cross-posted from: https://lemmygrad.ml/post/3190048

I've been languishing in my comfort zone. Continuing to do so will have terrible effects for me. To quote Marx, I "[have] become a monster, a huge mass of flesh and fat, and [am] barely capable of walking any more." Ever since the pandemic started I've become a terminally online antisocial weirdo who barely ever leaves my room, let alone the house.

Of course, in addition to the damage this does to my personal life, it also makes me non - potentially even counter - revolutionary. As someone who wants to be a communist instead of just some internet poisoned middle class dilettante, I don't know how I can be expected to jeopardize the comfort of my parasitic labor aristocratic class position when I can't even get out of my comfort zone enough to go outside, eat real food, and do even the barest minimum of light exercise.

  • macerated_baby_presidents [he/him]
    ·
    6 months ago

    The all-purpose suggestion is to make your "default options" the right choice. E.g. if I only have apples on hand, when I want to idly snack I'll eat the apple instead of going to the store for cookies. You want to expend as little willpower as possible. Habit and routine help a lot but it is difficult to build that quickly.

    Last year I read The Flinch by Julien Smith, which is a shit book you shouldn't read. But it has a good concept: a built-in propensity to flinch away from difficult things that becomes a general reflex. The feeling of not wanting to get into the shower, or not wanting to get out of the shower, or not wanting to get out of bed, etc. Smith says that this is a pretty general pattern of behavior, and if you can practice pushing through the hump in one area it will extend to other areas. Personally I've noticed that my mental state before I get into a cold shower does seem similar to that before I deadlift or do some other difficult thing.

    So in addition to the default options thing, I suggest you schedule one unpleasant but achievable thing in the morning. Maybe a cold shower. Anyone can start there. It can't hurt you, it just sucks. There's no reason to do it other than to prove that you can do hard things. But with that proof you will find it a lot easier to believe that you ARE a revolutionary communist and you can get shit done.

    • macerated_baby_presidents [he/him]
      ·
      6 months ago

      Also last year, I realized that I was spending like 8h a day on my phone and it was affecting my life. I sat down and took some notes and wrote up my theory of why I thought I was doing that, which I will reproduce:

      original notes doc

      goal: reduce compulsive phone use dopamine hit -> compulsive phone use long term, reduce need for dopamine hit

      phone use triggers:

      • boredom
        • do something else dumbass
      • escape from difficult task
        • willpower/discipline

      strategies:

      • make phone use inconvenient.
        • leave it off except for scheduled hours
          • replace some functions with other things
            • bathroom / smart home spotify?
            • wear watches more often
            • paper to-do lists
        • delete social media apps
        • greyscale
      • replace with some other dopamine hit
        • seems bad?
        • replace with good "mode shift" activity?
          • every pomodoro, go put something away / play with cat / walk around block

      Said I was either going to fix this myself, really try, or pay for therapy. After I identified the problem I took a long weekend where my phone was completely off and I tried to "detox" a little and push through it. The specific actions I ended up taking were

      actions
      • Got smart home speakers for kitchen and bathroom. Now I can select and listen to music with my phone in the other room. Temptation much reduced. This has been helpful, but I do have to take my phone into the kitchen to look at recipes sometimes.
      • Keep my phone charging in the bedroom when I'm in my office, and in the office when I'm out of the office.
      • Wear watches more, leave the house without my phone sometimes. I can only do this for short trips though since I want google maps if I'm going far.
      • Use paper to-do lists instead of the notes app on my phone
      • Limit social media apps to 20/30 minutes each with the built-in controls
      • Install an app to lock down my phone outside of certain hours, or more than an hour a day. This also helps me stick to my daily schedule, because if don't stick to it I miss the scheduled "fix" of screen time.

      I'm down to 1-2h phone daily. It hasn't been a monotonic improvement, and some of that has been shifted to bullshit internet time on the computer* like I'm doing now, but even though I feel pretty online I think I've improved a bit overall. If you want to lose weight or get offline I think you need to analyze how you have gained weight and gotten online and why, and then use that info to come up with some actionable strategies. If you're ordering takeout too often the strategy will be different than if you're eating too many snacks or genuinely just really sedentary. I have found that I cannot implement goals like "check my phone less" or "eat healthier". They HAVE to be discrete actions or they won't get done, no matter how much I beat myself up.

      Good luck comrade.

      *like you i'm a programmer. being extremely online is a genuine workplace hazard for us

    • JoeByeThen [he/him, they/them]
      ·
      5 months ago

      Last year I read The Flinch by Julien Smith, which is a shit book you shouldn't read.

      Lol, someone recommended that to me some years ago and while I still haven't read it, somewhere from it I picked up hopping into my showers before they get warm. Not all the time, especially in the middle of winter, but most of them. It's interesting how you can breathe yourself to a kind of tolerance if you just get in there and hold still under the cold. And then as soon as you move, you gotta deal with the shock again.

      No go, on the rest of the book though?

      • macerated_baby_presidents [he/him]
        ·
        5 months ago

        the only saving grace is it's short. basically a polemic, not a lot of content. he gives stupid ass reasons for overcoming your flinch reflex, like cops and soldiers do this to make decisions quickly. meaning shooting kids lol