on my experience with anxiety here if you're interested.

I don't get it but Yes.

Day 237 Short post today. Watched a documentary on Scientology last night. It's even weirder than I thought. Can't wait for the Louie Theroux doc about it to finally be released. Meeting someone for lunch today, going to a movie with another tonight, meeting with Cam this afternoon, and I should probably change my oil today. Busy busy. Too much computer use this week, fingers going numb. Time to stop. Have a great weekend, everyone.

I will just sometimes ctrl+a ctrl+c my post once it starts getting to a certain length, just in case. There are also extensions that will do auto form capture to avoid this problem, too.

Day 236 I took time for myself last night and it was faaantastic. I came home, went for a 30 minute run, showered, went grocery shopping and got a big ribeye steak, came home and pan-fried it in a cast iron skillet to a crispy-crusted medium-rare perfection. Instant-read probe meat thermometer ftw, 125-135F internal temp. Then devoured along with steamed broccoli. Then meditated for 20 minutes, and journaled for 30 minutes. Then slept early. I feel much better today than yesterday. I am, thankfully, not feeling tired today. I also figured out my schedule for the next few days, which has me feeling a little less overwhelmed. Getting a grip on things again. I'm learning that even more so than having good habits, learning the skill of restarting all of those habits when you fall off them (which is inevitable and will happen again and again) is equally important. It's like in meditation when you have to learn to come back to the breath over and over again. I'm basically giving myself permission to do what I need to do this week to take care of myself, and not blaming myself for skipping jiu jitsu or social events. Next week I start back 100% normal and on the ball. I may revise my schedule so that I have 2 nights per week all to myself so that I'm more balanced. I also want to say that I love this community and that I'm glad to be back posting regularly. I've been working with Cam one on one but that is coming to a close in the next couple of weeks, so it will be good for me to keep in touch with the forum so that I'm still plugged into GameQuitters. Lives are being changed here and it's actually a privilege to see it and help and be helped. It's been great to see the new faces and catch up on old journals. I changed my quote today to the Lao Tzu one because I've been feeling overwhelmed and rushed. But that's no way to live. We do want to challenge ourselves and push our comfort zone, but I think we should take our time and bite off an amount that is sustainable. Lately I've gone beyond that. As we grow though, we can handle more and more at once.

Awesome. You write well. I will follow your thread now :P. Regarding old friends holding you back. Well, if they aren't adding to your life, or if they are negatively affecting you, you're totally justified in cutting them out. You could just start by not prioritizing them and instead choosing to spend time with others who add value to you. Or, if it's a serious problem, like you said, you can just write him an email and tell him that you can't be friends anymore. Difficult, but it's a step that will for sure leave you better off. Time you spent with him can now be put towards something more enriching for you.

For whatever reason I really like the idea of more titles haha. As others said Veteran at 30 posts should be moved up. Here's some other ideas just to brainstorm: New Member 0 Member 10 Novice GameQuitter 30 Adept GameQuitter 100 Veteran GameQuitter 250 Old Timer 400 Unstoppable 600 Over 9000! (9000+) (jk :P) Legend (Special) Haha, I'm not sure if I actually like the Idea of having "Veteran Gamequitter" instead of just like "Veteran" but I thought I'd throw it out there. Even if you just stick with Veteran, maybe have some intermediate rank just called "GameQuitter" around 100 or something. Idk. I'm sure there are other cool titles we can come up with.

Hey Spinips, loved that 4 Stages of Life link. Glad to see you're still going strong on the forum, fellow "Old timer" haha.

Hey Hitaru! Jumping in to read your latest entries here. Keep up your streak and get to 90! Thinking of yourself as your own worst enemy is a useful thought, I think. Once you overcome your own limitations you realize how far you have come, and that you're just better than you were before.

Awesome photos Alex!

Hey coccinust! Seems like you're off to a great start here. Sleep + prioritizing studying is a great combo. Sometimes the simplest things work great.

Hey Zala! Not to read into it to much, but do you think you could be slightly depressed? Not laughing for weeks combined with not getting pleasure from enjoyable activities would both be symptoms of that. Just a thought. Your 140 days is still a great accomplishment! In some cases simply removing gaming might not enough if you have underlying depression that needs to be treated. Gaming addiction (as with any kind of addiction) will often go together with other mental health issues.

Managing your distractions and creating a clean and quiet work environment is huge. Awesome that you were able to prioritize that. Also, Paint.net is a great piece of free software! I'm surprised I don't see it mentioned more frequently.

Day 235 Hey Alex! Thanks, it's good to be back :). Yeah, I suppose you're right that dating is something I do derive confidence from. Some people meet their partner young and get married and are happy with that, and more power to them. In my case, I want to meet a lot of different people way before I even think about marriage, and learn about myself and others in the process. This process for me adds up to me owning my sexuality and romantic needs and being able to actively work towards getting what I want... and yeah, it's really important to me. So I'm really happy that it's something I feel like I'm figuring out for myself. I'm sure there are ripple effects. Right now for me it's less about finding a relationship, and more about being able to connect with new people and learning. Life is like a roller-coaster! Although I think in some cases you need to actively make time for yourself. In feeling overwhelmed I feel like I'm losing a sense of control of things, which is very stressful. Normally I go to a trivia event tonight to see friends, but tonight I think I'm going to take time off for myself and just relax, journal, unplug, reflect, eat healthy food, get plenty of sleep, etc. I never used to understand the whole 'make time for yourself' thing because I was just never all that busy in the past, so I always just had that time by default. Now that I am busy enough where I don't have that time and it's starting to affect me negatively, I'm recognizing the need to just Do Less sometimes and actively prioritize time for yourself. Especially as an introvert, which I am. The family talk went well, but it's just the start of a complicated family drama thing. I won't go into many details, but it should be something I grow as a result of. We have a family member with mental health problems and I find myself in a place of being the only person with much understanding of mental health issues. As a result I'm finding myself having to provide leadership on the issue which has never been a role I've been in before in my family dynamic. So, it's interesting. We agree that quitting games isn't enough to make your life go well, and we also agree that you need to improve your lifestyle. But I think it goes beyond even that. There are mindsets that you must develop if you're going to be happy. No matter how great of a lifestyle you create for yourself, you will always have stressful and trying situations thrown at you at some point. It's how we respond to those situations that will often determine our mental health and our general outlook and stress level - and how we respond with habits, like meditating, exercise, etc.