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Quit for 90 Days? Post here!


wookieshark88

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Congratulations on completing your detox :) Are you going back to playing moderately, or are you done with games forever? I like what you wrote about discovering things outside such as birds singing, these are really beautiful things. I love listening to the birds singing outside my window in the afternoon, birds are generally great as they can be observed through the window and as could not leave the house much due to my allergy, I could watch them through the windows and they inspired many a poem :) Though the thing which helped me to appreciate and rediscover the world outside was the book on creative writing by Barbara Baig and the freewriting and observation exercises she included. Are you interested in creative writing too? I recall that you have a blog?

Thanks! :D I'm going to be moderate gaming as of tomorrow. If things start to fall to the way side im not going to be shy of doing another detox :). As long as im always improving and gaming doesn't interfere with that, then it wont be a problem.

Congrats on reaching 90 days Falky, I'm sure many more will follow :) . 

You gave me actually a good tip with number 1 on your list, right now I'm very busy with internships and school assignments and have like 4-5 big tasks at the same time. I am actually focussing on all those things at the same time and it makes me feel burnt out and having a big mountain to climb. I will try with focussing on 1-2 things, thanks for the tip I guess ;) .

Cheers dude and haha no problem!

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Great job!! Congratulations on your success.  I especially like this part "For the first time in 17 years I started to acknowledge my feelings instead of shutting them away and gaming." One of these days I am going to have to spend time and figure out the quote function.  It is awesome to be on the other side of 90 but don't let slide all your gains and just let them keep on building!

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  • 2 weeks later...

Today I've finished the 90 Day detox. 1st try and no gaming whatsoever. 

I say that less to brag about it and more to acknowledge that gaming isn't what holding me back in life.

I think I may be struggling with depression and anxiety disorders. These things may in fact be what keeps me from moving my life forward. When I try to plan for the future in any sort of meaningful way I get anxious and depressed. Anxious because of all the fears that come with growing up and being an adult, and depressed because I don't believe that I can do it.

I hope to one day find the courage to get help with it so that I can beat it.

But for now I celebrate an accomplishment. I set out to go 90 days without playing videogames and I have done just that.

I've invested more time with friends, learned how to be proactive in certain areas of my life, I've improved my musicianship, I've invested more time to family. These are all pretty positive things that have come from the detox that I will continue doing going forward.

@Cam Adair @Falky @Ironfly @Dannigan @WorkInProgress @hycniejsy @SpiNips

Everyone here has been super great. Thank you guys so much for your help in not only keeping me from gaming but listening to what I had to say as well.

Best of Luck everyone!

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  • 1 month later...

Finished the detox a few days ago. WOHOO! :)

In the time i started working out more seriously and took up music again. That and i finally have some direction in my life again.

But I still have much to do. I have newfound confidence in my ability to actually do things.

Edited by TheJan
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Finished the detox a few days ago. WOHOO! :)

In the time i started working out more seriously and took up music again. That and i finally have some direction in my life again.

But I still have much to do. I have newfound confidence in my ability to actually do things.

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What do you think are the top 5 lessons you learned from the experience?

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Hi everybody,

Today I have completed my 90 days detox! I am very proud of myself!  This is not the first time in my life when I am game free for 3+ months but it feels like the first where a relapse could be avoided at all or delayed for a very long time. Because I had previous relapses I started to question whether I can quit gaming at all and it's just part of me. It turns out I can do it: I broke my 2.5k hours of the dota2 streak (several relapses)! I am thankful to Cam for the community he created and for his weekly youtube videos, it helped a lot. Since it's my not firs t detox (previous were my own endeavors) at the beginning of this I started to think deeply again how to prevent future relapses. Any relapse it usually happens due to two reasons: lack of energy (too tired, too much stress, lack of sleep) and/or lack of big picture. Lack of energy is more important since your body affects your neuron connection and your willpower resource is depleted. This time, I decided to address both of this problem in a very simple scheme.

a. The key is to be happy, to feel better and achieve my big goals. This is correlated for me with happy faces = smiles.

b. To be well rested. This is correlated with meditation (best energy recovery for me so far).

The scheme is these: 

1) Print our the month calendar for current month 

2) Every day after meditation I draw eyes, after game-free day I draw smile => I draw smile face, otherwise, I need to draw unhappy faces (at the end of the day)

3) How it helps: every time you have the urgency to play you understand it violates your big picture of being happy, so you don't play. For me the idea to draw unhappy smile was just unbearable.

4) You can draw different happy faces all the time (reward variability).

This is scheme is consistent with the book "Hooked" (trigger->action (i.e. non-play) -> reward (happy smile, different each time) -> investment (collection of happy faces). In fact, I tried on my wife (for meditation) and my Mom (for physical exercise) and it can be applied for other types of positive form habits.  So, I hope you can use do improve your life after 90 days as well as to prevent relapses. 

Here is my example: 2016-07-10_16.47.28.thumb.jpg.916f8ffc8e 

What my key observation

1) I have found these 3 books most helpful: "Slight Edge", "Hooked" and "Willpower is not enough".  The last one is not from Cam's list but gives  a great perspective on the addiction in general, as well as a recovery process. 

2) Gaming addiction is lasting one, you will never be completely free since neuron's path is carved in your brain and just in "sleep mode". Always, be aware to not to wake it - i.e. by being well-rested and keeping big picture in your mind

3) "Usual" benefit of game-free life (similar to my previous experience) - a lot of energy, much-much calmer, higher willpower, better physical shape and clearness in my head, understanding the importance of big goals and means to them achieve, increased sexual drive and better relationship with loved ones.

4) "Small" decision does matter ("Slight Edge")!

5) I continue my guitar hobby and Toastmaster. I strongly recommend Toastmaster since it a) helps to find you like-minded people b) increase you confidence c) you might have many things to share with - the great environment to do so d) helps in your life and career d) you feel great progress in your speaking abilities after 4-5 speeches.

6) From the book of "resilience", true happiness is tri-color of pleasure, gratitude, and mastery. Every day I am thinking about at least one think what I got pleasure from (physical or intellectual), what I am grateful for and which area I am excelling in.

And again, I am grateful to Cam and hope to see him one day to say it personally (I live in Palo Alto and planning to visit San Diego  by summer of 2017). Keep do what you are doing, I am sure that you are great role model for many of us! I am looking forward how our community makes more and more people not only game-free but a better version of ourselves. Wish all of you find yourselves in real world!

Edited by SAINTRF
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  • 2 weeks later...
  • 1 month later...

Hi, my name is Dominik and I haven't reached the 90 Day goal yet (60 now), but my life has changed so drastically that I feel that I haven't played video games at all.

I'm Czech and now I'm living in a small town in the Czech Republic (Bělotín), but for the most part of my life I was living in Albacete, Spain. In this city my addiction for gaming started as well as my passion for video games. I didn't really play that much only 1 to 2 hours every now and then, but that suddenly changed when one of my friends told me to try out this game called League of Legends. I felt in love with it and quickly became so addicted that I wouldn't go to lunch just to play more rankeds. I found myself playing the game for 7 hours a day and sometimes even more. I was mean to my parents which re-bounced to me so they were mean to me, too (obviously). I had many hobbies aside from League: I was a student at IES Diego de Siloé (I Highschool in Albacete), I did boxing for two years this is the only thing that kept me fit and healthy, I played the electric guitar (for 5 years now), I went out with my friends and all this stuff. But, mainly my day was about playing league and that was what I cared about for all time. I played video games since I was 4 years old so I felt like it wasn't anything bad or something like that.

Then I moved to the Czech Republic again after living almost 10 years in Spain and my addiction only got worse with the time, I wouldn't study, I wouldn't go out, I wouldn't help my parents, I wouldn't do anything aside from league basically. I was so addicted that when I lost a game in league I was so pissed off that I broke one of my laptops with a punch. Then my mind was like "WTF Am I doing with my life?", and that thought got so deep into my mind so whenever I opened league I would start hating on myself deeply. This of course took my mood, dropped it on the floor and then slapped it even lower. This started my desire to quit gaming. I searched the whole Internet for the answer of the question "How to quit gaming?", one of the videos I found was from Cam (Thank you very much YT for showing me that video). I felt the same as he described it in there, I suddenly stopped feeling like I'm the only one and started to feel more Identified with the community of Game Quitters. I was watching every video on how to stay focused, how to change, how to improve, how to make changes stick, in that pursue of my desire to stop gaming I found another person on Youtube (Brendon Burchard) that motivated me. I decided to uninstall league forever and since then have happened 90 Days. I know said 60 earlier, but I relapsed for 3 days which only helped me realize that league was a huge waste of time and it was useless in order for me to change in life.

Now here comes the good part, here are the accomplishments I have done since I have stopped gaming:

  1. Now I find myself playing the guitar 4 hours a day, playing the songs I thought I could never play and learning new things everyday.
  2. This is the most important thing I've accomplished so listen up :D,  I gained the ability to keep improving no matter what, to focus on what really helps me to get to the goals I want, to meditate about what is really meaningful to me and what should be my next step.
  3. Now I help my family with everything I can, I do the dishes all the time 2x everyday or so, I wash my clothes, I mow the grass, I help my grandmother with gardening and everything she wants, I clean the house, I cook, I started loving everything and everyone around me, I started to feel better with myself and the best result I could get: My family started to love me more that I could ever wish them to.
  4. I improved at several skills and learned some new ones. Apart from playing the guitar I have a lot of hobbies. I improved on rollerblading (Now I can do a 360, that is the most awesome thing I have ever learned), I improved at the languages I know : Czech, Spanish, English, French and German, I learned to program in several prog. languages : HTML, CSS, JS, Bootstrap Framework, Python and jQuery Framework (one of the things I now love to most to do in my free time), I keep learning new things of YT and sites like Khan Academy.
  5. And the last one, but not the least one. I have started to feel alive and live my life with joy and love.

Thanks Cam for creating this awesome community and helping so many people. I hope you all enjoyed my story, BYE!!! 

Edited by Dominik Clemente
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  • 1 month later...

Ok, now it is my turn!

i can't believe I was reading this 3 months ago and now I'm eligible to write my own testimonial!

Some random thoughts:

  • The first three weeks felt like three months. Three months without gaming seemed to be three years.
  • There were cravings. There were nightmares. There were bad days. They pass. You stay.
  • The way I saw the entertaintment industry changed completely. I don't blame them if people fall in to vicious cycles. I got to know where I was standing and were I'd like to go.
  • I understood the difference between feeling happy and being happy.
  • Community is important. I read about it for the first time in Napoleon's Hill Think and Grow Rich. Here I experienced it and understood its importance.
  • To be accountable is important. When you put your face out there and say something, you will do everything in your power to keep your word.
  • Things get a bit scary when you stop looking at games and start looking at what's ahead of you. For me it happened that way because I'm changing careers and starting something from scratch again. Feels like I've just graduated from HS, except I'm 30 f***ing 4 years old.

Right now playing games doesn't seem a big deal to me. I think I'm able to play them. But I don't want to. Not until I'm happy enough with what's going on in my life. When that happens, I might play something IF I feel like playing something.

I also can't finish this without sending a big thanks to everyone who's been in this journey with me, especially to Cam, because, well you know why. I want to be part of other people's victories as you all have been part of mine. So, I'm staying around.

Thanks! I'm looking forward to the next post on this thread!

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  • 2 weeks later...

Well, well. Hi all. 

It's been a long journey, longer than many. It took 3 tries and many hardships but now I can proudly declare that 

I've finished the 90 Day Detox

Finally I'm a member of the VIP club, hah. To be honest, I'm not the most applied student of the class, I'm struggling a lot with making good habits (the most basic foundation for a better, empowered life), but here are some reflections:

1. When I first arrived here I couldn't see a way out. I was depressed. I was desperate. I was alone. I was a frightened, hopeless child. Well, now I've reached the level of a teenager at least. I've learned to be self-aware, to reflect on my weaknesses, to stop victimizing and start caring.

2. Journaling, journaling, journaling. I thought it was the finest example of deadbrained teenage girl pastime. Thanks, movies. Keep a journal, people. Things I thought were completely pointless to write seem the most insightful now and I can't understand my experience and journey without them. 

3. I found two passions during my journey and recovered one.

I reconciled with acting, but I'm not sure how our relationship is going to develop. We're trying to get along little by little.

I was brave enough to put myself 3500 km away from home and now I won't be able to stay in the same place for long. I have to thank my therapeutic time here for that.

And of course the third passion is Game Quitters. Translating began as an improvised hobby but I want to make much, much more of it. I want to get involved and have an active role in the expansion and wellbeing of this community, and now I know I'm ready to take the challenge. After all, now that I've learned to eat, shower, clean my clothes and do chores by myself, taking some responsibility is just the next natural step. And the most important thing: I've learned to talk about my abilities without falling into overconfidence or false modesty. Especially the second one.

4. I've learned there is life beyond my mother, my house and the expectations put on me. I might not have formal titulations, I might not have a career, but I'm a healthy, bilingual, optimistic and adventurous young man. I can do anything if I put my heart into it. There is the time and there is the chance. 

5. I've developed a much more positive view on the world, and I hope it was done without becoming naive. There are things wrong in this world, there is bad people, danger, illness and death. But it's alright. I'm coming to terms with my natural boundaries, something a year ago couldn't even dream to do. 

Now I'm not sure what to say, but surely it should be something sugary. Thanks for being there, your support, your honest opinions and criticism. You are wonderful human beings. We share struggles, we share pain, and there is a shared future for all of us. I could never have believed I'd ever say this, and if someone in my place a year ago reads this it will be ok if they don't trust me, but anyway here goes:

If I DID IT, so can YOU!

See ya around space quitters, this is not the end.

Edited by Hitaru
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Screw it, lets do it !!

As for the beginning I'd like to mention I am little tipsy right now but whatever.. I am gonna be honest at least.

I FUCKING DID IT !! 90 DAYS OF NOT GAMING AND NO GAMES-RELATED STUFF (like websites, streams, youtube etc.)

filepicker%2FNjL6whNxTG6wFlVox0Nz_Winnin

This is the first resolution I have completed since a veeeeery long time. Why did I manage to do it? Honestly?

SHAME!
SHAME!
SHAME!
burning back of my scull.....

Being 27 years old, living my with parents, treating job as the minimum to survive and as the mean to continue gaming. Constantly feeling sorry for myself and comparing myself to others. I hit rock bottom. I felt like worthless piece of shit. I saw the close ones getting on with their lives, starting families, getting promoted, moving out, building houses, buying flats, having children, being happy and there was I....going on with the 5th hour on twitch, watching stream, chatting with other addicts (not recognized yet). The shame burnt hole in my head. I said to myself "enough is enough", if I fail this time I might consider my life as lost forever. No shit, as the person interested in psychology I am sure that my depression would reach level of life-death thoughts. Fortunately I managed. Dunno how to be honest and I aint planning to go back to gaming.

What can I say guys?? Straight from the heart, it is damn worth it!!

 In the beginning it's hard, it's even more depressing than it was as you are more clear-headed. You often replace gaming with other time-wasting activities like watching TV-shows/movies to kill that time you used for playing. After a while though it starts to feel better as you prove yourself the will you have. It is meant to be hard. I have played since being 8-9 years old. It's not that easy to get yourself unused to it. It takes the time. It takes shackling yourself to heat radiator.... Ok, *kidding.. but as a metaphor it is kinda true for your mind. You gotta shut your brain off and be committed to your resolution. You gotta see the big picture, feel the bottom or see the better future (both serve as the fuel for your detox).

Wish you all best of luck!!

 

Edited by Marcin Nalborczyk
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  • 3 weeks later...

How would I personally describe the detox with my own words after the 90 days experience? Well... to put it short:

You come back to be yourself.

The world seems crazy around you as soon as you realize how much you numbed yourself with this drug. We are all so much more than we realize and as long as we numb our conciousness with gaming we only paralyze ourselves to the point where we become desperate and don't know what to do.

The value that this program here has is not explainable. The name is more fitting than it firstly seems because after all my experiences I can really say that I have:

Respawn-ed. (So now I'm the RespawnEdOrange ;)).

 

If I would have to point out 5 things that should be considered (due to my experiences from it), it would be:

1. Make a Journal. You probably won't believe it at first but this is some miraclestuff right here. Writing this journal in this forum is something that will change you, but not because people here are telling you how to live your life the right way(which they don't do, there are such great motivators here doing the right stuff), it is because you learn how to talk to yourself. How to listen to yourself. You start to get in touch with yourself and this is a very, if not the most, important lesson to learn during this Journey.

2. Follow the steps of Respawn. Your first days will be filled with all kind of possible physical and psychological Issues and cravings but it sounds probably worse than it is. It is a crazy time in the beginning and you should respect yourself for every day that you can successfully finish during this time and the steps in Respawn are helping you during the beginning. They show you the way how to handle all these crazy things and how to endure them without simply giving up because of the smallest things.

3. You will grow during the process. This whole detox felt so overwhelmingly undoable at some points, so don't give up if you feel like you can't do it, I can assure you: You can. If you need it then seek for the support here, because you will get it and it is simply great in this forum and helps a lot. Tasks that seemed very hard in the beginning will become easy in the end and you will grow stronger in so many ways that you will be able to handle a lot of different situations with your new experience!

4. Don't be too hard on yourself. I'm a great friend of being too hard on myself...of expecting the perfect results from me or seeing them otherwise as a failure and this is the reason why I had some of my problems: because in the end a goal that had no failure is a road with no experience, it has no value. The experiences that you earn during your Journey are the most important thing, so if you do mistakes from time to time then don't worry, just get back on track as soon as possible and keep going!

5. It is never too late. I am now aware of what happened to me during the last years and I think the most can relate to this feeling when you took a moment for yourself during the past and realized that you've lost a couple of years for this addiction of yours that you didn't even really knew about until recently. I felt very insecure about the fact that I simply lost so many years during my addiction and if I'm honest then I am still a little bit insecure about it at the moment because it still affects my life right now but,... you will learn during the detox that there is no reason to be insecure about it. The "ideal way that everyone should go" is just an Illusion. There is no time limit to that tells you that you can't start your life right now. You can start with it anytime.

I guess this would be my core experiences during my detox. It opened my eyes and helped me to quit what destroyed me. Gaming was something to distract me from this thing but the detox did more than just letting me quit Video games: It let me left what pulled me down all those years and made me wanna numb myself so much. I still have to deal with the aftereffects from all this but hell... I'm so happy right now that I could cry tears... Well let me add another point:

6. Don't be a crybaby after 90 days. haha just kidding! Go and enjoy your new life and all the things around you! :)

Thanks Cam for creating this <3

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What have I accomplished during my detox?

 

1. Planned a very thorough and thus more fulfilling trip to Japan because I was willing to spend a lot more time on planning it.

2. Tidied my belongings a lot and have come to embrace an even more minimalist point of view, one that I am still working on.

3. Sold my bike that I have been wanting to get rid of for a while (part of the tidying process but a point that was hard to complete).

4. Worked a lot of overtime and was commended for being the first person in my role in the firm's history to complete all of my year-end projects one month in advance.

5. Bought new clothes and started paying even closer attention to my beauty regimen. :P

6. Started eating all dinners with my boyfriend at the dinner table instead of in front of my computer.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Okay, so I've also crossed the 90 day treshold now - finally I spend time with the cool kids!
My post can be found here. Cam wanted me to add my name here aswell, so I did. My achievement is now being eternalized :D 

Hope more people will join the VIP club - I don't wanna be the newest member! 

Peace.

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