Turn it off

I don’t have Mom nagging at me anymore, back when I was still bummin’ it at home playing Tony Hawk THUG on a Dell Pentium 2 Processor, maxing out million point combos pwning n00bs, for absolutely no reason.

Now. Older, and a dad.

No one is holding my doomscrolling/gaming/binging accountable anymore. Just unlimited, bottomless, content from friends/fam. Chasing 100+ shrines in Zelda TOTK, still going. Chasing Rocket League Diamond 1, since forever. YouTubes Tiny Desk autoplay on, tutorials on painting and watching other people painting, admittingly 100% addicting. Hours. Gone. 

Mom’s nagging, I don’t miss it. But it’s weird that it still rings in my ear as if I still need it. It just comes with a droning low-grade anxiety that doesn’t shake off. Even when I try to just sweep away distractions with all these learned video shorts on tips and tricks to be productive. It’s just much easier to watch other people paint than rather to actually go and paint with my own hands. Who am I? I’m back in the rabbit hole weeeee.

When in doubt. Turn it off. Library time baby:

“Becoming increasingly clear to those who have attempted these types of minor corrections, willpower, tips, and vague resolutions are not sufficient by themselves to tame the ability of new technologies to invade your cognitive landscape–the addictiveness of their design and strength of the cultural pressures supporting them are too strong for an ad hoc approach to succeed.”

Cal Newport – Digital Minimalism