Sjoti's Journal - 90 days are done. Going for something bigger now

[sjoti]

Hey guys!

I'm Sjoti, a 21-year-old student from the Netherlands. I've realized that if I don't want to be a student forever with a debt that keeps on building that I need to change a lot in my life. This change has been happening for about a year and the realization that gaming was an extremely toxic part of my life I made the decision to quit gaming along with smoking on the 20th of June. Today I am 62 days in. I only started reading on this forum quite recently and I hope that by sharing my story, my experiences, and my methods that someone might get motivated to make the same decision I did or make following through easier. 

I have my own method of planning and it's quite likely that I'm going to use my results from that method as a base for my daily journals. Next to that I'll try to share some of the most important moments that I want to share that occurred in the first 2 months when I get reminded of them within other daily journals. 

I have my own method of planning and it's quite likely that I'm going to use my results from that method as a base for my daily journals. 

Click here to see how my planning works

 

Currently at  Day 90

 

 

Edit on 19-09-2016:

90 days are done. I've realized that I've got a long way to go and that that's totally fine; I also know that on that long road ahead I've got more control on where I end up.

Day 90:

I ended the detox at a festival. Amazing atmosphere, great people and lots and lots of fun. It wasn't planned or anything, but it seems to fit well with how I feel. Now I'm having a bit of a hangover, which is totally fine. 

Anyways, to get back to the 90 days.

There's a lot I've done, I took chances I've never taken before. I've been living a structured life, tried out new things, found out about new passions, started learning new skills. I can list some of these things, however, I'm just going to keep it short because it all comes down to a simple realization which made me improve by a whole lot. 

I learned that I can control my habits and behavior by taking action. This sounds so incredibly simple, so incredibly logical and rational and yet this is the first time I've ever been conscious of it. I can take care of any addiction. I can improve good habits and destroy bad habits. 

There's no chance I'm going back to gaming anytime soon. I'm enjoying my current state of being way too much 

 

Thank you all for letting me share the stories with you guys, and thank you all for sharing stories with me. I'll be most active on discord as always, and I'll be keeping self-improvement up for longer than these 90 days. 90 Days are enough to make a change, but it's only the basis for something bigger. That's what I'm aiming for. 

 

 

 

 Bonus: Me the day I started posting these journals, this was day 62:

 

If you have any questions feel free to ask!

Edited September 18, 2016 by sjoti
Day 90 reached

[Cam Adair]

Welcome dude! Great to have you here on the forum.

[Reno F]

Where were you riding? And what were you riding on?

[sjoti]

Where were you riding? And what were you riding on?

Close to where I live is a pretty damn good trail, it's a quite technical trail with mostly flat areas and short climbs and descends. 

This is my baby, around a half-year-old 29" hardtail: 

 

I removed the back wheel and the chain and now the chain is in a nice bath to become clean again. I took a little extra effort with cleaning since sand got everywhere due to the mud. 

 

Edited August 22, 2016 by sjoti

[sjoti]

Day 63:

The day is not completely over yet , however, I'm pretty sure not much will change from the point that I'm writing this.

I'm noticing a change. I'm taking a different approach to life. Like yesterday I first took care of the stuff I had to do in the morning, as I had planned on my board. It just feels like it's a much more healthy approach. I figure stuff out ahead of time, I take care of the small things right away. I initiate conversations with people, I take the lead when it comes to making appointments. Impulsive ideas are healthy ideas. I went for a 10km run today, I cooked a huge amount of pasta salad that I'm going to eat for lunch or whenever I feel hungry. Cooking that took me about 45 minutes, minutes I would otherwise never spend on cooking. By spending that time today I'll be able to save a lot of time the next week, time that I can spend in productive ways. 

Like yesterday, sometimes things don't go as expected, and like yesterday that is okay. Wasn't able to get my bike clean because I missed some tools. I decided to go right ahead and go to a bike shop; sadly it was closed. Doesn't matter. I took a direct approach to solving a problem. That's what counts, and this small thing can wait till tomorrow (I checked and the shop will be open). 

When I look around me everything is clean and tidy, I feel like I'm thinking a lot more clear and whenever I decide to relax I don't have a single worry as I have taken care of everything. 

Tomorrow I'll be visiting my new school for the first time, and I'm excited. I'm excited for what this year is going to bring and god damn, it feels good.

 

[Cam Adair]

Sweet bike.

[Piotr]

Nice progress. Surely you will achieve even more! Can't wait to hear about it.

[sjoti]

Day 64:

M ostly positive news today, combined with a potentially big negative. Let's start with the positive.

I visited my new school today and had some friends coming over. I was quite excited for going to school, it was a little less exciting than I expected. Even though it was a little less exciting I still gained some information on what I can do to prepare myself in the best way possible. I had a great time with my friends, which resulted in a super pleasant evening, weren't it for that one negative.

On to the negative: I somehow injured my knee. It's been a reoccurring thing for the last decade which will limit my sporting abilities in the short term. I was planning to go for another ride tomorrow but that will not be possible. I just have to wait and see how bad it is. At worst, I won't be able to walk properly for about a week which also means that my outdoor activities will pretty much be impossible. I already took action and I'll be working towards training my knee to prevent these issues starting next week. 

[WorkInProgress]

Did you go to the doctor to check it out? I wouldn't Train blindly without a professional opinion.

[Cam Adair]

Thanks for popping in on the live stream today!

[sjoti]

Did you go to the doctor to check it out? I wouldn't Train blindly without a professional opinion.

I'm going to train with the help of a physical therapist 

Thanks for popping in on the live stream today!

Thank you for giving me some great anwers!

[sjoti]

Day 65:

Today was a bit of a rollercoaster. Good feelings mostly ruled the day while some bad feelings came and went away.

I've talked to my coach with whom I've set up a plan for next year, which feels good to me. A safety net is set because I'm being honest with myself and realise that falling into old habits is something I can prevent, not something that I have to be scared of. Being scared of it will only cause me to put it away which will have as a consequence that when it's there I won't be prepared. Now I already am.

Some moments I just can't really relax and feel guilty even though I have no reason to feel guilty. Some other moments I don't really do as I planned to do which also causes me to feel guilty. I guess I'll have to be actively monitoring my thoughts a bit more and see if I can prevent it or deal with it effectively.

I'm a work in progress. Progress is being made, day by day. Figuring things out and failing is part of that progress, and that's the way I should be approaching more parts of my life.

Thanks for reading!

Edited August 24, 2016 by sjoti

[sjoti]

Day 66:

it has been incredibly hot today. Still tried out mountainbiking, despite the heat and my injury. No regrets. 28km further, I went slow for the first 10 to get a feeling for it and I went crazy with the next 18km.

Had some friends over, watched a lecture and relaxed for a bit. The injury is not as bad as I thought, which means I can still folloe my passion. Fucking love it.

Time to get some new personall records. Expect a better journal tomorrow, there's limited/poorly timed available time today

[sjoti]

Day 67:

Today's experience: Socializing can sure be exhausting.

Again, limited time available for a report today. It's late, I'm tired and I just want to get this over with, to be honest. Friends came over from 3 pm till 1 am. Got out of bed later than planned so I was working like crazy to get different stuff done before 3pm. Managed to get it done just in time so I had about 30 minutes of relaxing. After that, 10 hours of managing them, chatting, being there. It's something I enjoy it but at the same time it just takes a ton of effort for me, it just made me realize that I really enjoy my alone time.

No struggles with my old addictions whatsoever. I just have a lot of cleaning to do tomorrow. 

[Cam Adair]

You're doing great man! Keep it up.

[sjoti]

You're doing great man! Keep it up.

Thanks and will do!

On to...

Day 68:

I decided to take it easy today. Just chill and relax, parents are getting back tonight from a 3.5-week vacation. Today was a reminder that taking care of things early makes the rest of the day just a lot better. I waited too long with being active, which in the end didn't really matter but throughout the day just made me feel guilty. Lesson learned I guess. Next to that lesson I need to keep in mind that there are other activities to do than looking at a screen. 

So yea, not much to say for today. Tomorrow I'm going to plan for next week again. I'm also going to be a bit more active tomorrow, today I had my day off, my time to relax. 

With that in mind, I plan on sharing some extra planning methods tomorrow on this forum. 

Thanks again for reading!

Edited August 27, 2016 by sjoti

[sjoti]

Day 69:

First time posting in the morning. Yesterday was a nice day. Caught up with everyone who was away for holidays, helped around the house and took care of some small stuff. Looks like the house is full again.

Shared some stuff on the forums, read a little bit and tried to fix my mountain bike. I apparently partially broke my rear brake so I took it apart to see if I could fix it. Sadly it looks like that isn't a possibility, however, I did get the chance to look at the inside of it and now I managed to learn quite a bit from that. Tomorrow I'll be visiting the shop and see if I can get some replacements.

I'll be working again starting tomorrow, don't really feel like it yet but eh, I could use the money and the experience. Just a week to go before I can start studying again. Depending on how much I need to work I'll decide if I can make a video and share some thoughts with you guys!

Throughout the whole day, I didn't have a single struggle with gaming. It's smooth sailing!

That was it for day 69. I'll be posting again tonight!

Thanks again for reading!

 

[sjoti]

Day 70:

Days are going by fast now.

I have to make sure I keep everything going. I'm keeping myself in check by using google keep, which is a great tool due to its simplicity and the ability to use it on my PC and phone.  I'm still picking up small projects, I just took apart a computer screen so now it's vertical, tomorrow I should also have a little stand to put it in, all I have to do is wait for some glue to dry up. Also went for another 30km trip on my mountain bike, the weather was nice!

I ordered books, installed Solidworks and downloaded a good tutorial to prepare myself for next week when school starts. This is quite unlike me, and I like the change. 

Anyways. Tomorrow I'll be working again, setting up a plan with what I'm going to do the rest of the week so that'll determine what the rest of the week is going to look like for the most part. 

 

[Mad Pharmacist]

Hey, 21 days left to build a fundament for the live-long building!

Greetings, Mad Pharmacist

[Cam Adair]

I ordered books, installed Solidworks and downloaded a good tutorial to prepare myself for next week when school starts. This is quite unlike me, and I like the change. 

Sweet! You know @JSmith is working on it too right?

[sjoti]

Day 71 and the power of habits:

 

The last few days my reports have been fairly short. They also have just been small descriptions of the days, which is ok but I want to touch on a bit of a deeper subject, the power of habit, and being more conscious about them.

The decision to change forced me to be conscious about my habits. If I wasn’t thinking about it properly I would fall back into old habits. With this change occupying my thoughts for the last 70 days I noticed the habits of others around me more than I used to while being reminded of my own. For the first time in a long long time, I have been aware of the way things go on autopilot and the 70 days have shown me that I can change the direction the autopilot is going in. It can happen consciously like it happened with me and a lot of others on this forum and it can happen subconsciously which I can see in people close to me. Some of them are becoming mature, picking up good habits while others seem to be stuck or maybe even spiraling down into bad habits. They steer their autopilot into a place where they might crash, a point from which it can be hard to get up from. I want to learn how to communicate to them that they can change. I will learn it and do it, and if I continue this path myself I am sure that I will at least get better at it.

I will try to stay conscious of my actions, and keep this steady pace of improvement up. I'm going to use gaming as a starting point for the improved me. There's much to learn and much to gain, and there is no end to it. By adapting to new situations, habits that are either growing or disappearing I can see myself getting over great obstacles and accomplishing awesome things.

 

I plan on touching on these types of topics more often, probably expanding them. 

Thanks again for reading!

 

 

[Cam Adair]

Yep! This journey is a lot more about a shift in your consciousness than anything.

[JSmith]

Good luck with Solidworks

 

[sjoti]

Good luck with Solidworks

 

Thanks, you too man! Haven't really had the chance to really start yet; I'll change that starting tomorrow
Day 73:

Whoops, I skipped day 72. The reason for that was me being busy and heading a bit earlier to bed. 
Anyways, I got my books for next year. I started practicing a bit of calculus again, luckily next year starts with super basic stuff. I need to learn how to sketch, so I'll be doing that every day while recording my progress. Once I notice some decent progression I'll share it with you guys!

I've also been working, today I worked for 8 hours and I'll be diving in my books again. Getting familiar with the stuff I need to study is something I can already take care of now without it taking too much effort so I figured why not do that later at night when I'm a bit more tired. 

I'm seeing more and more that there are so many amazing things to do and that there is so little time. I want to learn how to sketch. I want to build an awesome website, as an example of what I'm capable of when it comes to building a website, with the ultimate purpose of that website serving as my portfolio for anythings else I achieve. I want to be fitter than I've ever been before. I want to play amazing stuff on my piano, maybe create something of my own. I want to know more. Right now the absolute biggest thing holding me back from achieving those things is one simple thing. I want to break a habit of doing nothing. With nothing, I don't mean relaxing. Relaxing is something I need to do. With doing nothing I'm talking about doing things that have no benefit at all, such as browsing reddit before I go to sleep. Watching youtube videos because I don't feel like doing anything. This holds me back, brings me no benefit at all. I don't relax by doing that, I hurt my sleep which is really needed. 

Starting today, no more browsing reddit in bed. This is the moment I browse reddit the most and where stopping the behavior benefits me the most.

Thanks again for reading!

 

 

Edited September 1, 2016 by sjoti

[Cam Adair]

I'm seeing more and more that there are so many amazing things to do and that there is so little time.

Haha yep! Just remember, you have like 50+ years left in your life, so you have more time to do all of those things than you think!