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NEW VIDEO: I Quit MMOs and THIS Happened

Daily Journal


Alex

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Day 14 "New record!"

Two good things about today:

1) I believe 14 days is a (adult) life record for days without playing videogames. Great success.

2) I had a few hours in the car today to think about my life. I spent a good 5-10 minutes focused on answering one question; am I less happy/fulfilled after giving up videogames? The answer surprised me. Having played zero games, no pc, no console, no phone (not even my beloved chess), I realized I felt exactly the same. I felt no difference in happiness or any other emotion. The only difference I could perceive in my general mood was that I was less anxious (probably more attributed to recent meditation schedule). 

I feel that I've developed a new perspective on gaming. While I have been feeling the tug of game cravings, if it never made me happy, why should I waste my time? This is a totally new experience for me. How much more will I change by day 90?

Today I'm grateful for:

1) The ability to forgive

2) Perspective 

3) Believing in myself

4) Thai peanut sauce

 

Goals for tomorrow:

1) Drink 3 liters of water

2) Increase exercise to 40 minutes

3) Reflect on past success for motivation on future goals

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Day 15 "New tricks"

Solid day today. Still can't quite get my exercise routine down when trying to work out at home, so I'll try going to the gym on campus tomorrow. Was triggered earlier today when a friend mentioned a new expansion to an MMO we played a lot of. I'm at the stage where I want to test my boundaries, so I read the patch notes for the expansion. I found that after I learned about the new changes, I was able to say "that's cool", and then put it away. The urge to play went away soon afterwards.  I realize now that it was risky, so I'll try to avoid that type of behavior moving forward.  

Today I'm grateful for:

1) My education

2) Friends that feel like family

3) Uplifting music

4) Home-made meals

Goals for tomorrow:

1) Wake up early- 6:30am

2) Work out first thing in the morning

3) No internet until lunchtime

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Definitely risky, and no real need for it right now. It's a bit of a mindtrick we play on ourselves to "test" how we're doing. There's some merit to it but most of the time I think it's learning more towards self-sabotage. Good to hear you're doing alright though!

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Woke up at 5:30am, out the door by 6:30am, and at the gym from 7-8am. I feel invincible.

Goals for tomorrow:

1) Wake up early- 6:30am

2) Work out first thing in the morning

3) No internet until lunchtime

the second one is win-or-lose the whole day!

Trust me, I'm Mad Pharmacist

This is feeling more and more true. 

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Day 16 "Finding my stride"

Incredible start to the day. Woke up at 5:30am (wha?!?!?) and was working out from 7am till 8am.  Got a hearty breakfast and got straight to work. From 8:30am until 1pm I did about 3 days worth of work. It was awesome. Then after lunch I slowed down a lot, which is typical for me. Gonna try to do the same things tomorrow. I would give almost anything to keep this momentum going.....

Today I'm grateful for:

1) Large fancy gym at school, which is vacant first thing in the morning

2) Being able to walk to most destinations during the work day

3) Ear plugs

4) Jasmine green tea

Goals for tomorrow:

1) 5:30am wake up. Lets see how long I can keep this up

2) practice bassoon for an hour

3) Eat extra vegetables

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Day 17th "Yawning at 8pm"

Woke up again at 5:30am, at work by 7am. I don't think I've ever woken up so early two days in a row. I feel like a totally different person right now. That and finishing all my work by 3pm is also a very strange feeling. I'm so tired at 8:20pm that I can't even think clearly. Weirrrrrrrd. 

Today I'm grateful for:

1) Being tired when the sun goes down. 

2) Meeting deadlines instead of ignoring them

3) The best boss I'll probably have in my entire life

Goals for tomorrow:

1) Wake up at 5:30am again. If I can do this for a week straight I will consider it a life achievement.

2) gym for 1 hr, emphasis on cardio for contrast

3) finish all work by 3pm

4) practice saxophone

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Day 19 "Yin and Yang"

I find that I have to take each day as it comes, without expectations. I will have good days. I will also have bad days. Right now I'm trying to reconcile that the fact that the bad days are unavoidable and unpredictable.  All that said, since I started the 90-day detox my good days are better than ever. The bad days also seem to have improved since the detox started. 

Today I'm grateful for:

!) The good days being really good

2) The bad days being less bad than previously

3) re-discovering my love for music

4) Like-minded individuals to call friends

Goals for tomorrow:

1) Finish out the week strong at work, so that I don't need to work so  much on the weekend

2) Life and long term goal meditation

3) Make plans for the weekend to get outside

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I find that I have to take each day as it comes, without expectations. I will have good days. I will also have bad days. Right now I'm trying to reconcile that the fact that the bad days are unavoidable and unpredictable

This is called "The Work." It's a practice. You won't be good at it over night, but you will improve with it over time. :)

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Day 21 "Slump"

The beginning of the week had great productivity, which fell substantially as the week went on. Not sure what happened. On the plus side,the anxiety hasn't return (yet). I keep falling for the trap of "I can work from home if I really try". No, no I can't, and I've proved this to myself time and time again.  Tomorrow I'll try to stay out of the house and attempt productivity. 

Today I'm grateful for:

1) Quiet spaces

2) being able to cook

Goals for tomorrow:

1) minimum 8 hours out of the house

2) eat vegetarian for a day

3) make stringent plan for the coming work week

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Day 25 "Progress"

Good day today. First thing this morning I half-meditated at a beautiful lake for an hour. During this time, my focus was on new creative outlets for both work and life. I learned a lot about the types of activities that motivate me, and ones that do not. One that came to the forefront was digital illustration, which combines my love for technology with art. Having no experience with software like adobe illustrator, I was promptly started educating myself in a free but nearly equivalent program called Inkscape. This turned out to be very engaging and a ton of fun. Also, a solid career skill. I'm imaging myself moving away from laboratory research and working on digital science illustration, and its very exciting. I haven't been this excited learning new work skills in a long time. Learning new skills in the morning, writing my thesis in the afternoon, and playing some table-top role-playing in the evening with friends made for a fulfilling day.

Today I'm grateful for:

1) Serene environments for introspective thinking

2) Feeling like I have the ability to direct where my career will go

3) The ability and opportunity to learn new skills 

4) Having a stellar accountability partner. Cheers MmmWatermelon. 

Goals for tomorrow:

1) Meet at least 2 new people at social gathering tomorrow night

2) Improve scheduling technique

3) Gym

4) Guitar

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Having no experience with software like adobe illustrator, I was promptly started educating myself in a free but nearly equivalent program called Inkscape. This turned out to be very engaging and a ton of fun.

Great job taking action quickly. That's a major key to success. 

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Day 28 "Without games"

Great day today. Spent 7 hours outdoors swimming/picnicking/hiking with some new graduate students at my school. The social interaction and meeting new people felt very rewarding. When I had some free time this evening, I dove into a new photo-editing project and was excited to do so. As excited as I used to get about gaming. I took a moment to check with myself, and I did not even want to game instead of the photo editing work. This was a very positive feeling of reinforcement that games are should probably be gone for good in my life. 

Today I'm grateful for:

1) meeting like-minded people

2) intellectual conversation

3) being outdoors instead of stuck in front of a screen

Goals for tomorrow:

1) Better balance between work and hobbies (too much hobby time)

2) Cardio!

3) try non-guided meditation

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