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practical_romantic  2yr ago (text post)   3902 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for October 23, 2022

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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I developed a terrible habit of looking at the IGs of girls I used to talk till early 2021 before I left IG forever. Any opinions or tips or pointers on how I can curb this bad habit. I have removed my study's wifi router and download everything I will need to study so as to reduce my usage. Best internet usage is just saying Hi to a bunch of smart people in places like this one and getting advice you apply in your life. I hate the internet now as low status, low value me can feel good about myself or get some status as a fringe e celeb whereas the only way to lead life is to do important things IRL on a consistent basis.

How do i stop myself from checking the IGs of other girls. I use third party apps often and it is kinda pointless at this point. Life on IG is only a small snippet for what happens to you irl if you are not a total loser or internet addict or both. Checking the IG of my former oneitis does hurt but otoh not being able to get with her caused me enough pain to not use the app again (I deactivated) and start a parallel group of like minded people (something like themotte but on whatsapp or telegram) where I have people who are actually successful in life while also trying to help to the best of their abilities as they genuinely would be happy to see me outdo them

I'll be honest with you here. Sometimes I read your comments and get frustrated.

The class of problems you struggle with can be bunched into the "young guy trying to gain social status" category of problems. And guys will do everything from lifting, to careermaxxing to not using social media to go on a "dopamine detox", etc.

The issue with this is that change along this is made in the span of years/decade not days or months. So reading yet another post of yours where you have yet another problem is irritating because you know it won't be the last one for a long time.

The best thing you can do is to go offline, and come back after you have made significant progress to your life.

Fair point. I did make some changes to my life but they happened slowly. I feel that I have maxxed out whatever advice I could get from this place so should look towards prolonged isolation now as it's hard for me and others to see any meaningful progress on a weekly scale.

I did remove my wifi and will start ensuring that my phone is locked by either my dad or ma to reduce usage.

You don't need prolonged isolation, you're welcome to come and chat with people of course. But I agree with @f3zinker that you probably should just wait and see the effects in your life from the changes you are making, not posting here every week going "here's the latest problem I have, what do". To be perfectly honest, you kind of obsess over your shortcomings (real or perceived) and that isn't necessarily any healthier than ignoring them. The key with many things in life is to try to find a happy medium between the two extremes, and that definitely is the case for self improvement.

Yeah no I get what you mean. It is sane advice, I shall start posting again after new years or some major life event.

ColdTurkey or some equivalent could be useful here. You can program it multiple ways to block something, either based on URL or even by window name

But I'll warn that it's only as good as you are: your Other Self will constantly try to find ways to bypass (and will likely succeed). And the obligation would be on you to block those new roads too. You can't just maintain a static list.

You're probably lucky: I'm using it for porn and...well, there's always more so you're always updating block lists. Instagram probably has limited mirrors for your friends' pictures.

(You might also need something else for your phone, I know I'm still trying to deal with that avenue of temptation).

reminds me of a great video by Luke Smith on porn or internet addiction.

Video 1 - https://youtube.com/watch?v=BsvYEkTzmGQ

Video 2 - https://youtube.com/watch?v=Psl6hQ8hGuc (more specific and better than the first one)

Coldturkey seems good so have installed it. I use third party apps or instagram since I deactivated over 18 months ago for good and will not return till I fix my life to the point where I can use the app but like a normal person, not as an addict. I used it to talk to girls but studying super hard, developing skills in the intellectual areas I care about, working out and other things like approaching girls in nightclubs will do infinitely more than any amount of screen time. If I can get a quant gig in some place like NYC in a few years, I can meet actual models and that is a payoff I would deem worthy.

Porn is hard to quit but you may benefit from getting better at sex, Meditating, meeting more girls and reading books like the sex god method that will help you get better at it.

Pornography is bad, evil, unhealthy and completely immoral. You have to watch higher amounts of it with increasing levels of degenracy to get the same effect as when you first started.

Depends on how you use the internet, but you can block domains in Screen Time on iOS, and password protect Screen Time. Use same suggestion as elsewhere in the replies — use a long, randomized password you keep written down, somewhere, that you won’t remember and would have to go retrieve.

I use third party websites to do this so will block domains. Thanks for the suggestion pal!

Change your Instagram password to something random you cannot remember. Remove the Instagram app if you have it installed on your phone. If you use Instagram on a laptop, change the zoom to be maximized and use your addblocker (you use an addblocker, right?) to block everything on the site.

Edit: You say you use third-party browser apps to access their accounts. Remove those apps now! Use your addblocker to block everything on their page in the appstore. Set zoom on those pages to 500 %. Basically same as above.

All of this can be reversed/circumvented if you really want to, the goal is to make to make it too many clicks to be worth the effort, and to give you time to reconsider.

Yeah. I just cannot get over my oneitis. The only way to get over is to meet more girls and the only way to do that is to study well, have a fixed routine i follow and exercise (+ meditate) so that I can actually move to some place like delhi and work on a remote job.

I will add website blockers on my phone and laptop. It only hurts to see her happy with her boyfriend but otoh life will get better if I spend more time doing things irl instead of having a needy little oneitis. I did way better than someone like me should have on my first night out so it is more of an issue of just doing things more than taking the easy path and being online. You should be able to walk away from every girl on the planet at the blink of an eye, that is true abundance.

I will also ban reddit, twitter etc. Just need momentum, first few days are the hardest.

Do 30 pushups every time you find yourself on insta.

lol, I do not have insta, I just use third party apps on my browsers, I used it today, should I do pushups for that?

edit - did 20 on an incline, my triceps are fried, will do 10 more lol. Good warmup tho, was gonna start working out in the morning tomorrow daily anyway.

edit - based idea. I should do 3 hours of work for every 30 minutes of internet surfing.

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