Go agane.

[Hmmge 672]

Hello. Time for some good old fashioned personal development cringe! Haven't been on these forums for ages, it's nice to see things still up and running. Changed my display name but kept the profile picture the same, for the old times sake( @karabas?)

 

So to TL;DR the last 18 months, I crashed down from my highest peak of potential down to the rock bottom. I did graduate, although taking longer than expected but hey it's still a W. Near the end of my master thesis, I really started pushing myself once again. I was set to be finally free from uni and able to do "whatever I want", which meant accomplishing some of the dreams I've had since a long time ago. So I started a business, had my dad help me set up the beurocracy because in this country it's a nightmare, and I started making the product/service. I researched and wrote, and planned, and experimented, and in the end had something workable. I started looking for trial clients and found some. I also found a business strategy/mentoring programme that I would enroll in that would help me grow and that I also believed was a good approach. I started working with clients for free, refining/iterating the service based on how it goes with them. The future that I saw unfolding for me in the next couple of months was incredible. It was what I was always dreaming about. It was my mission, to help people in a meaningful way while building income and being independent of location and employers. Plenty of potential for creativity and growth, while also not based on working 16 hours a day for 5 years. I also found a girlfriend(now ex), who was just the most wonderful person and the way we were able to communicate and grow in such a short period was great. I visited her in her country and lived together for a month while I worked on my business at her place. On top of that I was meditating every day, working out, getting up on time, eating really well, everything was by the books and I felt amazing.

I was SO close to living the dream. This is when something went wrong. Because I still had no income, it was time for me to return to my home town and make use of a room in a flat my mom owns(used to live there during highschool/early college), while I get at least a bit of income going. The other rooms in the flat are rented to random people, but at the time I came back it was all empty. I set up the room for work and the next 2 days I kept working as usual. Before, living with my ex was a bit distracting and so I wanted to go FULL focus on this venture, working all day and get things going. But that did not happen.

All I had to do is pull one final trigger, and that was enrolling in the mentioned business mentoring programme. It was very costly for my standards but I viewed it as a business expense, essentially a part of the initial investment, because I wasn't as naive as to think I could figure out everything by myself. Because of the huge investment of money and also time(as the programme involved a good deal of pushing myself further), I viewed it as the final stepping stone. After I press that button, that's it, I'm out of the matrix. I am now living my life the way I've wanted to for so long, my passion and purpose being fulfilled. It also meant no more video games and fucking around. Of course casual gaming with some story-based games would be fine, but I could no longer no-life 10 hours a day playing league or wow. I remember it feeling like in Lord of the Rings, when Sam and Frodo venture out of Shire and Sam stops for a moment in the field and says "This is it, if I take one more step, it'll be the farthest away from home I've ever been".

I couldn't take that step. I had no Frodo to grab me by the hand to go face the challenge together. I've spent most of my highschool days in this room gaming all night and the entire environment was pretty deeply ingrained in my brain to game. Coupled together with the challenge of taking that one final step, I just broke. I don't remember which game I played, but I gamed all day and deep into the night. I woke up in the afternoon, feeling like shit, and kept going. I kept in check with the clients and still did my work but it was very difficult to do and every moment I just wanted to game more, and so I did. I had no one to stop me there, no one could see my descent into madness, as I ripped my dream apart. At some point, I stopped working entirely and ditched everything, including my friends and girlfriend by ghosting everyone because of fear of confrontation. I was ashamed to show myself, to show that I did it again, after I was CONVINCED that I was finally 'fixed' and that I was on the right track. But no, the old Go Agane is back.

Man I actually tear up writing this.

It's been many months since then, and it's as if my life hasn't moved since. Literally still have no job, living off of what was essentially my fund for the business startup. I figured that this time around, I'll pick a different strategy for recovery. Instead of making a big and dramatic decision like I've done before, I will take baby steps and work my way up slowly but surely, as so many people recommend. But that apparently doesn't work for me at all and lead me into a spiral of complete lethargy and energy drain. One day I do a baby step, and then the next day I don't. It just doesn't stimulate my pitta energy, or maybe I'm doing it wrong. Either way, the life I dreamt about was literally weeks away from fully actualizing. And now, months later, I'm here sitting in the same fucking room, surrounded by trash and dust, barely having enough motivation to go outside. I'm still young, not as young as before, but still got time to fix this shit and get back on track. I don't think the dream is dead, I never believed in such finality. But it hurts. I want to be my own self again, vibrant, enthusiastic, creative, present. Not this dead slog of a body.

Fuck.

Edited July 20, 2022 by GoAgane

[Paul A. 455]

Thank you for your vulnerability to share your story with us. I can’t really relate to how you must be feeling, but just know that I’ve got your back. Feel free to reach out whenever you need.

[Hmmge 672]

Alrighty back in here after 2 months. I need to journal regularly. In the past when I was active on this forum every day, it has been extremely helpful. The little while for reflection, writing, and light planning always grounded my mind and helped stay on track or get back on track. 

I've had a great meeting with my HG coach today. At one point he asked me a question that triggered a strong emotional response. Had to take a breather after that one but emotional catarsis is always nice. Thoughts are popping up that it should be used as a propulsion point for change, but I just can't right now. Well, writing this journal is a positive action so that's good. I'm feeling pretty relaxed now and semi-excited for the day ahead. I have to reset my degen jetlag so that's gonna be an ordeal. 

A very vague, non-committal and chill entry for today. I mostly just want to write here for the sheer sake of it. Hopefuly do one more before bed too. After 24+ hours of being awake ouff here we go.

[Lobares2 56]

This journal entry hits differently man

‘Either way, the life I dreamt about was literally weeks away from fully actualizing‘

This is something which happend to me as well, so totally feel you. This was game changer moment basically changing the environment of old habits, gaming attitude for good. 
 

Im pretty sure I remember you from years ago around 2018-2019, but not sure couldnt find your old journals.

About the ‚baby steps‘ -> this never worked for me. I know the idea behind it, but the ‚big changes and decisions‘ you mention keep giving me the motivation to stay strong since you do something ‚special‘. No idea at the end whats better and what not, but that was my way which worked for me. Well I failed like 100x before it worked but that was the moment it worked.

Set your goals, start that counter, post ebery day,and take those final steps once and for all man

[Hmmge 672]

Lost Ark Detox Days 1,2,3 / 7

Lost ark, a fairly recent mmo western release, has been the heaviest anchor pulling me down this year. Certainly not the only one, but definitely the heaviest by a large margin. I could write pages and pages about gaming throughout my life, but for now I will say this: I have never seen a game designed so perfectly to manipulate the human's little lizard brain this effectively. As predatory as that is, there's honestly beauty to be admired. Much like fascination from how a disease can spread throughout a body's cells, or a drug can work it's way through an addicts life, or how a swarm of insects can cooperate to attack another nest. I shall make a longer essay, maybe even a video on all the addictive systems one day.

Last friday, one of my best friends and one of my co-raiders that I've been playing lost ark with, quit the game forever. This came at a pretty interesting time when I had just finished a big achievement I've been chasing in-game as well as general discontent and burnout from the game settling in, as well as of course the absolute stagnant state of my real life. I took it as an opportunity to go along with him. He completely destroyed his account, giving away all the gold, destroying his accessories and armor, deleting all characters. That is the one and only true way to quit, because this game requires such an incredible time investment, once you destroy all that, there's no way anyone is coming back. Well, I wasn't quite ready for that kind of commitment, BUT I did manage to give myself a push and green light a '1 week off'. So I gave him my steam account to hold for 1 week after which I can just get it back without pushback. Just like they say in AA communities - 1 day at a time. I'm quite literally not committing to more. I will see how I feel at the end of the week(ending on friday night) and decide what to do then. But right now I can say, I feel great. Surprisingly not even feeling much FOMO, but that might change.

So the first 3 days were pretty great. I went to see my friends after a looooooooooooooongass time. It was going to be just a short drink for a couple of dudes after work, but because I wrote in the message group that I'm coming, everybody got hyped and around 10-15 people showed up at the bar. Was pretty cool. Nobody was judgemental and everybody was very happy to see me so that's great. Next week some of us are going to watch the new episodes of rick and morty together, which coincidentally, will be on saturday, so during the first day that I could have my lost ark account back if I wanted. We'll see what happens. Anyways, I also exercised for 10 minutes, doing some flexibility routine. Might not sound like much, but for me this was huge. I re-connected a little bit with my musical heart, listened to a shitton of music and sang. I've got a tremendously large mountain to climb before me, but I'm happy I was able to take these first couple of steps forward.

Edited November 8, 2022 by Hmmge

[Hmmge 672]

Wanted to append this to the entry but somehow it got all sussy so let me try here 

 

[Hmmge 672]

Lost Ark Detox Days 4,5,6,7 / 7

One day at a time, I managed to get to 7 days. Wasn't too hard actually, the game puts an extreme amount of pressure on players so having that relieved felt good and I didnt feel like going back at all. In fact, on friday I told my friend I'm extending the detox for another week! I did play a few others games throughout the week for a bit. I think I played 2 games of league, both felt like a waste of time, about 20 minutes of overwatch, got bored very quickly and I installed starcraft 2 but couldn't even be bothered to open it. The only game I spent significant time on was MTG, because friends of mine have been mentioning they bought physical paper decks and wanted me to come some time for a ses, which is pretty awesome, but made me boot up the online version as well. Already feeling kinda bored of it though and more importantly, I feel like there are things that will make me feel happier and more fulfilled and I genuinely have motivation to do other things more. So for now I'm keeping this detox for lost ark only and focusing my mind on intentional action rather than avoidance.

 

Still feel tremendous amounts of shame, disappointment and anxiety but at least I'm on the right track, no matter how long that track is and no matter how slow I'm going. It feels good to finally be genuinely trying my best even if my best is disappointing to me. It's a bittersweet concept haha. We'll see what comes out of it this week

[Hmmge 672]

Lost Ark Detox Days 9,10 / 14

What a day! After SO LONG I genuinely felt like I had a productive day. A lot of it was chores like cleaning up, laundry, bills and after that a lot of brainstorming, planning and scheduling the next couple of weeks. What's even crazier than that is that last night I went to sleep at 23, and I woke up today morning at 8. Might not sound like something to be wrote home about, but to me that is huge. It set my whole day up for success and I felt great throughout. At one point I realized how much of the self-development work I've done through the years in the past has integrated with me fully. A lot of things that I know work for me were automatically picked up and it just kind of clicked. Things like intermittent fasting, the way I do my to-do lists, preparing a glass of water before bed, journaling here, standing&pacing, using a website blocker in a specific way etc.

Got a plan for tomorrow already written out and it does include a couple of things that are anxiety-inducing for me but if it doesn't go as smooth as today that's fine, I'll do my best to prepare tonight evening as well as I did last night and just face it. Only way to do it.

Edited November 15, 2022 by Hmmge

[Hmmge 672]

Lost Ark Detox Days 11 / 14

Quick update because it's late night, been out to a small shisha bar playing some paper magic with buddies, really cool sess. That plus going out to get a haircut took a lot of time, but despite of that I accomplished a lot today, most importantly getting back in touch with family in a small way, setting up a possible meetup next week. That has been a big point of anxiety for me and I'm glad I was able to not evade that emotion, but rather notice,observe, and let go of it instead.

Big D(detachment) energy. 

[Hmmge 672]

Lost Ark Detox Days 11-16 / 90

Oooooweee interesting couple of days. I spent a lot of this week just sleeping to be honest. I think I broke my own records of consecutive sleep time, but if not, I definitely did for total sleep time in a week. Change of mind, change of energy, seems like the body had some resetting to do as well. However, I do use sleep as a mechanism for escape as well and I am aware that played a role for sure. What's more effective than an mmo in shutting down the conscious mind, getting rid of all anxieties and worries? Well, being literally unconscious in sleep of course! The wonders of human brain. Whoptyfuckingdoo. You can tell I'm tired/sleepy by the way I'm writing. Anyways I also saw myself seeking for some kind of escapism in games/shows/reddit/youtube, this week was tough and I had a hard time doing stuff, but in the end I drew energy from my inspirations, allowed myself to fail, and eventually bounced back on the weekend. Started brushing up on my coding skills as well as playing the guitar/piano. I'm looking forward to continuing that and getting into even more exciting stuff next week!

Extended the detox to 90 days. Never felt any desire to go back to it thankfuly, the same energy is simply being directed towards other things. Like a flow of leaves I need to blow it in the direction that is most fulfilling, because that current never left and will probably never leave. I might extend the detox to other things as well eventually, but for now this is good. Writing this journal after a long talk with a friend, which was already WAY too late for me to start but he needed a listener so I was glad to be of help to someone and even if I wake up in the afternoon tomorrow, it was worth it and I'm happy I did a good job today. I'm an awesome person and I want to project my love for life out there

 

 

 

[Hmmge 672]

Lost Ark Detox Days 17 / 90

Very productive day, lots of intentional activity including coding, re-organizing the room, consolidating music production files so I can start with that as well this week and others. What I'm going to focus on the next couple of days is to start using pomodoros to make working more focused because I'm still very much all over the place even though I'm spending the time on the right thing. On top of that, I will also start exercising, maybe start with a flexibility routine for now and then hit the gym next week. Hmmge. 

[Hmmge 672]

Lost Ark Detox Days 18 / 90

Woke up late due to staying up late last night doing music, oh well. I was very unfocused and low energy all day because of that, but I did the best with what I had so I'm still happy. Had a dense meeting with my life coach as well, discussed some emotional awareness/processing stuff regarding family so I will let that swim around tomorrow and probably set up some meetups with dad on thursday. Otherwise all good, progressing slowly but surely.

[Yan 139]

1 hour ago, Hmmge said:

Lost Ark Detox Days 18 / 90

Woke up late due to staying up late last night doing music, oh well. I was very unfocused and low energy all day because of that, but I did the best with what I had so I'm still happy. Had a dense meeting with my life coach as well, discussed some emotional awareness/processing stuff regarding family so I will let that swim around tomorrow and probably set up some meetups with dad on thursday. Otherwise all good, progressing slowly but surely.

You've got a life coach? That's some advanced stuff there.... Is this life coach in the place you want to be in life though? How much does he charge?

[Hmmge 672]

Lost Ark Detox Day 26 / 90

Had a BIT OF A TUMBLE for a few days, sleep going all over the place, productivity down to 0, messiness, no energy, avoided contact with people. I was avoiding my emotions, too scared to fight, but I bounced back! Last two days were very productive, got a bunch of coding done, shredded the guitar, did some psych work and chores. So I'm pretty proud of that. I'm very excited for tomorrow as I'm going to be finishing my first coding mini-project(maybe), and also I picked up the Buttersnips song from Pheriphery after years of not playing and holy fuck that is so insanely fun to play. Extremely hard and I am nowhere near the skill level to play even at slow speed but I'm getting better FAST because of previous muscle memory. Fast progress is fun. I join a work streaming session here and there and today I did in the morning as well, I felt like it helped me stay focused more so I will do that again tomorrow.

Keep going forward!

[Yan 139]

3 hours ago, Hmmge said:

Lost Ark Detox Day 26 / 90

Had a BIT OF A TUMBLE for a few days, sleep going all over the place, productivity down to 0, messiness, no energy, avoided contact with people. I was avoiding my emotions, too scared to fight, but I bounced back! Last two days were very productive, got a bunch of coding done, shredded the guitar, did some psych work and chores. So I'm pretty proud of that. I'm very excited for tomorrow as I'm going to be finishing my first coding mini-project(maybe), and also I picked up the Buttersnips song from Pheriphery after years of not playing and holy fuck that is so insanely fun to play. Extremely hard and I am nowhere near the skill level to play even at slow speed but I'm getting better FAST because of previous muscle memory. Fast progress is fun. I join a work streaming session here and there and today I did in the morning as well, I felt like it helped me stay focused more so I will do that again tomorrow.

Keep going forward!

Ignoring me huh? 😄 Way to go on getting back at it, when life knocks you down and you keep standing up that means you're very probably doing progress. Stay hard.

[Hmmge 672]

 

Lost Ark Detox Day 27 / 90

Woke up early and crushed it. Apart from coding for many hours, I managed to get the courage to call dad and we scheduled lunch on sunday so we'll see how that will go. This was very difficult for me so I'm happy I did it. After dinner I got super tired and kind of passed out early in the evening, which made me skip what I wanted to do in the evening but that's okay because I woke up at 4am today so I just have that time now. Hype!

On 12/1/2022 at 1:48 AM, Yan said:

Ignoring me huh? 😄 Way to go on getting back at it, when life knocks you down and you keep standing up that means you're very probably doing progress. Stay hard.

Sorry I sometimes take multiple days to reply if I don't know what to write right away. It's the HealthyGamer coaching programme. Although it is still expensive for me, it is the most affordable option and DrK is one of my life's biggest inspirations and I strongly resonate with most of what they say and the way mental health/life is approached so I'm quite happy with it.

Edited December 2, 2022 by Hmmge

[Yan 139]

On 12/2/2022 at 6:27 AM, Hmmge said:

 

Lost Ark Detox Day 27 / 90

Woke up early and crushed it. Apart from coding for many hours, I managed to get the courage to call dad and we scheduled lunch on sunday so we'll see how that will go. This was very difficult for me so I'm happy I did it. After dinner I got super tired and kind of passed out early in the evening, which made me skip what I wanted to do in the evening but that's okay because I woke up at 4am today so I just have that time now. Hype!

Sorry I sometimes take multiple days to reply if I don't know what to write right away. It's the HealthyGamer coaching programme. Although it is still expensive for me, it is the most affordable option and DrK is one of my life's biggest inspirations and I strongly resonate with most of what they say and the way mental health/life is approached so I'm quite happy with it.

Did you wake up early with an alarm clock or accidentally? Because if it was accidental I wouldn't count it as a positive. Which programme are you on the 30 50 or 70? How far in the process are you? How would you describe your process thus far? Do they advocate gaming in moderation and not quitting all together? 
Edit: Way to go on scheduling dinner with your dad, I guess it's something you needed to do, since it seems you were thinking about it quite some time.

Edited December 3, 2022 by Yan

[Hmmge 672]

Lost Ark Detox Day 28 / 90

Visited a friend for a home office sess in the morning. Wasn't actually as productive as I hoped it would be but still good.  Then kind of dozed off at home early in the evening to wake up early again. I seem to have a dip in energy after dinner with this schedule. Not quite sure what to do about it just yet, but waking up super early has been great for me either way, and I'm not oversleeping either so I'll just observe it for now. Today I might go out with friends so that will possibly shake the rythm up.

@Yan It is absolutely a massive positive, and a huge success for me, to be able to wake up naturally after a proper sleep amount. The reason why I am now sleeping well is all the things during the day that I do that set me up, there is very little accidental about it. Not sure what you mean by 30,50,70. Are you interested in it as well?

[Hmmge 672]

Lost Ark Detox Day 29 / 90

Woke up early and stayed super productive all day, really got into the zone and chose to not go out to stay in it. Got a ton of coding done, shredded on the guitar(did like 3 hours, super satisfying), and even worked out. Feeling really good, it's one of those days when it goes easy. I wish every day I could get into it like this. Well, too bad tomorrow will be a social day instead. I'll make sure to set everything up for monday either way.

[Yan 139]

21 hours ago, Hmmge said:

Lost Ark Detox Day 28 / 90

Visited a friend for a home office sess in the morning. Wasn't actually as productive as I hoped it would be but still good.  Then kind of dozed off at home early in the evening to wake up early again. I seem to have a dip in energy after dinner with this schedule. Not quite sure what to do about it just yet, but waking up super early has been great for me either way, and I'm not oversleeping either so I'll just observe it for now. Today I might go out with friends so that will possibly shake the rythm up.

@Yan It is absolutely a massive positive, and a huge success for me, to be able to wake up naturally after a proper sleep amount. The reason why I am now sleeping well is all the things during the day that I do that set me up, there is very little accidental about it. Not sure what you mean by 30,50,70. Are you interested in it as well?

I'd highly recommend reading The Little Book of Stoicism by Johan Salzgeber. I think it could make you a lot of a happier person. You think you'd check it out? ( I've listened it through about 7 times if not more now, I'd clearly hands down recommend it 🙂 )   
30 50 70 are the costs of the three coaching programs they have. Well, at this point I'm just asking. But I'm not ruling out any possibilities

[Hmmge 672]

Lost Ark Detox Day 42 / 90

Two weeks since the last update wew! Some days have been kinda rough, not being able to accomplish much, but some were ok. I connected a bit more with some of my friends as well as family, by visiting dad and surprisingly everything going well on that front. 

4-5 years ago I had the most intense growth period of my life and though there were many factors going into it, the most major contributor was a simple rule I adopted from a community dear to my heart but now dead: Resistance = do it. Or in other words, whenever I feel resistance towards an action, I go do it purely for the sake of overcoming emotional resistance. No other reason, emotion or thinking process is necessary because simply the act of overcoming resistance and consciously taking an action despite of negative emotions telling me not to, is a powerful exercise that is capable of rewiring my brain in the exact way that I want. Not gonna write essays about why it's powerful but following this rule has gotten me tremendously far and yesterday I started using the rule again after an emotional realization. Not applying it to literally everything just yet, but it feels great to do, almost 'fun', in a way. Leads to some crazy outcomes pretty fast. Even writing this journal, I didn't really feel like doing it when I thought about it, I felt a tiny bit of resistance and thoughts like "ugh what am I going to even write about" and that was all the reason I needed baby. Resistance = do it. In a way, it hugely simplifies decision making and eliminates useless or destructive thoughts, because often negative emotions manifest in rationalizations like "why would I do this", "I don't know how to do this", "what if I'm going to fail". All of these get essentially swept away from my mind because there is one single reason that overwrites them all - resistance = do it.

[Paul A. 455]

Resistance = do it…. I love that! I may need to start applying that to my life as well

[Hmmge 672]

 Growing Consciousness Day 43 / 90

My body decided it wasn't going to sleep last night so today was kind of rough but a mid-day nap kind of saved it. Given the bad circumstances I did quite a lot. Leaning more and more into the resistance=do it rule, and used it to overcome anxiety from certain tasks that needed to be done. The to-do list is getting smaller! I also FINALLY looked back into orchestral production. Now I've 'started', I dipped my toes into it, and the wall is soooo much smaller when I'm going to start again. Possibly tomorrow. Ahh there are so many things I want to do, and not enough time to do them all. Right now I have more pressing issues, but that is something I will need to deal with soon as well. 

I thought about making an audio/video journal privately instead but then, talking aloud at 1:30am didn't seem like such a good idea in this flat, hmm.

[Hmmge 672]

 Growing Consciousness Day 44 / 90

Just reporting here quick for consistency, wanna head to bed ASAP soooo no monologuing today!

[Hmmge 672]

Hmmge

Alright I'm not sure what I'm doing with the title here LMAO. Initially I quit lost ark for 1 week, then at the end of it I went for 1 more, and then 1 more, and now it's been 7 weeks. I've been on strict abstinence streaks before but I am no longer using that approach so counting the days seems a bit pointless. I have other games available afterall. However, I do plan to make myself a rule-set for a dopamine detox in january, let's see and make a draft:

• Websites blocked/uninstalled from phone: Reddit, twitch, youtube.
  • Exceptions: guitar/IT/math/production tutorials, music, showing something cool to friends or family.
• No games
• No phone in bed, toilet, or while eating/cooking/chores/walking/commuting
• Eating food with no distractions(videos and such)

I feel like I'm forgetting something. This would be for 2 weeks, not sure when I'd start because new years will be a bit chaotic for me. Visiting family now and then I'll be with friends aroundd new years or a couple of days so maybe I'll pop it sometime randomly