Self-development Game

Progress

2008-03-30T18:08:00.001+02:00

During the last days something special happened. Probably the quantity at last started to evolve into quality. The speed of self-development increased. I got rid of internet partly.

Progress

2008-03-08T16:52:00.003+02:00

I feel that the transformation of my character is happening. The change of habits is quite painful though. Still in general I am winning some points everyday, this is the proof that the progress is not halted. The progress is going on everyday.
Getting a good habit is like mounting a hill. When there is a setback you are sliding back to the basement. When you are on top you get in a comfortable zone which is like a basement for another hill. There is always a risk that you will go back to the basement of the first hill. Still this risk is getting smaller everyday. Yes, a good comparison is being an alpinst, getting higher and higher to the top.

Motivation

2008-02-23T10:39:00.003+02:00

I found that another important thing that is keeping the fire of self-improvement is your long term life goal. So I will write at least 10 long term goals or wishes you have on paper and read this list every day to get it in your subconsciousness.
Looking in the past I noticed that most of my wishes and goals where achieved merely because I stated them.
I wonder that the nature started helping me right over after I stated my goal. This goals could be any.
I hierarchy of goals will by like that:
10 life goals
10 goals for the year
some goals for this week
goals for a day
I should always connect my daily goals with global goals. This is where I could get motivation and inspiration. I will try it and share.

Blogging

2008-02-23T10:37:00.004+02:00

I noticed that I did not write in my blog for about a month. The reason was that I had very much of work. Now I will try to find more time for the blog.

Get rid of TV

2008-01-17T17:31:00.000+02:00

I have decided to get rid of TV.
I was shocked to know that average american family is spending about 4 hours every day watching TV.
I have taken away TV set from my flat. So there is no TV anymore.
Benefits:
The benefits are quite similar to the ones I got getting rid from Internet.
So at work I got rid of Internet and at home I got rid of TV.
The time gain is aproximately 4 hours of time every day.
I should spend them for something useful.

Trying to get rid of internet.

2008-01-17T17:22:00.000+02:00

I did not blog for a while. The reason is that I have swithed off my office computer from internet. I can get to internet only from another PC that is in another room. That computer is exposed to all the office so it would be a shame of me to surf.
I have no internet at home.
So I started to struggle with my addiction in quite brutal and straightforward way.
In fact I understand that this is the only way to get rid of internet.
Now I am doing the following:
1. I do not spend any time surfing the net.
2. I prepare all necessary files on my office computer and send all e-mails at once.
3. I do not need to check mail all the time. I do it only once or twice a day.
The benefits:
1. I add about 2-3 hours of my life every day.
2. I feel good, I am not so tired in the end of the day.
3. My head is not overloaded with unnecessary information.
4. I got home much earlier.
5. My work is not suffering any more. I am more concentrated on work.
6. I do not feel guilty and frustrated every day.
Thank you my table. This is the way I can control myself. I hope that at last I found the way how to gain more points on this goal.

No internet

2008-01-03T18:14:00.000+02:00

I am still not successful to struggle with my internet addiction

I try to use 3 ways to struggle with internet addiction:

1. I just try to talk with my stupid unconscious that is willing to surf the net without control. I talk with it as with a stupid baby, laughing at it.

2. Another way to skip internet is to lie to your unconscious saying that you HAVE NO INTERNET. Sometimes it believes!

3. Set a timer in your mobile, say for an hour, try to work solely on one task without interruption.

I got it!

2008-01-03T16:17:00.000+02:00

Good I work! I am doing the same thing: brushing teeth twice for more than 40 days in a row.
Was it difficult. Actually no. It was difficult during the first couple of weeks when I put this goal forward. It was important just not to forget it.
I would rate the difficulty of this task as SIMPLE.
You should just try to not to forget it and remember that you are actually earning easy points on this. Later it will be difficult not to do that because it is just digusting feeling terrible taste in your mouth.
So how to inspire yourself doing it? Easy money. Just do it!
For me the inspiration is coming from the self-development game I am playing.

Brush teeth twice

2008-01-03T15:23:00.000+02:00

Group of tasks
Health
Description of task
Just brush your teeth twice a day: in the morning and in the evening.
Why
In short:
1. Toothbrushing cleans plaque bacteria and sticky foods off of teeth and gums.
2. You wont get cavity and gum diseases.
3. You save hundreeds and thousands dollars in dental work.
4. You save your natural smile.
5. Good oral hygiene also ensures a healthy heart
6. Prevent bad smell out of your mouth, this could even enhance your relationships with people and improve career!

I found some good links about that on the internet:
http://www.kidshealth.org/kid/stay_healthy/body/teeth.html
How
1. Take a spoon, remove mucus from your tongue.
2. Water a brush, put over some good tooth paste (should contain fluorid)
3. Gently brush your teeth all over for about 3 minutes.
4. Floss your teeth.

http://www.ehow.com/how_3063_brush-teeth.html
my rating: 4/5
http://www.tutorials.com/08/0868/0868.asp
my rating: 5/5 (just excellent tutorial!)
http://www.3dmouth.org/1/1_4.cfm
my rating 5/5 (video tutorial!)
Blogs about that
http://mygreenside.wordpress.com/2007/11/16/brush-brush-brush-your-teeth/
very inspirational post on the blog (5/5!).
http://tunisiancc.blogspot.com/2007/11/10-steps-to-brush-you-teeth.html
dry but good post

Goal achieved!

2008-01-01T17:44:00.000+02:00

I noticed today that some modest goal is achieved today. I am cleaning my teeth twice every day.
I have done it for 40 days in a row. Is it my habit now? I would answer yes! I feel better in the evening when my teeth are clean.
But if I will notice that I am not keeping it as my habit I will take this habit from "got it" section of my table and start all over again!
I added a new goal instead of this one:
At least 30 min for professional education every day.

Never tell about your intentions

2008-01-01T17:39:00.000+02:00

To keep score going you should be inspired to fulfill the task.
I would recommend not to declare your goals to other people as they can comment on your actions in some negative way and this could cool your passion to work further.
So never tell about your efforts. Better keep it with yourself.
Many sites and blogs are suggesting to share your intentions with as many people you know as possible. They suppose that these people could support. This is absolutely wrong.
Great things are proceeding in silence!

My internet addiction

2007-12-30T08:28:00.000+02:00

Today I made a short analysis of my table. I understood that some of the goals are still not achieved for a too long time. I would call some of the goals as key goals because they are influencing the success of achieving other goals in my table. Just imagine I achieved max 4 points during the last two months! (it means that I was able not to be addictied for 4 days in row).
I decided to start working hard on one of them: internet addiction.
I understood that I have an internet addiction.
How my internet addiction looks like:
I am surfing the internet for interesting information with no control. This action takes much of my time and creates blur in my mind. I am becoming very unlucky in my life and work. I feel very unhappy and even ill after these internet sessions. These sessions are taking from 2 to 3 hours a day. It does not matter whether I feel good or bad when I start doing it but in the end I feel bad always.

What I will do:
1. I will skip working on other goals until I will achieve at least 15 points on internet addiction. This is important as I should concentrate on this concern.
2. I still need internet for:
a) Writing blog, tracking my progress
b) Sending and receiving e-mails on work
c) Finding some information for work
I will use a very usefull program Pageaddict.com that traces how long time you are spending in the internet.
I will create tags in pageaddict.com for "blog", "e-mail", "work", "undefined". I will try to keep the value of "undefined" as zero. In this case I will have the right to earn a point for that day. Also I will restrict using internet for these tags:
blog- 30 min
work e-mail - 30 min
work - 30 min
undefined - 0 min
I will publish the graph of pageaddict after 2 weeks.
3. I will try to replace my internet addiction with some good addiction. I will think about that.

Addictions

2007-12-27T18:26:00.000+02:00

Addictions are another dimension of our life we should care about.
These are easily obtainable bad habits that are getting support from inside of our subconsciousness.
Here is a list of tasks:
1. No alcohol.
2. No smoking.
3. No internet for entertainment.
4. No TV.
5. No extensive use of p2p programs.
6. No computer and flash games.

Drugs is the addiction that is not included into this list because you will definitely need external help to get saved.
Please add some more.

No alcohol

2007-12-27T08:29:00.000+02:00

Group of tasks
Addiction
Description of task
Do not drink alcohol in any amounts. Do not drink alcohol at all. Do not drink it at parties, celebrations, anytime, anywhere.
Why
There are 2 cases about alcohol.
1. Person is not addicted to alcohol so that he can quit drinking without any outside help, professional counseling, or support group meetings.
2. Person is addicted to alcohol and needs outside help.
To skip even the opportunity of the second case becoming reality for you I would suggest to skip drinking alcohol completely right now.
Luck in the future. People are becoming addicted with no aware about that. Less than 5 percent of alcoholics are what we think of as bums. Most alcoholics are just like the people you know. Anyone can become an alcoholic -- young or old, rich or poor, married or single, employed or out of work.

Health. Alcohol is a poison and in any amounts it influences all parts of the body producing stress for it. Alcohol ages and damages the brain.

Your character. A significant proportion of violent crimes and vandalism among and by youth involve alcohol.

Useful links describing alcohol and its problems:

Truth about alcohol:

http://www.qis.net/~truth/

http://www.lovethetruth.com/truth_about_alcohol.htm

http://www.news-medical.net/?id=14713

What is alcoholism, facts:

http://alcoholism.about.com/od/about/a/alcoholism.htm

I will definetly update the links and replace them with even more convincing.

Please propose your links and ideas.

Partnership!

2007-12-25T19:08:00.000+02:00

My proposal to make the use of this site more interesting:
I write tasks for each aspect of life like I did it for health (just open these links in new tabs).
You can propose your tasks in the comments section in case if I did not cover all necessary tasks.
You can add the following information:
1. Short task name
2. Task description
3. Description about why the task is important, make people inspired to fulfill the task, give some inspiration.
4. Provide some relevant interesting link on the web that impressed you.
5. Provide link to your blog or website.
6. Share your life experience.
If you would like to make the same table and follow the difficult path of self-development the way I propose I could show you how to make this table. I use GoogleDocs. Just send me an e-mail on my address edoiram@gmail.com. If you want to put the table on your website we could exchange links to our websites to follow each others progress.

Than I will put the most suitable task into the main list and make you the author of this task.

Health tasks

2007-12-25T11:34:00.000+02:00

Health tasks:
1. Get up before 6:00
2. Go to bed before 22:00
3. Morning exercise for at least 10 min.
4. Wash teeth twice a day: morning, evening.
5. Wash teeth after each meal.
6. Do not eat after 18:00. You can only drink.
7. Use Mediterranean diet.
8. Eat breakfast in the period 7:00-10:00
9. Eat dinner in the period 11:00-13:00.
10. Warm shower or bath in the evening
11. Cool shower in the morning.
to be continued...

It would be great if you could add some new tasks or comment on the tasks that are mentioned above.
If you would like to propose some new task than you could mention the following: task name, task description (why it is so important), some inspiration link on the web about this task, your own experience. If the task would be new and interesting I will transfer it from comments section to the body text and put you as a task author (together with a link to your site).

Please write your comments

Health

2007-12-25T10:51:00.000+02:00

Health is the most important part of our life.
Health origins in our mind.
Most of our bad traits are correlating with some perceptible illness. I will describe it later in more detail.
Developing new habits and changing the mind will influence health substantially.
Health both signals the problems in our mind and also influences our mind. Therefore it is very important to work hard generating new habits that will prevent the health problems in the future.
I will divide this big topic into many smaller feasible concise tasks to work out. Most of these tasks should be completed daily.
I put health as Nr. 1 because it is probably the easiest part of our game. Also you will be able to see results and this could give you inspiration to develop further.

Advice

2007-12-23T16:57:00.000+02:00

Some important hints to break bad habits:

Choose a "target habit." What is causing you significant pain? (You don't have to start with the most vexing concern.)
Assess the problem. After choosing the target habit, select realistic problem parameters. Break a big problem into manageable, smaller pieces.
Anticipate grieving. Both before you start and during your habit-changing program, don't be surprised if you experience a poignant, if not profound, sense of loss.
Take the plunge. The objective of planning to break a negative habit and to remake it into something positive is not to have everything perfectly figured out before taking the plunge. Jump in.
Seek ongoing support. Teaming with a habit-breaking buddy can make the highs and lows of habit change less overwhelming.
Do it by the numbers. Two numerical principles will help sustain hope and the change effort:
- The 21-Day Principle. Most habits take at least 21 days to form and break.
- The 80:20 Principle. Eighty percent of your results are usually produced by 20 percent of your activities.

Habit categories - our life categories

2007-12-23T13:15:00.000+02:00

I would divide our life into several categories:
A. Health
B. Family
C. Work
D. Education
E. Character
F. Relationships
G. Society
H. Addiction

I hope that this list includes all spheres of our life. You could add some more categories if I missed any.
To make our life balanced we should develop all these dimensions in a balanced way. We should start working on the habits that will support our constant self-development. All these life dimensions should work as team players supporting each other.
The description of all of these categories will follow.

New blog

2007-12-20T11:34:00.000+02:00

Today I will renew my blogging. The concept of blogging will change. I have erased all of my previous posts. I will describe the way I will make my blog shortly.
By the way you could write some suggestions of what would you like to read.

Good-buy internet

2007-06-09T13:12:00.001+03:00

I have decrease the use of internet to 30 minutes per day. And this time is used for work purposes only (mostly for work emails). Now I have vast amount of time to spend for purposeful things like self-improvement.