The No Screen Challenge

2/2

 

Glad to have you back!

 

Hey, man, good to see you!

 

4/5

This morning, I started checking my phone as soon as I woke up. That's a no-no. I only set my alarm on Mondays and use my phone for that. I think getting a better alarm clock might help me.

 

Okay, I'm now ready to do this challenge again.

Let's start with three days. 0/3. Deadline is 09:30 pm on sunday to thursday and 10:30 pm on fridays and saturdays.

 

1/3. There was one thing I really did right a couple of years ago without even knowing it. I had as a routine to go out on the balcony as soon as I woke up. What I learned yesterday was that this is super effective for triggering the ganglion cells in the retina, which reinforces a stable wake up time. It only takes a minute or so (through glass it takes 50x longer). If you get that sunlight in the eyes as soon as you wake up, an internal timer is set when adenosine is to be released in your body, which is the chemical for feeling a hunger for sleep.

so if you go out and get sunlight in your eyes as soon as you wake up, this will make it easier for you to endure in this challenge.

 

2/3, Going for seven days instead, 2/7.

 

The fresh air and view also sound like they'd be pleasant, apart from the physiological effects of the light on the retina. I'll try to step outside first thing too.

 

9/12

 

10/13

 

Light exposure between 11 pm and 4 am will inhibit dopamine release during daytime and may also lead to depression, according to peer reviewed studies. Just saying...

I don't know which day I'm at as I haven't been good at counting lately. However, I have more or less been on track when it comes to screens for a couple of months except for a few days here and there (where I may have passed my deadline with about 30 mins). Unless I feel I'm loosing control over my screen usage in the late hours, I will make a serious effort in holding my deadline on the very second. During these four years, I have developed a pretty good skill in stopping using screens before it gets too late.

If I would be using screens when I actually should be asleep, I will report it here. Otherwise I will just hang around here as usual

@Philosophical_Dad I really dig your no porn tracker. What day are you on?

 

Checking in. Lovely days, lovely mornings, restful nights.

 

On track. How’s it going for you @Philosophical_Dad ? And what about you others, @Stephan S ? @The Great Safecracker ?

 

I need to make sure to log in here more regularly...

The studies on light you mention sound interesting, @Force Majeure . Link? I was aware about the physiological mechanism there. In my own experience, it seems like screens per se don't have a big effect on my sleep. However, if I look at the wrong thing on a screen--something that keeps me clicking or scrolling--I can be kept in front of the screen for a long time and lose a lot of sleep due to staying up. However, I'm rarely up past 11, so my sense of my own experience is consistent with those study results.

It's been going fairly well lately, thanks for asking, Force. I've been extremely busy. I'm working my job and running a startup while parenting. It's a lot. And there are a lot of ups and downs, especially with the startup. But if I feel like I'm doing my best and staying focused, I feel like I handle the ups and downs reasonably well. Lately, I've been doing that. And I really do think controlling screen use, particularly porn and politics, has a lot to do with that.

Speaking of which, three of the last six days, I visited Twitter more than my screen rules allow. (I don't have a Twitter account but I use the site to see certain people's commentary.) I should do better. But it's still been much better than just letting myself check without restriction.

13/19

 

I haven't been keeping track of porn outside of my "no screen" rules. I've been peeking at porn a little more than I should, and that's one reason I missed a few days recently.

What about the tracker do you dig? It's been a while since I've used that feature. I've just gotten back to using this messageboard.

 

This podcast is invaluable for one who wants to improve himself. Porn addiction is being mentioned in episode #33 and #39. Sleep is being discussed in the episode linked above but also in the following episodes #3, #4 and #5. Neuroplasticity and how you can change your brain for the better is discussed afterwards and it's super interesting. That's what I can tell for now because I'm currently at episode #7.

I suggest you check out episode #33 and #39 just to get some very good information about dopamine and if you like the podcast, then take it in chronological order.

Ah, I see. I thought you were on day 500+ when it came to porn. If you haven't seen that yourself, you're probably surfing NoFap on a smartphone in portrait mode, try landscape mode and the tracker comes up. Don't ask me why they did it like this, it took me years to realise this and in my opinion, it's really bad coding practise.

 

Cool, thanks for the recommendation. I'll check it out.

Real quick, I've gone through the research on the psychological effects of porn. My very tentative big picture takeaway is that it's a major source of procrastination, for some people, and detracts from romantic relationships. There's debate about why it's bad for people in romantic relationships; porn defenders claim it's because of stigma. My guess is that, by making men more sexually sated, it worsens sex and makes the man less sexually interested in their partners, which is a problem unless the man's sex drive is vastly greater than the woman's. I suspect that sexual desire doesn't just make sex better, it also motivates men to please their partners in others ways, to get them in the mood.

I will say, though, that I don't think this research admits of very firm conclusions about porn's effects or the mechanisms by which it has these effects.

 

13/20

Some stressful situations and lack of sleep, mostly due to waking up too early, threw off my self-regulation...

 

Checking in.

Well, since it depletes the dopamine system, it will affect your goal seeking behaviour and drive. When you're in a romantic relationship, that in itself will release dopamine but since a porn addict has a disrupted dopamine system after seeking higher and higher peaks, that relationship can seem uninteresting because the dopamine release isn't high enough. Another thing is of course that a porn addict starts to associate his sexual drive with porn instead of real sex.

Another neurotransmitter porn releases is acetylcholine, which is responsible for memory. So basically it will make you remember all the porn better and everything else less. Brain scans of heavy porn users have also shown that porn addicts have similar brains to alcoholics, e.g. a smaller forebrain, which is the logic brain that is responsible for things like decision making and willpower.

If one is over 25 years old, the brain is being filled with grey matter, which tends to stamp down the neural pathways that has been evolved up till that point. Before this happens the brain is very plastic and you can learn things passively. When you get older however, it gets much harder to learn new things but luckily far from impossible. Instead of being able to learn things passively, you have to pay deliberate attention to what you want to learn, have strong incentives why you want to learn it and lots of focus. Identifying what you want to learn is a key factor because the process of identifying that will release certain chemicals in the brain that enhances neuroplasticity.

Indeed. When you ejaculate, you increase the bonding to the person you are with, which in the porn case is unreal. Also, since addicts seeks higher and higher dopamine peaks, it will transform the sexual interest to bizarre things over time, which probably will make the real sex seem uninteresting.

Of course there's a lot more to say about porn but maybe you have already read up on this.

 

Lack of enough REM sleep makes you emotionally labile, which is another way of saying that you act more reflexively, so watch out
Also yoga nidra and other guided body scan meditations will help.