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ceponatia

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On 9/30/2020 at 5:12 AM, Phoenixking said:

Hey man! How've you been?

 

You messed me up, I went to page 3 to find my post assuming that it's been so long since I've posted that it probably got pushed back a bit but since you replied it was still on page 1! ;)

I've been well. Not really into social media much these days and the more philosophy I read the less I get into it lol. I haven't even written on my blog in over a month because I don't want to write something trivial and self-absorbed just to get a dopamine hit and ... that is really all I have ideas for right now. Real writing is hard. It got me thinking though, how many brilliant writers are out there who will be lost to mediocrity because they post a 3 paragraph blog about their favorite place to get pizza instead of sitting down and putting their nose to the grindstone? Maybe none, idk, just a thought. I certainly have better ideas when I stop thinking about things in terms of posts and tweets, though.

So that's why I've not really been here. I do still come and read about once or twice a week but haven't had much drive to post anything. I'd be lying if that meant my life was just 100% productivity 24/7 but I feel like even in my hobbies I'm spending my time better.

Idk my life is just pretty great these days and when things are good I don't have much to talk about because I don't want to sound like I'm humble bragging. Haha

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44 minutes ago, ceponatia said:

You messed me up, I went to page 3 to find my post assuming that it's been so long since I've posted that it probably got pushed back a bit but since you replied it was still on page 1! 😉

I've been well. Not really into social media much these days and the more philosophy I read the less I get into it lol. I haven't even written on my blog in over a month because I don't want to write something trivial and self-absorbed just to get a dopamine hit and ... that is really all I have ideas for right now. Real writing is hard. It got me thinking though, how many brilliant writers are out there who will be lost to mediocrity because they post a 3 paragraph blog about their favorite place to get pizza instead of sitting down and putting their nose to the grindstone? Maybe none, idk, just a thought. I certainly have better ideas when I stop thinking about things in terms of posts and tweets, though.

So that's why I've not really been here. I do still come and read about once or twice a week but haven't had much drive to post anything. I'd be lying if that meant my life was just 100% productivity 24/7 but I feel like even in my hobbies I'm spending my time better.

Idk my life is just pretty great these days and when things are good I don't have much to talk about because I don't want to sound like I'm humble bragging. Haha

Sometimes we just move on. I thought of leaving here at one point but idk. I feel like I have some sort of legacy where I'm helping others and I still find it helpful to write about my general issues. It's up to you. Your life. 

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  • 3 weeks later...

About four years ago, prior to getting sober, I went to college and took a Python class. I did absolutely terrible and ended up dropping the class half way through to spare my GPA (which was not great to begin with). Because of that, I was a bit scared to try again and always felt apprehensive about the looming programming courses in my current University schedule. Now I'm a week into my second programming course and I'm doing so well I'm actually tutoring other students. Being sober is conducive to logic and problem solving, it turns out. I can't even remember why it was so hard before because everything just makes sense now. On top of that, thanks to what little I did learn before, I'm able to solve a lot of the problems in fairly advanced ways compared to what the teacher is expecting and earning a few kudos for my work. I think a big issue was that early programming is taught in the form of math problems and I've always believed myself to be genetically miserable at math (or maths if you wish, lol). Acing a College Algebra course last month definitely boosted my confidence and I also was able to see that even though the programming problems were about solving math problems... they weren't really math problems. Sure, you had to know how to solve them, but the program does all the heavy lifting for you. The challenge of the programming problem is finding the most efficient way to do it (and later when you get into functions it's about how to do it in a way that can be repeated out of context).

So I'm pretty confident these days... at least when it comes to school. There are some issues going on at work stemming from an alcoholic coworker going into her mental health death spiral and trying to drag everyone else down with her. She's been spreading a lot of lies about the rest of our department to both our boss and the HR department (and in turn spreading lies about our boss to the HR department so she looks insane even to them). I've been waiting to leave this department for almost a year now. Initially it was put off by COVID but there's really no reason I'm still here at this point. We have a superficial meeting next week which is basically the supervisor's attempt to point out how insane this employee is because we know she won't actually say anything to our faces. If nothing comes of that I'll use it as an excuse for why I need to leave ASAP. Being the only man in an entire building is rough sometimes. All I want to do is work but women (settle down, not all of them... this is a generalization lol) are so obsessed with gossip and drama. I'm sick of being pulled into it just because I'm sitting in the vicinity.

Other than that, I've finally had time to restart my blog. I shuttered it a few months ago because I wanted to get rid of all the cringey stuff I wrote while in early recovery and wanted to start writing more serious articles but could never find the time or inspiration. Now my school schedule is a bit slower because I'm able to complete the whole week's coursework in one day so the rest of the week I can spend on my Statistics class and whatever hobbies I am into this week.

I picked up another synthesizer on sale (Modal Electronics Skulpt) which is pretty sweet so far... way better than the Volca I got last year (or earlier this year... time has lost all meaning). Aphex Twin (nerdy techno fans will recognize the name) sponsored a rerelease of the Novation Bass Station and I pre-ordered it immediately upon receiving the email, lol. I've always wanted one to begin with because it's pretty much the synth behind every 90s / early 00s Drum & Bass bassline. One beefed up by Richard D. James is even better. I haven't really looked into all of the things he added to it but since I've never owned an original it doesn't really matter to me.

I plan on being around more often. Life just got a little crazy for a few weeks. I'll catch up on all your posts over the next day or so. 🙂

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I'm happy to see that uni and hobbies are going well in your case. When I lecture English most of my students are women. Some of them are so talkative that they wouldn't other students speak! But in solo lessons it's great, because they practice a lot and I just correct or help them sometimes. I can imagine the hell at your job when one of them starts sending bad vibes and others just get caught up in it though. Is there a specific reason why there are so many women where you work at or is it just a contingency?

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On 10/24/2020 at 3:17 AM, Ikar said:

Is there a specific reason why there are so many women where you work at or is it just a contingency?

The only way I can answer this is in a long-winded rant otherwise I'll come across as a sexist, lol. I think it's just the nature of governmental clerical work in the USA. It doesn't require any expertise, we have great medical benefits compared to private company jobs, and it's unionized so once you're through your probation period there's virtually zero chance that you'll have to worry about being fired or laid off. You can do very little work and never have to worry about being replaced (which is truly why the government is so dysfunctional and can never get anything done, in my opinion). To the issue of the industry being dominated by women, despite men and women being 100% biologically and mentally equal in every single way (sarcasm apparent I hope) there are many careers in which men without college educations can make a ton of money and those jobs don't appeal to most women. I'm biased; I think people like this are lazy on some level. However my more rational mind recognizes that not everybody is capable of what I am nor have they had as cushioned of a fall as I have.

Single parenthood is also easier for men to manage because, by and large, men aren't the ones raising the child(ren) most of the month. Child support payments certainly are devastating to a man with low income but I'm the kind of person who finds it difficult to feel sorry for someone who put themselves in their situation. That said, paying a monthly fee and only having to watch your kids every other weekend is a lot easier to manage with a career than having kids 5-6 days a week (and usually on the work days). I work in child support so I'm a bit more aware of the reality of the situation than a lot of the people who talk about how unfair the system is to men. Although all of that sounds like a tangent it was all leading up to me stating that many, many of the women I work with are also single mothers so a job in which they can take time off whenever they need with no questions asked and don't have to worry about getting written up or fired for missing a few days here and there is pretty beneficial to them.

The women here who really bug me are the ones who aren't mothers, have masters degrees, and still settle for a $40k a year job just because doing anything else would require effort. Those are usually the most negative ones because on some level they probably hate themselves, lol. I mean I'm going to college, have career aspirations, and tons of productive hobbies and I still hate myself most days of the week so I can only imagine.

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1 hour ago, ceponatia said:

The only way I can answer this is in a long-winded rant otherwise I'll come across as a sexist, lol. I think it's just the nature of governmental clerical work in the USA. It doesn't require any expertise, we have great medical benefits compared to private company jobs, and it's unionized so once you're through your probation period there's virtually zero chance that you'll have to worry about being fired or laid off. You can do very little work and never have to worry about being replaced (which is truly why the government is so dysfunctional and can never get anything done, in my opinion). To the issue of the industry being dominated by women, despite men and women being 100% biologically and mentally equal in every single way (sarcasm apparent I hope) there are many careers in which men without college educations can make a ton of money and those jobs don't appeal to most women. I'm biased; I think people like this are lazy on some level. However my more rational mind recognizes that not everybody is capable of what I am nor have they had as cushioned of a fall as I have.

I think the government jobs here in CZ are the same; it doesn't matter how much you (don't) do, just show up and get paid for being here with others for 8 hours. I'm unaware when was the last time there were mass across-the-board layoffs of state employees. Maybe the quality is so poor that they don't even need to do it, because the employees eliminate themselves 😄 

I also believe I had quite the cushioned fall. I plan to do my masters on the topic of "Changes in college education - comparison between sexes". Among other things, I want to prove that it's mostly women who aim for easier, less demanding, safer jobs (such as the government ones), because they value safety more than risk on average. The data is already in, but I wanted to wait for the 2021 census.

1 hour ago, ceponatia said:

Single parenthood is also easier for men to manage because, by and large, men aren't the ones raising the child(ren) most of the month. Child support payments certainly are devastating to a man with low income but I'm the kind of person who finds it difficult to feel sorry for someone who put themselves in their situation. That said, paying a monthly fee and only having to watch your kids every other weekend is a lot easier to manage with a career than having kids 5-6 days a week (and usually on the work days). I work in child support so I'm a bit more aware of the reality of the situation than a lot of the people who talk about how unfair the system is to men. Although all of that sounds like a tangent it was all leading up to me stating that many, many of the women I work with are also single mothers so a job in which they can take time off whenever they need with no questions asked and don't have to worry about getting written up or fired for missing a few days here and there is pretty beneficial to them.

I see the point about not feeling sorry for men who pay alimony, I think it's one of the reasons I am borderline paranoid about having sex without knowing the woman properly first. My motto is: "I want to stick my penis into a woman with whom I feel having kids would not be an utter catastrophe."

Of course, I'll likely be as stupid as the woman I am with at that time and there's going to be a lot of insidious flak incoming, but I think at some of it can be alleviated by not trivializing sex.

1 hour ago, ceponatia said:

The women here who really bug me are the ones who aren't mothers, have masters degrees, and still settle for a $40k a year job just because doing anything else would require effort. Those are usually the most negative ones because on some level they probably hate themselves, lol. I mean I'm going to college, have career aspirations, and tons of productive hobbies and I still hate myself most days of the week so I can only imagine.

I think they have a good reason to hate themselves, because they've done nothing yet that would warrant their choice and effectively sold their ambition. Effort is difficult, but everybody can handle being fat, lazy and addicted.

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On 10/29/2020 at 10:18 AM, Ikar said:

(...)

As usual we're on the same page with a lot of things, lol. There's certainly a fine line between holding people accountable for their own decisions (and for solving their problems) and negatively attacking people because of my own bias. I always try to re-examine what I say about situations I commonly run across like child support and gender differences in the workplace to make sure I'm not being too harsh. I do have a bias against women because of my past interactions with them so I try to always be aware of that and push myself past it. It's not logical at all... a lot of the negative situations I've had with women were either completely my fault or due to the rather poor job my parents did at socializing me. Consciously, I don't blame any woman for that, but we rarely (if ever) have control of our subconscious mind. I suppose that's why it's sub-conscious, lol.

"Trivializing sex" is something I've thought about a lot recently. It's one of those things where I have to be mindful that when people call me a misogynist or too conservative for saying that fucking random people isn't a good thing, it's kind of like how I was bullied into being a liberal by friends for so many years. Just because a bunch of people with no impulse control say that something is "freedom" doesn't mean it's actually a good thing. I actually said to a friend recently that I think there is certainly a such thing as too much freedom and he simply replied "wrong. Try again". Lol, ok great point I suppose! It's people like this I am really wary of these days. It certainly lessened him in my eyes and I seek his opinion far less frequently than I used to. I wouldn't mind if he disagreed with me and actually gave me his reasons but to just dismiss me like that is pretty childish... and I'll be honest, hurt pretty badly from a (formerly) good friend.

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It's been about a week since my last update. I actually fell into a brief habit of gaming heavily and finally gathered the awareness to get out of it. "Gaming heavily" is nothing like what it used to be when I was drinking but it's still a distraction which takes time away from better things. I watched one of Jordan Peterson's first lectures after he got out of the hospital and it was very motivational. It's funny because the topic was his 12 Rules for Life book but he always goes so in depth that he just talked about rule 1 for 2 hours. He addressed a few criticisms of the rule rather well which was great to hear because even though I find most of the criticisms of his work to come from people who don't read (not inherently a bad thing; I don't read nearly as much as I'd like people to believe, but if you're going to criticize a book you probably should read it) and who have never listened to a single one of his lectures, there are some genuinely constructive criticisms out there.

I've encountered the idea that it takes 10,000 hours to master something several times lately so I got as superstitious as I get and took it as a message from the universe, lol. I'm starting to log my hours with music activities to try to get as close to that number as possible. If I spent the 1,000 hours I wasted on Skyrim from 2012(?) to 2018 on music I'd probably be a famous composer right now, lol. Those kinds of analogies bother me a bit, of course, because playing games for 1,000 hours and studying / writing music for 1,000 hours aren't even remotely equal activities, but I can still try.

A lot of my problems are still a semi-direct result of Adderall. I feel great because I'm absolutely destroying my programming classes which is a complete 180 from dropping out of the same kinds of classes 3 years ago, but Adderall doesn't care what it makes you sit down and focus on. It could be homework or it could be chatting on Discord about nonsense for 3 hours. In fact I just deleted yet another Reddit account because I was spending way too much time on there again and started going down the rabbit hole of arguing with people about things I neither knew anything about or really even cared about. I need to see if I can do a better job at snapping myself out of it and doing what needs to be done and if I can't then maybe I should stop taking it. That would suck... I haven't developed any kind of dependence on it so I can easily go a day or two without it but to completely stop taking it and potentially go back to being depressed and angry all the time isn't a fantastic prospect. We'll see what happens!

Edited by ceponatia
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On 11/6/2020 at 2:58 PM, ceponatia said:

"Trivializing sex" - too much freedom

I think Willink would put it the way that you get true freedom through discipline. Sure, I can do anything I want and quit it whenever I want. But nobody gets to be good at anything without doing it a couple of times per week.

And maybe I don't get to be a good partner to any woman if I fuck three of them at the same time.

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I'm re-reading 12 Rules for Life. Well, I didn't finish it the first time so I'm re-reading the beginning of 12 Rules for Life and then finishing it. I think I got through 5 rules on my first go before I got burned out on reading. I highlighted and made notes on my first pass so it's interesting to reflect on them several months later. It's also interesting to see other poignant things that I didn't highlight, partially out of fear of just highlighting the entire damn book, and partially because I didn't notice them. I think we tend to skip over a lot of what's written in books and our eyes focus on things that are either outrageous, pertain to our own lives, or more poetic. After highlighting those things and re-reading, I'm noticing the content that's outside of those areas. I wouldn't do this with every book I've ever read; most aren't even worth the effort. It's a good thing to keep in mind though.

Lately I've also seen a lot of men balking online about how there are so many therapeutic and psychiatric resources available online directed toward women but hardly any for men. I used to believe this as well but now I think that it's not true at all. I think that men who are just starting out on their journey of truly trying to better themselves (as opposed to reading self help books and expecting that their lives will improve through divine intervention) aren't yet ready to be receptive to actual advice because... well... they're basically little bitches. Lol. They're still ranting about toxic masculinity and how ________ is a Nazi or something, just to impress the equally broken woman who has no interest in fucking them.

Anyway just my random thoughts for the day. Had a good week. Way ahead in class now. Super pumped about how quickly I've been able to learn Python. Oh I've also spoken to my psychiatrist about feeling so tired every morning, potentially due to Adderall. He prescribed a low dose SSRI to take every morning and it's been a 180 change. I'm social again, I've started reading (obviously from what I wrote above) and actually wrote some music instead of just fiddling with synths like they're toys.

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  • 4 weeks later...

"Always tell the truth, or at least don't lie."

I've been revisiting this one a lot over the past couple of days. Trying to really figure out what not lying would mean in my own life. I don't outright lie... at least not nearly as much as I did when I was a drunk. I do still occasionally say things when I don't know if they're true. That's going to be my focus for the time being. I haven't been present on much social media which includes this forum and my blog. I'm rather against airing dirty laundry in public these days. It seems to be too close to virtue signaling to me in that when people virtue signal they're telling the world how great and compassionate they are in order to get praise while with stuff like mental health blogs, people talk about how depressed and lonely they are in order to get sympathy. None of it is genuine. I do feel a connection with some of the people here, though, so I keep occasionally coming back to read what they've written and to post an update for anyone who is curious.

I haven't given up gaming. I've even been doing it more than I should. For many months I was pretty moderate with it. It hasn't negatively affected my school or work routines so I haven't had much of an incentive to quit, especially during lockdown and now winter. I have far too much experience with addiction to lie to you and say I'm going to try to "cut back" because cutting back is a useless exercise. I need to quit 100%. It's hard, though, because right now all of my friends are gaming friends and, like most of you have said, if I didn't play games we would no longer be friends. In that sense, they truly are not friends. But some companionship is better than none. Much of my life has been filled with these conditional friends. Women who talk to me because I make them feel what their boyfriends can't, gamer friends who talk to me because I'm funny on Discord and have a lot of "gaming experience". My best friend in my 20's was an actual sociopath who used me as his entertainment but I was too drunk to notice. On the bright side I wasn't one of the many women he raped.

So I've decided that the best thing to focus on, as a theme possibly for the new year, is to try and be the man I want to be instead of lying about the man I am. One of those views is moving toward something while the other is hiding from the truth. We'll see how that goes.

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I think I'm having my mid-life crisis, lol. It just really hit me the other day that I'm almost 40 and I'm so far behind all of the people my age that I look up to. I know people say not to think like that but it is true. I used to laugh at the people who lived with their mothers at my age when I was a kid. I suppose the only saving grace is that I'm living here to finish college while working full time and saving money to buy a house rather than because I'm one of those cringey incels who still get an allowance.

Dating life is rough because of the situation I'm in, naturally. What woman wants to date a recovering alcoholic who lives with his mother? A few do, but they're disgusting. Lol. I actually went on a date a couple weeks ago and kept in touch with her for a while but ultimately decided it would just be kinder if I didn't waste her time as I didn't see myself in any kind of real relationship with her. She was super judgmental and extremely liberal which at 40 years old is fairly unattractive. Don't get me wrong, I'm a liberal too (although I'm much more conservative than many others) but she told me that me owning a truck offended her and that she once broke up with a guy because he said he didn't like Hillary Clinton. Jesus. Well good luck with that.

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Not as far along as you, but I feel the same some days. It's easy to get wrapped up in those feelings. A couple of mistakes and a couple of bad deals, and here we are with a bad situation.

I've tried to take more solace recently in comparison to my old self rather than comparing to others. Yeah, I still have my goals and I still have my own problems I want to overcome, but I think I've driven myself crazy enough with trying to be perfect. When I look back on where I was 5 years ago--terrible social skills, no friends, living at home with parents working in a pizzeria--and now--average to even above average social skills, organizing events with friends and acquaintances, have my own apartment, engineer--I feel a little bit more proud. 

You've gone from alcoholic to recovering alcoholic. As someone who lived with one for years, and watching them go through, and WIN, that struggle, what you are doing is seriously impressive and more massive a change than many people will ever accomplish in their lives. Seriously, I mean that and I'm being 100% honest in saying that's a really impressive accomplishment. You're not going to get there overnight, and there is no linear path upwards, but if you can keep stringing the small wins together, you can get through that mid-life crisis and own the rest of your life like a boss. 

Again, big kudos. 

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8 hours ago, ceponatia said:

I suppose the only saving grace is that I'm living here to finish college while working full time and saving money to buy a house.

I think the main thing here is to remember that people can be broke or saving for something at 20, 40 or 60. The woman you want will stay with you because of the attitude, not because you already have a house. You are working on three big things and some people can't manage even one.

8 hours ago, ceponatia said:

Don't get me wrong, I'm a liberal too (although I'm much more conservative than many others) but she told me that me owning a truck offended her and that she once broke up with a guy because he said he didn't like Hillary Clinton. Jesus. Well good luck with that.

Does she have kids? I believe there are some people that naturally eliminate themselves from the gene pool...

Jokes aside, you are correct that your dating life is the reflection of the rest of your life, but it takes time to take effect. Relax and plan. When do you want to own the house? Do you want to change your job? Take a breath and think about these things. I'm happy I can live at the uni dorms during this time and I hope everybody can find at least a few guys to meet up with during these weird times.

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