JohnKeel Posted December 6, 2017 Share Posted December 6, 2017 Hi, my real name is David and I'm a 44 years old, long time Gamer....more on my background in my introduction post. This is my journey letting go of my passion of (excessive) gaming... I started three days ago making my decision to quit gaming after stumbling over the stopgaming subreddit. Right before quitting I still played Stardew Valley until midnight... In the last years I almost never played for extreme lengths like some of you did. So I always told myself that it wasn't really a big problem... But then I decided to be honest with myself and realized, that the only reason that I didn't play for 10 hours a day, was that I simply didn't have the time between a job and caring for two little kids. But most hours that I had alone for myself I played. So on monday morning I deinstalled Steam and all others games, blocked my most viewed gaming sites and decided to detox. Since I already did some short detox breaks of 30 - 60 days over the last years the first days were not that hard. Also the last two days were really packed with work, so that helped too. But even if I had no problem with not gaming these last days, my mind always came back to question my decision to stop gaming forever...It's just that being a gamer became such an integral part of my self image that makes it hard of letting it go. It feels kind of weird, but not bad. As I mentioned in my introduction, the only exception I will probably make in the future, is that I will play some video games together with my kids. Of course I will keep an eye on them to not let them make the same mistakes as me, but I also don't want to demonize games for them. As my extensive gaming was almost only on PC and never on console, I'm positive that I will be able to handle this. But I will never play games alone anymore...Only together with my kids and in moderation. And if I realize that it has a negative impact on me, I will find another way... So what will I do with the free time i gained? Well, at first, I will take better care of my work and our household. But I realized from Cam's Posts and Talks, that I can't just replace gaming with work without setting myself on the quick path to relapse... Therefore I need another passion. I always wanted to learn to code but only ever dablled a bit here and there and quit after a few weeks or even days. I always loathed myself for spending so much time on computers (more than 30 years) without learning any real skills. That's why two hours ago I enrolled on the Harvard CS50 Online Course (Intro to computer science) and I am determined to finish it. About a year ago I already started a similar online course from MIT and really enjoyed it. But I missed the last few weeks of the course because of holidays and never picked it up again...But this time it will be different, because I won't fall back to gaming to keep me occupied... I guess thats enough for today. I will try to post regularly, but perhaps not daily...I will appreciate any feedback and will gladly try to answer any questions.... See you soon! 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cam Adair Posted December 7, 2017 Share Posted December 7, 2017 Good job starting your journal! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now