2nd time quitter, 1st time w/ game quitters

[championeal]

Round 3 - Day 4

Today I had work and I had more energy at work than I've had for a few weeks now. The only thing I've changed is the lack of gaming so that's gotta be it. As far as I can tell, each time back committing to the gaming detox is easier. My first time quitting was hella fucking hard. My second time was pretty hard. This time is hard, but at the same time feels not too hard. The times I'm talking about are the ones where I really took a long break (a month or more). Not the times where I stopped for a day or something like that. I feel like the long breaks are really where our minds have the time and space to change. I'm feeling sure about keeping with it to give myself that opportunity to change and grow.

- Neal

[BooksandTrees]

18 hours ago, championeal said:

This time is hard, but at the same time feels not too hard.

I feel the same way regarding porn. I know it's different than gaming but I still feel like I've gained so much experience from quitting before that I'm in a better spot now to quit for longer.

[championeal]

Round 3 - Day 5

Talked to an old friend on the phone today for over an hour. The conversation reminded me just how much I’ve changed in the past years. This helped me to feel better about where I’m at now.

- Neal

[BooksandTrees]

5 hours ago, championeal said:

Round 3 - Day 5

Talked to an old friend on the phone today for over an hour. The conversation reminded me just how much I’ve changed in the past years. This helped me to feel better about where I’m at now.

- Neal

I've had a lot of these moments over the past 2 or 3 years and it's good to recognize change. Good job being introspective. 

[championeal]

Hello friends, nothing like starting over, again...

Round 4 - Day 2

A quote that resonates with me today:

A Warrior of the Light knows that certain moments repeat themselves.
He often finds himself faced by the same problems and situations, and seeing these difficult situations return, he grows depressed, thinking that he is incapable of making any progress in life.
"I've been through all this before," he says to his heart.
"Yes, you have been through all this before," replies his heart. "But you have never been beyond it."
Then the Warrior realizes that these repeated experiences have but one aim: to teach him what he does not want to learn.

- Warrior of the Light, Paulo Coelho

[championeal]

Round 4 - Day 4

Today, me and my family went for a long hike at a state park. Climbed under the waterfall. Swam in the pond. Just a good day spent outside.

- Neal

[aaditya]

You are strong brother and doing a great job pushing even after you are exhausted.

[championeal]

Hey GameQuitters Friends,

Day 1. It's been awhile. A long while. Not saying that I was game free the whole time, but times were decent. Not great, but I moved, started a new job. Ya know, it's like as long as things are going alright it doesn't get too bad. I didn't feel the need to full detox until today. My mind is cluttered. Almost feels like it's been in a fog during this most recent gaming binge. I'm sure more thoughts will come out over the next days. For now, I have a quote that stands out in my mind. I've recently started watching The Last Dance on Netflix. I'm a Chicago native and while I was not old enough to remember Michael Jordan in his prime, I still have a faint memory of my Dad purchasing me a Repeat 3-Peat shirt. Sometimes the right thing comes back at just the right time to break through the bullshit. And now, to leave you with the quote.

- Neal

"I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed." - Michael Jordan

[BooksandTrees]

On 2/20/2022 at 11:05 PM, championeal said:

Hey GameQuitters Friends,

Day 1. It's been awhile. A long while. Not saying that I was game free the whole time, but times were decent. Not great, but I moved, started a new job. Ya know, it's like as long as things are going alright it doesn't get too bad. I didn't feel the need to full detox until today. My mind is cluttered. Almost feels like it's been in a fog during this most recent gaming binge. I'm sure more thoughts will come out over the next days. For now, I have a quote that stands out in my mind. I've recently started watching The Last Dance on Netflix. I'm a Chicago native and while I was not old enough to remember Michael Jordan in his prime, I still have a faint memory of my Dad purchasing me a Repeat 3-Peat shirt. Sometimes the right thing comes back at just the right time to break through the bullshit. And now, to leave you with the quote.

- Neal

"I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed." - Michael Jordan

Welcome back. Nice to see things are better in general. It's tough having the back and forth with gaming but I think you can look on it as a sign of growth. You've quit before and learned a lot about yourself. What can you learn this time?

[championeal]

On 2/22/2022 at 5:19 AM, BooksandTrees said:

Welcome back. Nice to see things are better in general. It's tough having the back and forth with gaming but I think you can look on it as a sign of growth. You've quit before and learned a lot about yourself. What can you learn this time?

That's a good question. At this point, I can recognize the pattern of how I usually start with single player games, which is fine. Actually, I think if I only played single player or co-op games for the rest of my life I'd be fine. But at some point I convince myself to get back into online multiplayer and that's where the disaster happens. Once again, it starts out alright, but slowly degrades to more and more and more of my time being spent on the game until it's the only thing I'm doing besides working, eating, and sleeping. That is, if I get enough sleep, or even eat anything remotely healthy, or am even slightly focused at work. So, I'm trying not to let myself fall into that same trap. I already find myself thinking about playing some single player games, which again, I think would be okay. But I gotta remind myself where that path leads.

[WildRiftQuitter]

On 2/23/2022 at 9:01 PM, championeal said:

That's a good question. At this point, I can recognize the pattern of how I usually start with single player games, which is fine. Actually, I think if I only played single player or co-op games for the rest of my life I'd be fine. But at some point I convince myself to get back into online multiplayer and that's where the disaster happens. Once again, it starts out alright, but slowly degrades to more and more and more of my time being spent on the game until it's the only thing I'm doing besides working, eating, and sleeping. That is, if I get enough sleep, or even eat anything remotely healthy, or am even slightly focused at work. So, I'm trying not to let myself fall into that same trap. I already find myself thinking about playing some single player games, which again, I think would be okay. But I gotta remind myself where that path leads.

Same is happening to me I have these thoughts of playing some less addictive kind of games but If do I'll be getting bored and return to playing online mobas so for now I'm sticking with chess and bubble witch 3 Saga ( It doesn't provide any sense of stimulation or achievement )

[BooksandTrees]

On 2/23/2022 at 3:01 PM, championeal said:

That's a good question. At this point, I can recognize the pattern of how I usually start with single player games, which is fine. Actually, I think if I only played single player or co-op games for the rest of my life I'd be fine. But at some point I convince myself to get back into online multiplayer and that's where the disaster happens. Once again, it starts out alright, but slowly degrades to more and more and more of my time being spent on the game until it's the only thing I'm doing besides working, eating, and sleeping. That is, if I get enough sleep, or even eat anything remotely healthy, or am even slightly focused at work. So, I'm trying not to let myself fall into that same trap. I already find myself thinking about playing some single player games, which again, I think would be okay. But I gotta remind myself where that path leads.

 

On 2/23/2022 at 4:46 PM, WildRiftQuitter said:

Same is happening to me I have these thoughts of playing some less addictive kind of games but If do I'll be getting bored and return to playing online mobas so for now I'm sticking with chess and bubble witch 3 Saga ( It doesn't provide any sense of stimulation or achievement )

That happens to all of us and I dealt with it for years. I was able to overcome it by not gaming and then realizing if I played the single player one it was satisfying my craving for gaming in general and if I got bored it meant I was good and ready for a new hobby in real life. I think you just have to change the patterns a bit and you'll find success there. 

[WildRiftQuitter]

On 2/24/2022 at 1:02 PM, BooksandTrees said:

 

That happens to all of us and I dealt with it for years. I was able to overcome it by not gaming and then realizing if I played the single player one it was satisfying my craving for gaming in general and if I got bored it meant I was good and ready for a new hobby in real life. I think you just have to change the patterns a bit and you'll find success there. 

Hi, thanks for the reply

I see that your a long term quitter and would like to hear some advice from you on how to make the most out of my detox and get over gamming

I'm still on the beginning of my journey and I feel lost thinking about the future and my cravings are so intense that they exhaust my mind

Thanks by advance

 

[Pochatok]

On 2/23/2022 at 2:01 PM, championeal said:

That's a good question. At this point, I can recognize the pattern of how I usually start with single player games, which is fine. Actually, I think if I only played single player or co-op games for the rest of my life I'd be fine. But at some point I convince myself to get back into online multiplayer and that's where the disaster happens. Once again, it starts out alright, but slowly degrades to more and more and more of my time being spent on the game until it's the only thing I'm doing besides working, eating, and sleeping. That is, if I get enough sleep, or even eat anything remotely healthy, or am even slightly focused at work. So, I'm trying not to let myself fall into that same trap. I already find myself thinking about playing some single player games, which again, I think would be okay. But I gotta remind myself where that path leads.

That's quite interesting! For me,there is a strong disdain for multiplayer games because of how addictive, time-consuming, and often toxic they are. Going back into MMOs would bring me so much stress and anxiety (and sure there are benefits but they're miniscule) that I never even think about it. I'm really not sure how I got to this mindset though- I used to love MMOs and played them almost exclusively. 

Perhaps it's the growing appreciation of single-player game experiences, and learning more about all the problems and issues of the larger game companies, as well as journaling a lot on why MMOs are just bad for me. 

[BooksandTrees]

On 2/25/2022 at 9:14 AM, WildRiftQuitter said:

Hi, thanks for the reply

I see that your a long term quitter and would like to hear some advice from you on how to make the most out of my detox and get over gamming

I'm still on the beginning of my journey and I feel lost thinking about the future and my cravings are so intense that they exhaust my mind

Thanks by advance

 

I'll give a longer response today when I have more time but if you go to the celebrations part of the forum I wrote a piece about being 500 days free and wrote a huge article about it. You might find some answers there before I respond. 

[WildRiftQuitter]

On 2/26/2022 at 1:31 PM, BooksandTrees said:

I'll give a longer response today when I have more time but if you go to the celebrations part of the forum I wrote a piece about being 500 days free and wrote a huge article about it. You might find some answers there before I respond. 

ok thanks

btw could you link your celebration piece, couldn't quite find it

[championeal]

Been a little while since my last post. Overall, things are well and I appreciate @Pochatok,@BooksandTrees, and @WildRiftQuitter for the solidarity here. I'll have to check out the 500 day celebration post in the near future, to keep my motivation up. I share similar thoughts about online multiplayer games generally taking away more than they give. However, I do have a perspective that there is potential value in single player games. Over the past months, I've been in a phase of transition, leaving a job and just working part-time while I figure out what to do next. Generally, I've been interested in computer programming and specifically game development for a long time. However, simply playing the online games themselves always took priority. In the coming months, I'm taking a route that might be called risky by spending time learning about game development in Unreal Engine. So far, it has given me a good goal to focus on, and helping to reshape how I view gaming in my life. I have absolutely no desire to develop the clickbait addicting games, but instead be a force for good in the gaming world, focusing on bringing games that add value to someone's life. I'm unsure at this time exactly what that will mean for the future, but so far it feels right.

- Neal

[Pochatok]

On 3/11/2022 at 10:38 AM, championeal said:

'm taking a route that might be called risky by spending time learning about game development in Unreal Engine.

I've been much less invested in playing addictive (usually multiplayer) video games once I've realized what games actually appeal to me and why (whereas before the appeal was how addictive a game is). Isolating video games in terms of what they offer to me in life, making them an "ends" rather than a "means" has been very helpful in overcoming my addiction. 

Since I started learning composition, I've managed to connect with a few awesome people in the industry and it seems like I might end up working on small-scale video games in the future! I've also come to value games as an art form rather than a means of entertainment, and that really made being addicted to them kind of... impossible? I just can't go back to playing games for multiple hours a day because quantity/pleasure is simply not what I seek from gaming. 

Good luck! Keep us posted 🙂