Damje's journal

[Damje]

Day 9:

Had a good couple of days. Had another job interview on Friday, which again went pretty well. And have been socializing a bit more this weekend. So I'm quite happy with how things are going right now. I definitely owe that to quitting games, so I'm grateful for that. 

[goodvibes]

On 4/4/2022 at 12:14 PM, Damje said:

So I'm quite happy with how things are going right now. I definitely owe that to quitting games

glad you are already seeing benefits of reclaiming your time!  such a topic deserving of its own journal even.

[Damje]

Day 22

Haven’t written in a while, but things are going well. I have been staying away from games, but haven’t managed to stay completely clear from porn and other screen time distractions are still too present for my liking. Other than that I have been focused a lot on learning programming for data analytics. Got a certification exam next week for pl-300 (power bi) certificate and just started the 100 day code challenge in python. Excited to learn more about that. 
 

On the social front things have been going much better the past month. I feel much more confident and am enjoying contact much more. I feel less restricted and more free to just be myself and be okay with that. I don’t criticize myself as much as I used to.

 

I definitely feel like quitting games again has changed a lot in me. And I’m grateful for that. Now I think it’s time for me to pick up other screen time goals. Including more away time from screens in my free time, no more screen time in bed (before sleeping), no more porn. 
 

Tomorrow I will try to make a planning for myself. And the coming time I think I’ll have to write in this journal more often in order to keep myself on track.

[Damje]

Day 26

Haven't really been able to take the time yet to come up with a proper plan for screen time. Had quite a busy week. Managed to pass my pl-300 exam today, so I'm excited about that. Already on day 6 of the 100 days python code challenge as well, which I'm thoroughly enjoying actually. 

Anyways, Saturday I should have the time to set up screen time goals for myself to work on. Think I should mainly start to focus on removing screens from my sleeping pattern, which is an unhealthy habit that I've been feeding for far too long..

[diAmond64]

7 hours ago, Damje said:

Managed to pass my pl-300 exam today

congratulations on passing the exam!

7 hours ago, Damje said:

Think I should mainly start to focus on removing screens from my sleeping pattern, which is an unhealthy habit that I've been feeding for far too long

yeah screens are tough and can lead to unhealthy habits, I'm struggling with them too. I think for now I'm going to try being more present in the moment by meditating frequently. Also tracking how much you use screens per day might be helpful! Wishing you luck.

A

[Damje]

Bear with me, this is going to be a long post..

 

Status

It’s been a while since I last posted. Overall I would say I had a decent time. Managed to get to day 49 without gaming, but also increasingly watched gaming content on YouTube and urges to game really started getting more difficult to control. Other than that I have been really focused on learning programming and managed to score a job, which I will be starting in June.

Last Sunday however, I relapsed into gaming. I finally gave in to the urges that had been plaguing me. Started playing Stardew valley (for which I had been watching YouTube content) on my phone, which is supposed to be a chill game but of course not for me. I don’t know exactly how much I played these past 3 days, but I know it’s more than 20 hours. I barely slept, didn’t take care of myself as I should and have had a headache all the while. Last night I snapped out of it and realized I didn’t want this anymore.

 

Recap of my past 1,5 years.

It is now approximately 1,5 years since I decided to quit gaming and I am very happy that I decided to walk tat road. I have achieved a lot of things that I would otherwise have not been able to achieve. I finished my studies. Got out of a depression. I have started to build new social relationships and have become much more socially active. Before that I barely had contact anymore. I managed to get a job and improved my overall mental health and my self esteem tremendously.

It hasn’t been perfect (at all) or easy and there have been relapses. But overall, I am very proud of what I have achieved so far.

There however is also this feeling, that I haven’t been able to truly let go of gaming. Apart from the first 3-4 months I quit 1,5 years ago, I have never really felt like I cut my ties with gaming. I feel like I have been keeping the addiction alive. More specifically, throughout this period I have had long periods where I still watched gaming content on YouTube. It was always something that I realized wasn’t smart to do, but couldn’t really motivate myself to stop doing. It really started acting as my replacement for gaming (and so did porn on occasions). I basically replaced gaming with other high dopamine activities, with which I can turn myself off. Don’t get my wrong, it was still a hell of a lot better than actually playing games, but it also prevents me from ever really moving completely past my addiction and I keep giving my addiction a fighting chance..

 

What now?

So now I am at a point where I have had a short relapse of 3 days and realize that I want to move on. I don’t want gaming to play any role in my life anymore. I don’t want to replace gaming with other addictive activities. I want control over my impulses and I want to build a healthy and fulfilling life for myself. I want to start my adult life (which I have been postponing) and there are a couple of things that I’ll have to quit Cold Turkey for that to happen. It is going to be really difficult to achieve this, but I am confident that I will manage. It will be worth it in the end. So here are my (screen) goals for the coming months:

• Cold Turkey quit on gaming
  • shouldn’t be that difficult after only 3 days of relapse
• Cold Turkey quit on gaming content on YouTube
  • Still considering to quit YouTube as a whole, but I also use it to learn new songs on the guitar.
• Cold Turkey quit on porn
• No mobile devices in bed
  • The bed should be for sleep only. I really want to improve my sleeping patterns.
• No mobile devices first hour after awaking.
• Maximum of 2 hours Netflix a day. Non-negotiable!

 

This is NOT a punishment for relapsing! Relapsing has made it once more clear how shitty I feel when I game. How it drags me down and how it never brings what I want it to bring. It has made me rethink about my behavior and about the goals that I want to achieve.

I’ll probably write more tomorrow, but for now this will have to do.