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NEW VIDEO: The EASIEST Way to Stop Gaming

My daily walk


James S.

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On 7/5/2019 at 12:58 PM, James S. said:

Finding full time jobs in Arizona is very hard if you don't have a 4 year degree. 

What about Washington state? Do you know Arizona is full of job opportunities - especially one of the most blue-collared apprenticeships - in the nation? Washingtonians are looking for more relevant jobs like the info tech, marketing, and others that my college is training people with skills needed for the more competitive workforce. The career fair takes place in Bellevue next Wednesday thanks to the radio ad that I needed to hear in the past week. I'm going there after school!

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Days 107-114

No gaming problems

I haven't been posting since I been stuck in a cycle. Fell hook line and sinker for The Walking Dead from AMC and I just started up Stranger Things 2. lol

Putting together a play list of angry music. I been itching to hit the gym. Execution has always been the hard part. 

Not much else going on except getting the car in the shop on Monday. 

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Days 115-120

We splurged and I finally got a replacement power supply for my main computer. I installed it and got it working. My PC went down before I quit gaming and sure enough steam was installed. Also my other failed attempts to play Windows games on Linux. Thankfully my guard was up, I wanted to wipe the system clean and start fresh. Testing out Majaro KDE Plasma with it. Trying to see if there is any real benefit to switch over verse keeping Kubuntu. 

I did break away from the TV shows for a few days. Working on a few things around the house. 

Ending up watching a few episodes last night. It is amazing how my mind gets consumed by the TV show. Even my dreams mess with me. I plan to break away tonight and keep it simple tonight.  

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Days 121-126

Seems like gaming is a thing of the past. I get nostalgia every so often, but everything has changed. Like over the 90 day detox has been a shift of how our household works. My wife and I no longer at different computer screens. We are on the couch together pretty much every night. Almost hard to believe I gamed all my life. I don't know if I am on the outside looking in or something. 

Our new situation has it's challenges, but not the ones I started here with. At the same time I don't want to drop my guard too much. All it takes a moment of feeling comfortable and I can fall back into the black hole. 

As for our new challenge we are learning to balance what we watch. To cut off before I get no time to sleep. Unfortunately I can't just quit streaming videos anytime soon. Or at least to I change occupation. I found Google has made a tech support certification program that I can take which is more affordable. Hopefully it can help me get back into computer field. 

One step at a time, one day at a time. 

Edited by James S.
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Days 127-131

Not much has changed. Did some house work and rearranged our living room again. I am sacrificing my desk to give more room for the cats and my wife to do her work outs. 

A long time back we put our money together to get a Nintendo Wii from a pawn shop as a family event. Naturally it didn't work out. My wife wants to get her hands on it and try again to play games that require activity. I was stunned when she suggested it and I was "that is not a bad idea". Then it popped into my head...I can't do that. I can't play video games anymore. I will undo all my hard work. We discussed it and I compromised. She can only use it when I am not at home. I am wondering if I am leaving a time bomb in my living room. 

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Days 132-138

No gaming this week. A few moments in a waking dream where I thought gaming was normal, then I become aware of it and shut it down. 

Car problems got worse and I had to take a day off to resolve it. Heating assembly hose was the problem. The car cooling system doesn't like badly anymore which is a huge pressure off my back. 

I made progress in getting some furniture that is not ours ready to head out of the house. Bought a cheap desk to put a smaller work station together. To give me an alternative to the home theater setup we got. I did some research and experimenting with Linux again. I wanted to set up a server box and my laptop. Question of Ubuntu server vs Centos server. Opted for Centos, but I want to keep all my systems unified with the platform I plan to use. I switched my Kubuntu to Fedora 30 with KDE Plasma. What really won me over is Ubuntu could not solve the Broadcom issue with using the built-in WiFi adapter in my laptop. Fedora solved it on the first trial.

I am going to run this for a few weeks and see if it will work for me or not.  If it works right I will upgrade all my computers with Fedora. 

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Days 139-145

Kinda a scary week. Dealing with some issues at home. At one point I even questioned what was the point of giving up games. Really I been struggling with a lot of frustration with the limits with life. I have a shift bid coming up as well, which will dictate my next 6 months on how my schedule will look like. What I want is totally not available at all. 

I let a lot of my stuff go and I am gearing up to let go of more stuff. I feel like I am trying a social experiment. Who would I become if my gear wasn't available? My computers were not available what would I do with myself? My life situation SCREAMS change is needed, so I am trying to remove the distractions. I want to give up mindless watching TV or surfing the internet for going to the gym or improving my home condition. 

I am mindful in the morning and mindless at night. I need to find a way to be productive in both time frames.

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Days 146-152

Frustration, lots of frustration. Quitting gaming doesn't mean your life is fixed. It is just a stepping stone, or in my situation, it removes the veil to reveal the problems that I been ignoring all my life. Those problems don't get solved right away, they take time, they take seasons. Like I long to be a part of something, but we are stuck in this rut.  My frustrations at times make me want to find something virtual to be a part of. It tries to wear me down into asking why am I holding out. I have to walk away from my computer.

Seasons are changing. The call center I work for has gone thru shift bids last week. My wife and I talked about it, and she came up with a good idea. We are going back to Friday/Saturdays off. We are going to check out churches running Saturday night. There is no way we can screw that up lol My shifts start later, so I am preparing for war. Bed by 1pm and get up by 10am. Enjoy my mornings with my wife before work instead of feeling ripped out of bed in the mornings. 

I feel like I am trying to undo the damage from the past 7-8 years. We picked up bad habits/lifestyles and they have to become undone. I remember a wise lady years ago who got fed up with people coming to her with the same problems year after year. It was funny, but it was really true. "Mature! Mature! Mature!". I feel like I am just as guilty as the people she was saying it to. 

"When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways." -1 Corinthians 13:11 ESV

 

 

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Days 153-159

It was a rough week. I was a big mess come Sunday, and I just focused on putting myself back together. I had a good weekend just sorting myself out. My wife and I got to spend some good quality time in, we have gone to the library, I learned how to set up my applications on Fedora, and we hit the gym hard. I really pushed myself at the gym, sore all over. ?

I am just taking it easy and enjoy my workday. I am trying to take a break from streaming movies and do more reading. Like a breath of fresh air compared to the last few weeks.  The hard part is to stay this way and maintain it thru out this week. 

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Days 160-165

This has been a good week. No problems with gaming. I hit the gym twice and I got a good sweat on. Slowly reading my bible, trying to get about a half to a chapter a day. This is a project long overdue. The last time did this was like 10 years ago. I am already benefiting from my reading. 

Normally I would be home asleep right now, but I am transitioning to my new work schedule this week. I am holding on for dear life and see how I come out on the other side lol

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  • 4 weeks later...

Days 166-187

The transition has been difficult. For a minute it worked the way I planned, then my wife and fell back into our normal routines. This has been a very difficult month so far. Multiple times I was soooo close to falling back into video games. I ended up watching youtube walk thrus of the Halo games. I have no clue how I haven't started gaming again. Things are slowly getting better, taking it one day at a time. We are working to get back into the gym, we are both very overdue for it. I came to this website multiple times, but I couldn't find the strength to update my journal. 

Before my greatest desire was to become a computer technician. At this point I am just focusing on how to be a better administrator of our home. Like I have all these things I know needs getting done, yet I drag my butt and they don't get done. It is an uphill battle, but I gotta do it.

Finding some encouraging music: Only You Can
 

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  • 4 weeks later...

Days 188-215

It seemed like nothing was changing from day to day, week to week. So I took a break from posting here. Multiple occasions I was very close to playing again. I still watch Halo playthrus from time to time. 

I got a new watch, a LetsFit watch. I been using it to monitor my sleep patterns. It feels like it helps me to monitor myself. Going to try to hit the gym after work. My body seriously needs to be worked. Currently working on getting to bed early so I can wake up early. So far the results of sleeping for 10-12 hours, but I am getting better results. 

Car problems are done. I got thru emissions finally and now we are just recovering from that financial burden.  

One day at a time I guess.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Days 216-223

I am coming to a realization. I might not have played a video game in all this time, but just under the surface I am still a gamer. Given the opportunity I would give in. Sometimes when I am extremely bored I watch others play, and it makes me feel better. I start wanting to tweak things and almost talking to the screen. 

On Youtube I been checking out things Halo lore and Extreme details. It blows my mind how insanely detail they describe things about the Halo universe...then it dawns on me. None of it is real, this guy is talking about something that doesn't exist other than fiction content like comics, books, or video games. It messes with me how deep I let my mind go into this fantasy world, and how fake it is. 

I am thinking I am failing at this stop playing video games thing because I never moved on. I never found another life and lived it. I am living in such a bubble, that I don't escape from my fake prison world. I don't know how to escape all this to be honest. I was even thinking about what life would be without the internet, like drop it for a number of months. 

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I'm currently working on taking stock of myself of how I was before gaming and how I am roughly 6 months later. I think it helps me put things into perspective. Do you watch gaming content as much as you played yourself before?

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Hi @James S.

I hear you loud and clear about finding another life and living it.  

I watched this documentary and it changed my perspective about connecting with others and living a simple life. Whenever I think about escaping into virtual reality, I watch this to remind me about a different way of living.  Connecting with other people outside of a video game environment, for example, is something I am working on currently.  I haven't adopted most of the documentary's ideals, but I do like the idea of growing my own produce.  

Anyway, the concept is pretty extreme, and I certainly don't live like a monk.  However, I appreciated his perspective about quality of life.  Take what you you need from the video and see if anything can be applied.  

 

 

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