[passing_through]

I was addicted to computer games for a while. I never even really liked gaming, but it was a way to tune out the horrible life at home. Eventually, I kind of trained myself to like games; it's really weird too, thinking back I was the kid who liked long-term gratification over short-term, but eventually gaming changed me.

After I moved out, it was an anchor of sorts and I started playing even more. By this point, my gaming habits definitely matched up with the definition of addiction - at one point, I even went ~2 days without sleeping and eating.

The big change for me was getting a job. I couldn't fuck this up (considering I had already flunked out of university, getting a job in my dream field was a miracle), so I quit computer games. I've "relapsed" a few times since and every single time it has been horrible. It consumes me completely. I have now also decided to basically cut out any easy-to-consume entertainment out of my life. I spend my free time on books, nature and sports.

Looking back, it's the experience of totally fucking up my life through addiction that has helped me beat my addiction.

[superpermutat0r]

I was extremely desparate when I realized I could no longer pay for my World of Warcraft subscription when I was a kid. To the point of trying to scam people to pay for my account, trying credit card number generators and all sorts of silly things.

I would wake up early in the morning, play the game until someone mentioned I should eat, I would eat, then continue playing, until someone mentioned I should eat, I'd continue playing until late at night, go to sleep and continue.

I was extremely addicted and attached to the game. I dreamt about it, I thought about it, fantasized about it.

1 year passed, I started 8th grade and all of a sudden WoW and other computer games were extremely boring. I could play them for about 30 minutes and would just get fed up with any game.

I was like that for years, and just recently I started Super Meat Boy and it had the same addictive fulfilling qualities that I felt when I was a kid, and I could spend hours on it. I completed the game, switched to playing others, but still couldn't get addicted to anything.

I rarely play games now. Max 8 hours total playtime per year.

[r3bl]

> I dreamt about it

I would not believe that this was possible if the same thing didn't happen to me. Also about World of Warcraft. Just once.

The next day I got bored killing creatures on some side quest, a thought came through my mind ("what am I doing with my life?"), and I've never looked back.

[usrusr]

Happened to me all the time. I fondly remember dreaming of an infinite minesweeper plane where I could effortlessly solve pattern after pattern, forever.

That's when I realized that dreams are a mechanism the brain uses to train itself in a best-effort simulation of recent new challenges. Probably for committing new learnings from conscious understanding roughly analogous to symbolic AI to subconscious pattern matching more similar to ML. Months after I remembered those minesweeper dreams, I was able to multitask any though process that did not involve eyes and hands parallel to the game, in fact I solved my fastest boards when my conscious mind was completely distracted from the game. (and it was an addiction, and I've grown or of it)

[hycaria]

Dreams are some mixup of things that happened during the day. No need to read too much into them. I've dreamt of work, people, hobbies including computer games and cherished activities not practised for years at the time of the dream. Dreaming of "stuff that happened", basically.

[Jeff_Brown]

Dreaming of stuff that happened can be useful if you take it seriously. I often visit experiences in sleep which, when they happened, had led me to say to myself, "I should think about that, figure out what I could have done differently, what might have been going through their heads."

Evolution doesn't tend to waste things. As long as some processing is happening, it might as well be put to good use.

[mihaifm]

What kind of games did you play if I may ask?

I'm a casual gamer but at times I do lose grip on reality when playing certain games. I feel like understanding what causes the addictive behavior really helps.

For instance most RPG titles employ the same techniques as gambling, and gaming addiction is often equivalent to gambling addiction. Before getting excited about that item drop, think of it as just pure math (probabilty theory) and that it's nothing special about you finding that item.

Unfortunately this type of gambling in video games has a more severe form these days, with the increasing trend of microtransactions and "loot boxes". These can impact your wallet as opposed to just your time.

[hydrox24]

> I have now also decided to basically cut out any easy-to-consume entertainment out of my life.

I am by no means addicted to easy-to-consume entertainment, but I'm worried that it does impact my ability to focus on boring but important things. Could you share what steps you took, or what process you followed, to cut those forms of media out of your life?

Has doing so reaped benefits besides more time to spend on other things?

[sonnyblarney]

Congrats on your ability to recognize that it was a problem, and then intelligently bust out of it and move on. That's the stuff! Whatever 'that' is that enables us to fight and claw our way through ... I love those gritty people.

[romanovcode]

I have the opposite "problem?". I have PS4 and good gaming computer with lots of cool games but just cannot get into them.

It's really weird to explain but sometimes when I'm alone and have free day I want to play games but at the same the moment I start them I just can't do it for some reason.