Goodbye for now

[scotland171]

I too will wish you luck with whatever hurdles are in front of you.   

[Ozzybear1]

Life comes first plain and simple, and you gotta do what you gotta
do as they say and that I have nothing but total respect for that
and hope everything works out for you and you know all us video
game nuts will still be here to say hello when you return!
Until that time, take care of yourself.

Ozzy

[Herschie1]

[QUOTE=velcrozombie]
Without getting into details, my personal life is a wreck. I've been "circling the
wagons" over the past couple of days. All my video game consoles are sitting
unplugged, and all my Steam games have been temporarily deleted. Now it's
time to dismantle all other distractions, starting with the various websites that
have been time sinks, and this forum is maybe the number one culprit. On top
of that, the writing I have been doing on this forum lately has been half-hearted
and careless, since the fact that I have more important obligations to take care of
is constantly in the back of my mind. There are plenty of games that I would like
to play and talk about on this forum, but now is not the time.
[/QUOTE]

I hear you. I'm taking at least a two-week hiatus from video games. It's just becoming too much, and I finally figured out that I have a video game addiction, at least in the sense as to where they stand with my priorities. Playing games is fine as long as you have everything else squared away, but that's not the case with me. My wife is getting frustrated, I'm having a hard time paying the bills, and everything is just going down the tubes because I would honestly rather play games all night than anything else, including going on Monster.com or something to look for jobs. 

Enough for now. I must get my priorities straight. My health is suffering. Not that I have any serious health problems that I know of, but I'm getting fat, and I'm huffing and puffing going up stairs. I want to have a kid soon, but that's going to be hard when I'm living on the street, or when I croak at 45 (I'm 32 now). Not to mention the drinking that video game playing tends to encourage, although I'm not that big of a drinker. 

I might play again some day. But when I'm unemployed, broke, and out of shape, I need to put the controller down and get to work on my resume. 

[Atarifever1]

[QUOTE=Herschie][QUOTE=velcrozombie]
Without getting into details, my personal life is a wreck. I've been "circling the
wagons" over the past couple of days. All my video game consoles are sitting
unplugged, and all my Steam games have been temporarily deleted. Now it's
time to dismantle all other distractions, starting with the various websites that
have been time sinks, and this forum is maybe the number one culprit. On top
of that, the writing I have been doing on this forum lately has been half-hearted
and careless, since the fact that I have more important obligations to take care of
is constantly in the back of my mind. There are plenty of games that I would like
to play and talk about on this forum, but now is not the time.
[/QUOTE]

I hear you. I'm taking at least a two-week hiatus from video games. It's just becoming too much, and I finally figured out that I have a video game addiction, at least in the sense as to where they stand with my priorities. Playing games is fine as long as you have everything else squared away, but that's not the case with me. My wife is getting frustrated, I'm having a hard time paying the bills, and everything is just going down the tubes because I would honestly rather play games all night than anything else, including going on Monster.com or something to look for jobs. 

Enough for now. I must get my priorities straight. My health is suffering. Not that I have any serious health problems that I know of, but I'm getting fat, and I'm huffing and puffing going up stairs. I want to have a kid soon, but that's going to be hard when I'm living on the street, or when I croak at 45 (I'm 32 now). Not to mention the drinking that video game playing tends to encourage, although I'm not that big of a drinker. 

I might play again some day. But when I'm unemployed, broke, and out of shape, I need to put the controller down and get to work on my resume. [/QUOTE]

Good luck. Life can be pretty rough sometimes, and retreating into escapism can be tempting. I hope you get it all worked out.

As for the job thing, the best advice I ever got on that was from a job finding club my university put off that I was part of years ago: treat finding a job as a full time job. Set goals, set a schedule, and make yourself work those hours. Treat looking for work like it's already a job you're paid for. It takes as much time, energy, and commitment as work, and a thicker skin.

Good luck with it.

[velcrozombie1]

@Herschie

I feel for you, man. I'm not personally where I want to be yet, but I've made some substantial progress in my life over the past couple of months. I still spend too much time on the Internet, though; my time management is going to have to improve if I'm ever going to get to where I really want to be.

The good thing is that you realize you have a problem and you know the steps you need to take to solve it. Of course, it's a whole different thing to reach those goals, but the fear and anxiety that you have of the steps you need to take are worse than the steps themselves. Over and over again I've found that my problems almost seem to solve themselves once I begin to work on them and momentum begins to build; the problem is that's it's so tempting to stop to rest and celebrate once the good things begin to happen, and you must expend a tremendous amount of effort just to get things started again. Luckily, you have someone in your wife who can hopefully provide you with the support you need, and you two have the mutual goal of creating the right environment (in terms of both your financial and physical health) for a child.

I know what it's like to intentionally bury yourself under frivolities in an attempt to avoid your problems: I've spent weeks of 12-hour days on the Internet topped off with gaming sessions that lasted late into the night, interrupted only by eating or going to the bathroom. I had to leave college once after losing a scholarship and nearly had to leave a second time after losing my financial backing and having consecutive semesters where I failed all but one class. Hell, I WOULD be on the street if I weren't for some extremely patient and understanding family members. The only thing I can tell you to do is to hang in there and try to surround yourself with people who can help you and encourage you; the more people you can get in your corner, the better.

[Herschie1]

Thanks, guys. I think what's important is that I actually use these two weeks to do something productive, and not just sit around watching TV while on the internet. Then come June 23rd ,say, "Welp, it's been two weeks!", and then go back to the way things were. Otherwise I might as well be enjoying myself giving into the temptation of playing games. 

Come to think of it, I tried something like this one semester in college. I let some of my more trustworthy buddies pick me clean of my systems until the semester was over. One guy took my 360, PS3, and Vita, another took my Wii and 3DS. And what did all that accomplish? Absolutely nothing, as I merely pulled out my N64, and NES. I got through the semester, albeit not with the grades I would have preferred.

This time it's different. This hiatus includes handhelds, retro systems, PC games, cell phone games, even video game magazines and websites (I'm just here to check on this particular post). Not a trip to Gamestop, and Mariokart night has been replaced with NBA Finals night this week. I'm hoping that with all this, I can start to successfully get my life squared away.

[Vexer1]

I'm a student at my local college right now, and there have been times when i've had to force myself to stop playing games and watching movies/TV shows in order to study for my tests, and this year it paid off quite well as I got very high marks in my most recent class for the semester.

[bronZfonZ1]

I ran into an old classmate at my high school reunion a few years back, and like you, his life revolved around internet surfing, videogames, and waking up at 1 pm everyday.  He ended up enlisting in the Army, and at the time of the reunion he was working for the FBI.

While I think joining the military should be a last resort, there's truly nothing else that would give your life a much-needed kick in the butt like military training can do.

Best of luck to any of your future endeavors.  When you reach your goals and you feel that gaming itch don't hesitate to come back here.

[Herschie1]

I am a weak, weak man. Then again, I did accomplish a lot today, and even have a nice lead on a job.