8 ms·

Yesterday I had a bit of a talk with myself about my behavior pertaining to procrastination. I am addicted to: - YouTube - Gaming Worse, I have quite a runw

Yesterday I had a bit of a talk with myself about my behavior pertaining to procrastination. I am addicted to: - YouTube - Gaming Worse, I have quite a runway due to low living expenses. I came with a new idea today, I hope it helps anyone else. I need to get good at generating my own feelings. This is why I play games and watch videos. I do it to feel something. In order to do that I need to stay as close as to the activity itself while doing it myself. I came up with the following replacement rules: TouTube —> tell a story to myself. Yesterday I started a story about an alien who is a cat (and I wasn’t thinking about the show Salem even!). This cat/alien has seen humans for 5000 years. Games —> digital product design. Yesterday I imagined how it is to design a newsletter, in terms of aesthetics and UX. I hope this idea might help anyone. I sure haven’t read it anywhere.

john_minsk 7y ago
Interesting, did you just start doing it or has been on it for some time?
- mettamage 7y ago
  Just started so in that sense this idea hasn’t been battle tested. But replacement addictions work quite well with me (eg coca cola —> green tea). So the fact that this is a replacement scheme as well does give the idea some promise for me.
  - CaptArmchair 7y ago
    Hat tip: reddit/r/writingprompts. A poster provides a single line describing a premise and commenters write short stories. It's a great way of getting triggered to be creative. The difference between gaming / youtube is that writing is producing. You're creating something. And that triggers different parts of your brain making you feel like you're accomplishing something. Beware though. Writing short stories can become a procrastination in itself! For instance, instead of doing homework, you write a short story. Managing yourself is also being aware that your mind works at different speeds. Read up on Kahneman's Thinking Fast and Slow to get the idea. The big challenge each of us faces is learning to live with yourself and striking the right balance.
pumpkinsoup 7y ago
> This is why I play games and watch videos. I do it to feel something. I do the same. And it's a real pain, because after playing enough games or reading books everything gets repetitive. I feel sooo bored whenever I play a new game. That's why I wanted to join OSS project, preferably game. It is fun to create stuff that actually works. Well, maybe modding community is the way.
trianglem 7y ago
>to feel something This is a phrase I hear in American discourse a lot. What does it mean?
- hnuser123456 7y ago
  To feel excited, engaged.
- rocqua 7y ago
  At the very least, to prevent boredom. Probably also something like, having an immediate sense of purpose. Or just experiencing strong emotion.
- neuronic 7y ago
  The question is a bit odd if you are human, but let me explain this in short terms. Modern lifestyle has stripped many of us of essential, real problems. By far not all, of course, but definitely the generally well-paid IT crowd on HN. So instead of hustling to survive like a maid in 1929 Berlin (I am watching Babylon Berlin right now) what's left over are luxury problems, especially if you're in the double income no kids crowd. What the Internet calls "first world problems" but even less "important". Just pull yourself together after all, right? (the answer is no, this will of course break you, or anyone, in the long run but that's a huge off the rails discussion). What side project can I have? How can I fill my day with something useful instead of gaming? There is a profound emptiness for some people. The vast majority of jobs aren't as amazing as you are supposed to pretend in interviews. You stop feeling useful and doubt your place in society. Educated, trained but not applied to something that makes sense. Do I have to feel guilty about gaming because I am not productive after 6pm or should I invest time to develop myself because HN tells me to? After spending 8 exhausting hours at my job that lines someone else's pockets? This is where your mental game is played after the "real" problems are not a threat anymore. It's hard for struggling hard working people who bust their asses to pay rent to understand. I know because that's been me. I have seen both sides. Going to bed anxious because some huge bill just arrived. Now I am going to bed thinking: "what am I even here for?" And I actually enjoy my job. But in the end I am doing something shallow, something useless. Not advancing humanity or something.
tarruda 7y ago
> I need to get good at generating my own feelings. This is why I play games and watch videos. I do it to feel something. I'm also videogame addict. I've found that listening to game music/soundtracks (mostly instrumental) while programming really helps me achieve the similar feelings and even motivates me to get stuff done.
- TeMPOraL 7y ago
  Are you listening to music just from games you've played, or game music in general? I do listen a lot to music from games, movies and series for that emotional boost, but it always has to be something I've already played/watched and engaged with emotionally in the past. The music doesn't generate new emotions in me, it pulls on the past experiences. Listening to arbitrary soundtracks wouldn't work on me.
  - tarruda 7y ago
    I also listen to music from games/movies I've never played/seen. Sometimes I do get the emotional boost from music I've never heard before, but most of the times it is from games I played a long time ago. I'm guessing that music plays a large role in the emotions passed when playing games or watching movies.
  - HeWhoLurksLate 7y ago
    Have you heard the album "Sun" before? It's by Thomas Bergersen, and it's quite amazing. I'd recommend Empire of Angels if you just want to listen to one song. Quite ethereal, and though I've never seen the movie, I love the soundtrack.
  - mettamage 7y ago
    Ah yes, I'm heavily into chillstep and liquid dnb. My favorites: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PiLCHmyAgEU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PiLCHmyAgEU -- this dnb year mix is a bit too explosive but a lot of my favorite tracks are in there. Chillstep, no good mixes but I've got some tracks I really like to get you started (if you're into this sort of thing). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W6Hy0G0R3AQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W6Hy0G0R3AQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKKERJpFuvo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKKERJpFuvo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aWeL8bHij08 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aWeL8bHij08 -- he's a professional violinist and chillstep producer (aka the violin is real) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YCXuOvvWLQ8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YCXuOvvWLQ8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcsgA7Laxfg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcsgA7Laxfg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_jcLeUsBa4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_jcLeUsBa4
pdbrito 7y ago
I had a similar conversation with myself recently. In the spirit of sharing coping mechanisms... What I found helpful was to dig deeper into why I enjoyed playing the genres of games that I do. My favourites are MOBA/ARPG/MMORPG and there was quite some overlap in what I was enjoying. Stuff like: - MOBA - Skill based gameplay - You get better over time - You get to play with/against people better than you and learn from them - There exists an optimal strategy for each encounter you can discover - Team based gameplay - Work with others to secure objectives - Win/lose as a team - Sense of camaraderie - Ability to be altruistic - Winning/Losing streaks - Easy to track - Easy to turn into a short-term goal "Win the next game" - Short turnaround time - Games last between 15-30 minutes - Little downtime between games - Very easy to get back "into the action" Now I'm trying to organise my programming activities to give me the same sort of satisfaction: - Programming - Skill based gameplay => Skill based progression - You get better over time - Join a slack/discord and ask questions to learn from others - There exists an optimal strategy for each task you can discover - Team based gameplay => Community - Join a slack/discord - Sense of camaraderie (E.g. "We're all gophers!") - Ability to be altruistic (Help newbies) - Start something//Contribute to open source projects to work with others - Winning/Losing streaks => Commit streaks - Easy to track on github - Easy to turn into a short-term goal "Commit once today" - Short turnaround time => Short coding sessions - Setting a timer for 5/10/15 minutes and following a tutorial - Little downtime between games => Try to minimize distractions - Move straight from one tutorial from another It's been working well for me.
- mettamage 7y ago
  Hmm... What if you'd create like a software "game". Aka, a data structure and algorithm Hacker Rank thingy and then pair up with one other person over voice chat to solve the problem. I like how you're gamifying coding by putting it in the context of what motivates you about games in the first place. I'll look up some JS communities.
- XCSme 7y ago
Brave-Steak 7y ago
I've made a similar realization recently. It seems that I've built a life around consumption. Watching TV series, movies, playing games. I think we're not made for this. There's nothing there to really push us to grow as a person (especially if it's all we do), thus the emptiness (and often loneliness). I've thought about how to restructure my life into one of production instead of consumption, but it's difficult (to find what to produce, and then to get started) and takes so much more effort than passively consuming whatever media teams of people spent weeks/months/years creating.
- mettamage 7y ago
  I agree. I’ve been able to do it one time. And I promoted it on HN with a public facing account (this account is pseudo anonymous + my super hero name, if I’d be one).
  - onefuncman 7y ago
    hi fellow super hero
    - mettamage 7y ago
      Are you in a func? OR DO YOU NEED THE PERFECT FUNCTION?! Worry not! Run to the highest hill in the vicinity And call his name out loud... into the ether of infinity ONEFUNCMAN!!! Whatever func you're in or need. He'll save you. He always does. He's the best, for he is one func man.
- kharak 7y ago
  Good insight, I share your problem. Producing instead of consuming, in my free time, is what I like to do. But nothing seems worth it or I lack the skills and resources to do so. And so I remain where I am. Quit comfortably, all in all, but couldn't it be better?
  - LameRubberDucky 7y ago
    Does it need to be better? There are many quotes about simply being content in life. I finally realized it's okay for me to spend time playing Call of Duty if that's what I want to do. If I wasn't doing that, I'd most likely be doing some other hobby that may not have any particular value either. As long as I take care of my health, family, and job, my "spare" time is mine. Edit: Yuck, that sounds worse when I read it back. I do volunteer and donate to charity as well. I'm not completely selfish.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
ecmascript 7y ago
What helped for the gaming part for me is that I went 100% linux on all my machines. Since very few games work great under linux it solved my issue with gaming too much. I'm still addicted to youtube tho. Haven't really solved that part yet.
- blaser-waffle 7y ago
  > Since very few games work great under linux it solved my issue with gaming too much. A noble approach, but not true: (native Linux) Steam works great -- I've run it on Fedora and Linux Mint -- and plenty of games run flawlessly via WINE or Proton. Brand-spankin-new AAA games sometimes have problems, but the vast majority of gaming works well. For example, my latest addiction is Rimworld, which runs natively on Linux via the native Linux Steam client.
timwaagh 7y ago
i don't think this will work. telling a story is not watching youtube and gaming is not digital product design. the first two are leisure and the other two are toil. sure it might work for two days but i will guarantee you will be experiencing withdrawal symptoms and you will be back to square one after that. you can't just wave a magic want and substitute leisure activity with toil. your mind might want you to, but your body simply won't let you. try watching netflix and reading a book as substitutes. or go rehab by changing your environment to somewhere less digital.

john_minsk 7y ago

Interesting, did you just start doing it or has been on it for some time?

mettamage 7y ago
Just started so in that sense this idea hasn’t been battle tested. But replacement addictions work quite well with me (eg coca cola —> green tea). So the fact that this is a replacement scheme as well does give the idea some promise for me.
- CaptArmchair 7y ago
  Hat tip: reddit/r/writingprompts. A poster provides a single line describing a premise and commenters write short stories. It's a great way of getting triggered to be creative. The difference between gaming / youtube is that writing is producing. You're creating something. And that triggers different parts of your brain making you feel like you're accomplishing something. Beware though. Writing short stories can become a procrastination in itself! For instance, instead of doing homework, you write a short story. Managing yourself is also being aware that your mind works at different speeds. Read up on Kahneman's Thinking Fast and Slow to get the idea. The big challenge each of us faces is learning to live with yourself and striking the right balance.

pumpkinsoup 7y ago

> This is why I play games and watch videos. I do it to feel something. I do the same. And it's a real pain, because after playing enough games or reading books everything gets repetitive. I feel sooo bored whenever I play a new game. That's why I wanted to join OSS project, preferably game. It is fun to create stuff that actually works. Well, maybe modding community is the way.

trianglem 7y ago

>to feel something This is a phrase I hear in American discourse a lot. What does it mean?

hnuser123456 7y ago
To feel excited, engaged.
rocqua 7y ago
At the very least, to prevent boredom. Probably also something like, having an immediate sense of purpose. Or just experiencing strong emotion.
neuronic 7y ago
The question is a bit odd if you are human, but let me explain this in short terms. Modern lifestyle has stripped many of us of essential, real problems. By far not all, of course, but definitely the generally well-paid IT crowd on HN. So instead of hustling to survive like a maid in 1929 Berlin (I am watching Babylon Berlin right now) what's left over are luxury problems, especially if you're in the double income no kids crowd. What the Internet calls "first world problems" but even less "important". Just pull yourself together after all, right? (the answer is no, this will of course break you, or anyone, in the long run but that's a huge off the rails discussion). What side project can I have? How can I fill my day with something useful instead of gaming? There is a profound emptiness for some people. The vast majority of jobs aren't as amazing as you are supposed to pretend in interviews. You stop feeling useful and doubt your place in society. Educated, trained but not applied to something that makes sense. Do I have to feel guilty about gaming because I am not productive after 6pm or should I invest time to develop myself because HN tells me to? After spending 8 exhausting hours at my job that lines someone else's pockets? This is where your mental game is played after the "real" problems are not a threat anymore. It's hard for struggling hard working people who bust their asses to pay rent to understand. I know because that's been me. I have seen both sides. Going to bed anxious because some huge bill just arrived. Now I am going to bed thinking: "what am I even here for?" And I actually enjoy my job. But in the end I am doing something shallow, something useless. Not advancing humanity or something.

tarruda 7y ago

> I need to get good at generating my own feelings. This is why I play games and watch videos. I do it to feel something. I'm also videogame addict. I've found that listening to game music/soundtracks (mostly instrumental) while programming really helps me achieve the similar feelings and even motivates me to get stuff done.

TeMPOraL 7y ago
Are you listening to music just from games you've played, or game music in general? I do listen a lot to music from games, movies and series for that emotional boost, but it always has to be something I've already played/watched and engaged with emotionally in the past. The music doesn't generate new emotions in me, it pulls on the past experiences. Listening to arbitrary soundtracks wouldn't work on me.
- tarruda 7y ago
  I also listen to music from games/movies I've never played/seen. Sometimes I do get the emotional boost from music I've never heard before, but most of the times it is from games I played a long time ago. I'm guessing that music plays a large role in the emotions passed when playing games or watching movies.
- HeWhoLurksLate 7y ago
  Have you heard the album "Sun" before? It's by Thomas Bergersen, and it's quite amazing. I'd recommend Empire of Angels if you just want to listen to one song. Quite ethereal, and though I've never seen the movie, I love the soundtrack.
- mettamage 7y ago
  Ah yes, I'm heavily into chillstep and liquid dnb. My favorites: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PiLCHmyAgEU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PiLCHmyAgEU -- this dnb year mix is a bit too explosive but a lot of my favorite tracks are in there. Chillstep, no good mixes but I've got some tracks I really like to get you started (if you're into this sort of thing). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W6Hy0G0R3AQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W6Hy0G0R3AQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKKERJpFuvo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKKERJpFuvo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aWeL8bHij08 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aWeL8bHij08 -- he's a professional violinist and chillstep producer (aka the violin is real) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YCXuOvvWLQ8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YCXuOvvWLQ8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcsgA7Laxfg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcsgA7Laxfg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_jcLeUsBa4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_jcLeUsBa4

pdbrito 7y ago

I had a similar conversation with myself recently. In the spirit of sharing coping mechanisms... What I found helpful was to dig deeper into why I enjoyed playing the genres of games that I do. My favourites are MOBA/ARPG/MMORPG and there was quite some overlap in what I was enjoying. Stuff like: - MOBA - Skill based gameplay - You get better over time - You get to play with/against people better than you and learn from them - There exists an optimal strategy for each encounter you can discover - Team based gameplay - Work with others to secure objectives - Win/lose as a team - Sense of camaraderie - Ability to be altruistic - Winning/Losing streaks - Easy to track - Easy to turn into a short-term goal "Win the next game" - Short turnaround time - Games last between 15-30 minutes - Little downtime between games - Very easy to get back "into the action" Now I'm trying to organise my programming activities to give me the same sort of satisfaction: - Programming - Skill based gameplay => Skill based progression - You get better over time - Join a slack/discord and ask questions to learn from others - There exists an optimal strategy for each task you can discover - Team based gameplay => Community - Join a slack/discord - Sense of camaraderie (E.g. "We're all gophers!") - Ability to be altruistic (Help newbies) - Start something//Contribute to open source projects to work with others - Winning/Losing streaks => Commit streaks - Easy to track on github - Easy to turn into a short-term goal "Commit once today" - Short turnaround time => Short coding sessions - Setting a timer for 5/10/15 minutes and following a tutorial - Little downtime between games => Try to minimize distractions - Move straight from one tutorial from another It's been working well for me.

mettamage 7y ago
Hmm... What if you'd create like a software "game". Aka, a data structure and algorithm Hacker Rank thingy and then pair up with one other person over voice chat to solve the problem. I like how you're gamifying coding by putting it in the context of what motivates you about games in the first place. I'll look up some JS communities.
XCSme 7y ago

Brave-Steak 7y ago

I've made a similar realization recently. It seems that I've built a life around consumption. Watching TV series, movies, playing games. I think we're not made for this. There's nothing there to really push us to grow as a person (especially if it's all we do), thus the emptiness (and often loneliness). I've thought about how to restructure my life into one of production instead of consumption, but it's difficult (to find what to produce, and then to get started) and takes so much more effort than passively consuming whatever media teams of people spent weeks/months/years creating.

mettamage 7y ago
I agree. I’ve been able to do it one time. And I promoted it on HN with a public facing account (this account is pseudo anonymous + my super hero name, if I’d be one).
- onefuncman 7y ago
  hi fellow super hero
  - mettamage 7y ago
    Are you in a func? OR DO YOU NEED THE PERFECT FUNCTION?! Worry not! Run to the highest hill in the vicinity And call his name out loud... into the ether of infinity ONEFUNCMAN!!! Whatever func you're in or need. He'll save you. He always does. He's the best, for he is one func man.
kharak 7y ago
Good insight, I share your problem. Producing instead of consuming, in my free time, is what I like to do. But nothing seems worth it or I lack the skills and resources to do so. And so I remain where I am. Quit comfortably, all in all, but couldn't it be better?
- LameRubberDucky 7y ago
  Does it need to be better? There are many quotes about simply being content in life. I finally realized it's okay for me to spend time playing Call of Duty if that's what I want to do. If I wasn't doing that, I'd most likely be doing some other hobby that may not have any particular value either. As long as I take care of my health, family, and job, my "spare" time is mine. Edit: Yuck, that sounds worse when I read it back. I do volunteer and donate to charity as well. I'm not completely selfish.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

ecmascript 7y ago

What helped for the gaming part for me is that I went 100% linux on all my machines. Since very few games work great under linux it solved my issue with gaming too much. I'm still addicted to youtube tho. Haven't really solved that part yet.

blaser-waffle 7y ago
> Since very few games work great under linux it solved my issue with gaming too much. A noble approach, but not true: (native Linux) Steam works great -- I've run it on Fedora and Linux Mint -- and plenty of games run flawlessly via WINE or Proton. Brand-spankin-new AAA games sometimes have problems, but the vast majority of gaming works well. For example, my latest addiction is Rimworld, which runs natively on Linux via the native Linux Steam client.

timwaagh 7y ago

i don't think this will work. telling a story is not watching youtube and gaming is not digital product design. the first two are leisure and the other two are toil. sure it might work for two days but i will guarantee you will be experiencing withdrawal symptoms and you will be back to square one after that. you can't just wave a magic want and substitute leisure activity with toil. your mind might want you to, but your body simply won't let you. try watching netflix and reading a book as substitutes. or go rehab by changing your environment to somewhere less digital.