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Opbagration20's Journal


opbagration20

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14th of April, 2016
Day 70 (video games)
Day 1 (Internet)


Hi, guys! I am back!

I brought you both good and bad news. I will start with the bad ones.

Bad news
My fight with procrastination resulted in an epic fail. Yes, I still continue to surf the Internet (watching some stupid videos, reading political news, listening to music. trying to install  either Arch Linux or Gentoo on my old laptop) for, on average, 7 hours a hours a day. 

 

Good news
1) My gaming detox, on the other hand, is not a failure. Actually, I am 20 days away from the goal. It wasn't that difficult. I had almost no cravings to play games. Sometimes I felt nostalgia, but it was mostly because of the fact that I continued to watch let's plays and the fact that I had constant stress due to constant deadlines.
2) German. I visit language courses three times a week, so I improved my language skills considerably. I also discovered that flash cards method is very awesome. I decided to use Anki and Memrise and I have only one question: why was I so skeptical about them before? If you learn some foreign languages, these programs are a must!
3) Touch typing. I finished SOLO. That was excruciatingly difficult, but I managed to receive perfect score in almost every exercise (I didn't do 2 optional ones). Right now my typing speed is around 250-270 symbols per minute. And I constantly improve.
4) I still study a lot. Despite my procrastination habits. I still visit every lecture in the University. I watched Cam's video about consistency and I totally agree, that it contributes 80% of success. The reason why I managed to pass my entrance exams at University is that I never skipped classes in school. As a result, I had to only revise some things before my exams, and not to learn everything, like others had to. Because of consistency, I managed not to relapse.

Internet detox
Yes, I have made a decision to start a separate Internet detox. I guess, I should have started it earlier, but it's better late than never. 
So, I decided to set some rules for this detox:
1) No let's plays.
2) No entertainment videos on Youtube or other similar sites.
3) No politics.
4) Music is ok, as long as it doesn't cause any major cravings, or hinder my work. 
5) On Friday, Saturday and Sunday I may watch some series (Game of Thrones or some anime) for 1 hour in the evening (after 8 pm). 
6) Social networks are fine, as long as I don't procrastinate and use them only for work.
7) Every Saturday I will make a post where I will report on my progress. They won't be long, because long posts = procrastination.
8) I won't procrastinate. I have a lot of work to do. I hate it, but I have to. Suvorov once said: "What is difficult in training will become easy in a battle". 

I would also like to encourage others to start Internet detox. Why? Because, as all of us already know, failure to stop procrastinating during video games detox (and the main source of procrastination today is Internet) leads to relapses.

So, that is it for today! My next post will be this Saturday (16th of April). Have a good day (or night)! Good luck!

 

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16th of April, 2016
Day 72 (video games)
Day 3 (Internet)

Boring and tedious

I am reaping what I have sow. I could have done all of boring tasks at the beginning of the year... But, it is better late than never. If I consistently do all the tasks, it will make my life so much easier next month and during exams.

Plans for the future
1) B2.1 in German by the end of this summer and B2.2 by the end of this year. So, a lot of German this summer. Main emphasis will be, I guess, on Grammar and Vocabulary. My initial plan was to get B2.2 by the end of the summer, but I decided to be more realistic in assessment of my learning skills. Maybe I will write one of the posts here in German just for fun, once I hit that milestone;
2) CS50 finished by the end of the summer. I think it is high time to learn how to program. I will start the course once I get through all the University stuff (most likely, at the end of this month). Obviously, I won't have time to do the entire course before the end of this semester, but I will try to get through at least 2 lectures. And than during summer it will finish other lectures and maybe even start studying some books;
3) Getting fit. Most likely I will go to the gym and will be jogging a lot
.

So, that is it for today! My next post will be this Saturday (23rd of April). Have a good day (or night)! Good luck!

Edited by opbagration20
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1) B2.1 in German by the end of this summer and B2.2 by the end of this year. So, a lot of German this summer. Main emphasis will be, I guess, on Grammar and Vocabulary. My initial plan was to get B2.2 by the end of the summer, but I decided to be more realistic in assessment of my learning skills. Maybe I will write one of the posts here in German just for fun, once I hit that milestone;
 

I can tell you then if you make mistakes :P

Nice plans by the way. You will own this summer!

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23rd of April, 2016
Day 79 (video games)
Day 1 (Internet)


Greatest challenge
So, I will start with some bad news. My Internet detox resulted in a failure. I don't even remember when I relapsed. Was it on Monday, or on Tuesday? It doesn't matter. I have again wasted my entire day watching stupid videos on Youtube, listening to music and reading some news. I also broke my promise not to listen to music during work. Why I emphasise music so much all the time? Because, I have realised that it is one of the greatest procrastination triggers for me. For example, I start listening to some tracks on Youtube (to relax a bit after University), and than I see some interesting video. At first I can resist temptation, but then I go and watch it (mostly because of some tedious. I do it and than I lose control over myself. I can't even count how many days were lost because of this. I guess, I have to make another set of rules for myself:
1) No Youtube. I may use it only for studying purposes (CS50 videos are hosted there). The same rule applies to other video hosting sites.
2) No music on notebook. Another trigger, as I have noticed, is my notebook. I have never wasted more than 2 hours on my smartphone. I guess it is connected with how comfortable it is to watch videos there.
Yes, I am aware that I am making restrictions that are ridiculous. But I judging from what I observe, there is no other way.
I have some good news too: I didn't watch any let's plays or read about politics. No problems with social networks either. I don't play computer games. I also made 600 new cards in Anki this week (it will take about a month to learn them all). I guess, I may call it quite an achievement. But. now it is time to achieve something greater. This time I won't fail.

So, that is it for today! My next post will be next Saturday (30th of April). Have a good day (or night)! Good luck!

 

Edited by opbagration20
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  • 2 months later...

So, hello, guys. I guess it is not difficult to understand that I relapsed. I decided to play a game on day 90 of my detox (wanted to find out if I am addicted or not) and than it just snowballed into old good 7-16 hours a day. Well, at least, this time I was lucky in University, because I worked really hard before relapse and it saved me, so I have straight A marks. But, if I continue gaming, I will just waste this summer and won't achieve anything.
My biggest mistake is that sometimes I am to lazy to update my journal, and I made a decision that from now on I will post every single day during my second detox.
My goals are simple: continue learning German and to finally finish CS50 programming course. I have deleted my League of Legends account and am ready to do my best this time.
Thank you for attention. I will share more info tomorrow, since I am too tired today and need to finally get some sleep.
Have a good day (or night)! Good luck!

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  • 7 months later...

So, I am back. This time I am quitting for good and, hopefully, for the rest of my life. I have some good news: I managed to do a 90 day detox in autumn again and that kinda saved me from many problems, even though I still had problems with procrastination (damn politics). Sadly, I relapsed again and this time around my game addiction became even worse: sometimes I even neglect sleep or studying - something I have never done before. So, it is definitely high time to quit.

As for the last year, it was a failure, kinda (I did not manage to achieve even half of what I planned, since I wasted holidays playing games), But still 180 days without games is a good result. Now it is time for a life without games.

Now, what I am going to do:

1) Stop playing games.

2) Avoid game-related materials like videos, streams abd music (one of the.main reasons why I failed both detoxes)

3) No "let's try and play" on day 90. Together with music it is one of the main pitfalls for me (and not only for me, judging from what people write here)

4) Implement little changes to habits every week. Steadily and without hurry.
For this week it will be quite simple: do homework as early as possible, without postponing. I can do anything except gaming during free time this week.

Thank you for attention! Good luck!

P.S. Damn, my old posts are so cringeworthy, that I can't even read them...

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  • 1 year later...

The Man who Managed to Read the Entirety of Internet

I am back. A lot of stuff changed in my life: I found a well-paid job, started my Master's degree, and decided to learn Italian. As a result, I do not have much time for computer games or procrastination (continue to do both, in fact); one may say that they ceased to be a problem. However, while relatively "safe" and negligible, those habits still poison my life, taking away precious time that can be spent on something productive. For instance, I tend to sacrifice sleep for some stupid political stuff/music/games/let's plays, resting only 5 to 6 hours per day sometimes.

For this reason, I would like to solve all of those problems once and for all. Gaming no longer brings me any pleasure: modern industry lost the last vestiges of creativity. Procrastination/Internet surfing is equally boring: as the title says, I have read the entirety of the Internet. Thus, all that is left is to let go, and finally do something new, something fun. My plan is fairly simple and straightforward: I would like to start a 90-day (and then ad-infinitum) gaming detox and limit the time I waste on the Internet to 20 or 30 minutes per day (1-2 hours on weekends). I will just post some signs here every day (maybe a "+") and maybe some traditional posts from time to time if everything goes well. Don't want to use the forum as an excuse for procrastination. Since I have a hobby now (Italian), I should have no problems with achieving my goals.

Thanks for reading my boring journal! Good luck!

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21 hours ago, Xiryts said:

Good job bro

I did too have some procrastination issues during my final exams what helped me is an app that tracks the time I spend 

online (I used "moment" on IOS) then when I exceed my daily limit I turn off the device and never use it till next day.

P.S Never thought someone could get addicted to politics xDD

Thank you!

As for tracking/blocking programs, I tried every single one of them. None, absolutely none helps. I managed to bug out and break Cold Turkey ten times or so (even asked the developer for help, lol). I guess it is not about programs or anything but just about discipline.

P.S. As for politics, people consider it boring because they perceive it in complete isolation. Once you start seeing all political stuff through the lens of economics and philosophy, it gets much more interesting. Even addicting. It is as if you were blind all your life and then regained vision.

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3 hours ago, Xiryts said:

Oooo I know what you mean something similar happened to me when I studied "real" maths : P

Well, that is one of the best thing to learn in my opinion. The ultimate problem-solving tool. I hope to have an opportunity to learn this subject in the future. You are very luck in this regard if you study maths on a deep level.

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22 hours ago, Xiryts said:

Lol I'm very far from deep level it's just that once during highschool a new maths teacher came and instead of the usual approach "Memorize this" -> "Apply it in exams", he taught us why formulas were true, where did they come from ..et..which made the subject interesting xd 

Oh, well, I see. Nevertheless, you were lucky. Few teachers strive to actually teach the students how to think. The education systems are getting destroyed all over the world, regrettably.

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