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Posted (edited)

Hi guys,

I noticed how the other journals helped me, so I decided to share my journey as well. I will try to update the first post every day or few days. Please note that I used a fake name.

If you have any questions, want to know more of my story, want to learn from my experience or anything else? Please make a reply and I will answer you! You guys helped me, so I am here to help you too.

Why journaling:  I am making this journal for a couple of reasons. 1. I am now accountable for all my actions to this entire forum - 2. I believe other people can learn from my experience, just as I learned from others on this forum - 3. I want to be able to read my own story, possibly use it later to inspire others.

Background info: I was gaming since the age of 10, and I have been playing world of warcraft for 16 hours a day during my lower schooltime. Later I moved to shooters. When getting good at shooters I became semi-professional and went to and won several competitions and LAN parties. After a few years of that, I got contracted. I was a professional gamer/e-sports player for 1.5 years and made my money by gaming. That contract was terminated September 1st of this year. I am 23 years old now.

After my gaming career: I kept on gaming, but I did not feel fulfilled anymore. Sadly, I really did not know what else to do. I started browsing facebook and 9gag when I wasn't gaming, which was an even worse waste of time. Yesterday I decided to quit both of them. Here begins my journal.

  • Green = possibly useful tip for others
  • Red = Special situation that happened
  • Blue = new milestone

 

October 6th, 2016

Day 1: (TL:TR - made decision to quit after weekend, after 10mins gaming decided to quit on the spot, filled rest of day with leftover work, remembers my dreams for the first time and were related to life becoming a game)

Made the decision to quit gaming in the morning, it was a Friday so after I came home I decided: 'I am going to game so long the entire weekend, that I am definitely wanting to quit on Monday'. So I began gaming when I came home, and after 10 minutes I really did not like what I was doing. I uninstalled all games, all game communications and placed a website blocker to block distracting websites.           -         I filled my time with work that I still had to do (approx 55 hours of work piled up!). I woke up quite a few times during the night, and I remembered my dreams (which never happens). I wasn't gaming in these dreams, but they felt like 'life was turning into a game'.

Day 2: (TL:TR - Didn't know what to do in morning, other journals helped me, started working, completed 11 hours of work in 8 hours, distractions were short, couldn't sleep during the night)

Day 2 has started now, in the morning I was unsure what to do. It was hard to start working because I am in the habit of gaming. This forum and the other journals helped me and I started work now. I also started this journal in the morning and will update tomorrow again. The rest of the day was amazingly productive, I worked trough 11 hours of work in only 8 hours. I had the same amount of distractions as usual, but now they only lasted a few minutes since I could not turn them into gaming or browsing. I said I was going to update tomorrow, but I couldn't sleep and I was thinking about 'gaming through the night'. I decided to get up for 30 minutes and then go to bed later again.

Day 3: (TL:TR - Hard to start working in the morning, only half of the ammount of distractions, 2 minor browsing relapses because had to disable website blocker, managed to compelte all planned tasks, put my gaming PC and laptop for sale, felt fulfilled for the first time and slept well)

In the morning I found it hard to start working on my left behind work, I didn't start gaming or browsing because I banned that. Instead I did nothing at all. This distraction lasted for about 10 minutes, much shorter than the normal 1 hour of gaming that I would distract myself with. The rest of the day was rather productive and the amount of times that I was distracted has halved. I did however wastefully browsed twice for 10 minutes, it happened because I had to turn my website blocker off for one of my tasks. A minor relapse, but nothing that I worry about. I managed to complete all my tasks and in the end I was very productive, I did not have the urge to start gaming after my morning block was gone. I even slipped in some extra unexpected work (putting my gaming PC and laptop for sale, I want to buy a new ultra-book for work only). I had a minor issue while working on a school project, after about 75% of the work I did not feel like coninueing. However, because I was not able to distract myself, I managed to get back onto it and finish my school work. This night I felt fulfilled for the first time in my life, and damn.. that is a good feeling. I fell asleep easily and had a good nights rest.

Day 4: (TL:TR - started working in the morning, was productive most of the day until stuck, slept great due to magnesium supplement, dreamed about life being a game again)

This was the first morning that I started working straight away. And I was productive pretty much until 3/4th of the day. I was stuck on the work and I was unable to complete it due to a lack of skills. So I outsourced the task, but it left me unproductive for the rest of the day. I did manage to sleep very easily that night, it was because I started taking a magnesium supplement again. It works wonders for sleeping and rhythm. My dreams however were again 'like life itself had become a game'. This is becoming a trend now. It are different dreams every day, but the meaning is the same. It is like life is a game, this night I even leveled up.

Day 5: (TL:TR - overslept by 5 hours, cancelled seminar attendence of today, started working directly after waking up, no game cravings, cheated browsing a few times, did not finish all tasks, slept well)

This morning I overslept by 5 hours, it may have been a result of yesterdays unproductiveness. I made the excuse that later today I would have a seminar about inbound marketing and I needed to have slept enough for that. When finally waking up, I did not have enough time anymore for all my tasks and ended up canceling the seminar. I feel bad and horrible about doing this, but I realise I was just not ready to attend seminars again. In the morning however, it was really easy for me to start working again. I think I am getting into this habit while losing the gaming habit in the morning. .I did not have a single craving for gaming all day long. However, I did cheat a few times (total 15 minutes) browsing wastefully. I also didn't manage to complete all my work of the day. I got stuck again during a tasks that went a bit above me for that moment. I need to find something to get over those moments. It feels like that is the onlky thing holding me back right now for success. I slept great this night.

Day 6: (TL:TR - ....

Almost a week in and I slept great last night. I did oversleep again however, but that may just be because I am a naturally 'long sleeper'. I need 10-12 hours of sleep to function properly. I recently changed my diet, and I kind off hope that I can get back to a normal 8 hours of sleep. It was easy to start working this morning, the habit is really forming right now. I also noticed that I kept my house clean without thinking about it. Normally everything was always piling up, but now I just clean up after myself unconsiously. That's a major win for me. I also notice more and more how writing this journal and publicly posting it is doing me HUGE benefits. I would've completely relapsed if I didn't write here. I worked extremely productive the entire day, the only major issue was that the work I expected to be done in 4 hours too me a total of 10 hours. So I had to reschedule my entire piling up list. No problems, I will just do it! This night I had a long phone call with my dad, I went to sleep to late and I couldn't fall asleep that easily. I think it was because I have a timeframe in which I can sleep easily, to early and I can;'t sleep and too late and my body has adapted to staying awake.

Day 7: (TL:TR - ....

IT HAS BEEN A WHOLE WEEK! I overslept this morning as a result of sleeping to late last night, but again I was able to start working easily in the morning. I am getting more and more excited about working, making progress and doing something with my life. I am starting to feel a bit proud. Also, I have a big announcement to make in the next few days! ... updating tonight or tomorrow morning ...

Edited by Yellow
Posted

You need to replace gaming with something else. Easy to say, hard to do! Take it as a test of willpower than can change your life. :)

  • Hitaru pinned this topic
Posted

You need to replace gaming with something else. Easy to say, hard to do! Take it as a test of willpower than can change your life. :)

Absolutely, right now I have a lot of work leftover and after that I am going to pick up the company I started a while ago but couldn't continue due to my bad gaming addiction/habits. In the mean time I need to find a hobby (I really don't know what makes me happy...) and a social life.

I think about either picking up playing piano or starting to paint. I realy dreamed about both of them, but never made the journey to start and practice. I only dreamed about already being a pro.

Posted

It certainly helps many people to find a new hobby. I quit most of my gaming, I still casually play, but I was lucky enough to learn how to control my gaming addiction, rather than stop it totally. If it helps, I am the Linux guy around here, perhaps if you want to learn Linux I'll be here to help.

Posted

today I relapsed, in day 3. It was not a gaming relapse but a browsing relapse. However, it only lasted for 10 minutes twice and it happened because I had to turn off the website blocker for a while for one of my tasks. I decided, for next time, not to disable the website blocker for any reason... even if that means that I cannot complete my task, I will find another way to complete it.

I am sad that I had this minor relapse, but proud that I went trough it and decided on my own that it could not continue. It also made me realise how vulnerable I am when the 'road to distraction' is opened. I hope this will go away with time.

Posted

Hello yellow! Thanks for your sharing and I am sure that your journey can indeed inspire others! I initially only wanted to quit gaming but after reading your journal I realise that meaningless browsing is also a problem. Although I stop gaming, I spend 3~4 hours a day browsing and watching YouTube, leaving the school work behind. I probably should consider stop meaningless browsing.

Painting is really a great habit to develop. I have no interest to other things except drawing and gaming. So drawing really saves me that it lets me to be admitted to an art college. It can also be started without much money. If you haven't drawn before, I suggest you to start with reading The New Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain . You will undestand the principle behind drawing and will be able to draw a realistic self portrait after trying the exercises.

Posted

Thank you for reading and for your support!

I've written your book suggestion down and I will start reading it when it comes available on blinkist, thanks!

Posted

Just a small celebration, last night I fell asleep super easily and I felt fulfilled for the first time in my life.

Feels great, doesn't it? :)

  • Guest unpinned this topic
Posted

@ Piotr I am actually reading 1 book every day trough Blinkist. I love reading non-fiction books a lot :)  fiction however, never really bothered me. But I am also not enjoying movies, series and storyline games (I only played competitive)

 

Also a MAJOR step for me. I sold my gaming PC and so now there is NO WAY back. It will be picked up on sunday.

Posted

I really like the way you organize and update your progress journal! Would you mind, if I organize mine the same as you do? It is fun to read!

  • 2 weeks later...
Posted

Any idea on how you're going to invest this money? 

I used part of the money for a new laptop with massive speed for productivity and the other part went into my business.

I really like the way you organize and update your progress journal! Would you mind, if I organize mine the same as you do? It is fun to read!

Ofcourse you can, just take notice that updating the starting post won't bumb your topic to the top.

---

I haven't replied here for 2 weeks now, I am sorry! I will update very soon again. I didn't read/update or visited because 1. I went on a holiday without internet 2. I didn't have a computer system until today 3. I had exams in university 4. Life has changed very positively and I haven't had a single urge to start gaming again.


Status update coming very soon, but a small update I couldn't keep for myself is the following.
> I decided to start internet fasting, meaning that every sunday I won't connect to the internet and every day I will disconnect entirely for at least 2 hours.
> I decided that I will allow myself to play games on saturday only, hoping to not start the addiction again and keep it under control. Next saturday will be the first time and I will update on how I feel after that and on my progress. (I will also update earlier on the rest)

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