I should be studying right now, but everytime I sit to study, I can’t sit there long enough, I want food even though I am not hungry, I want to watch TV/youtube, self-pleasure… etc…
No matter what productive work I want to do, I will try to not do that and do something which gives me momentary pleasure. I want to masturbate, eat lots of food even though I am not hungry while watching TV/Youtube and I don’t seem to be able to break the cycle and it’s destroying me. How can I break the cycle and do something good for a change instead of pleasuring myself in the moment meaninglessly?
I got some counselling, then on the anti depressants, they were the first step - let me see why I should do something different, but then I got onto the ADHD meds and they let me focus. It took a while, had to work out what worked for me but once I got it it was the answer I needed. They’re not the solution for everyone, but if you haven’t tried at least talk to someone about it.
unfortunately, this might not seem like a great solution for my problem. I have been on meds and I still can’t perform and I didn’t notice anything getting better while I was having those meds.
To add on to the other commenters, medication alone doesn’t usually solve things. Rather, it makes you more able to implement solutions to your problems. It’s why therapy is pushed so hard.
You could also be on the wrong meds. It can take a lot of experimentation before they work.
Self discipline is a skill in itself and it is something you can learn.
At it’s most basic you restrict things you want and make them a reward for doing a task.
It can be hard to restrict things as you say. When I used to study, I used to go to a “3rd place” to do it. That is somewhere that is not home or work - I used to go to a library. In that environments you don’t have TV, or food, and hopefully you won’t be masturbating.
Mobiles can be very difficult though - if you can’t stop yourself using your phone to watch YouTube then either leave it at home (I know, shocking idea in this day and age!) Or install parental locking/anti distraction software that locks your phone down for certain periods. This can help you learn self discipline with your phone.
Similarly if you study with a laptop, then look at anti distraction tools to keep you focused on your work rather than surfing or on YouTube.
The reward side is very important. You need to be consistent and follow through on your promises to yourself. Don’t use unrealistic rewards - like “if I study for 6 hours today I’ll have dinner tonight”. You’re going to have dinner anyway, and you don’t want to go down the road of punishing yourself. Make it a favourite meal, or promise to watch next episode in a favourite TV show.
The idea is that you will be still enjoying those things because you will study and work. But be prepared to deny yourself those things if you fail to reach your goals in the beginning.
Self discipline is hard, not least because you can cheat yourself too easily. But it’s worth putting in the effort, and the forced physical separation from the distractions and rewards at home makes it easier.
hey, thank you! I feel like my brain is hijacked by all the stuff I do and I can’t do anything else. Fuck this laptop and fuck this phone. These aren’t good for me.
I got diagnosed with ADHD, prescribed some meds. It was a total waste of time. Gave me anxiety for about a year and a half before I stopped taking the meds. My success at handling the complexity of life increased for the first few days of my medication routine, then dropped back to where it was before with more panic attacks.
For me, getting an ADHD screening started a major detour in my own development.
It’s mostly not your fault. Apps, games, and socials are intentionally designed to be addictive. That’s because the more time you spend on them, the more ad revenue the owners make.
If sheer willpower doesn’t work, find other ways around it. Someone else already suggested going to a library or another place, that’s good advice. Of you phone is an issue, you could turn it off and allow yourself to turn it back on after you’ve been productive for an hour, or after you have achieved a specific goal.
I’ll 2nd what hexagon said about going to a library or similar place. Trying to work around other people who are working helps to focus the mind and reduce distractions. If you can go to a library, this may be a good place to set up better practices, e.g. thoses others have suggested, first, then set up a work-only zone at home you can transfer that feeling of focus and work to.
Escaping from these things is a long slow process involving a lot of work.
The book Atomic Habits is very good. It talks about how you have a limited willpower budget and the best way to make long term change is to only make small changes at any given time, and stick with that small change until it requires zero willpower. Then you can make another small change.
Basically it’s like making a sculpture by putting down little layers of concrete, then waiting for the concrete to fully cure before putting more concrete on it.
You make a little change to your habits. Something like “I don’t touch any apps other than alarm clock for the first five minutes of my day”.
Then you do a huge and nearly exhausting amount of work to make sure the first five minutes of each day aren’t your normal escape patterns.
Trying to go whole hog takes more willpower than you actually have, and so it breaks down. Trying to alter the first five minutes of the day takes an amount of willpower you can actually afford to spend.
And the key is, after you’re consistent with it for a while, it eventually takes no willpower, and is now by definition a “habit”.
This is a fantastic answer. The things that trigger the reward center in your brain should not be the common input. I fully agree with the suggestion to remove the temptation beforehand and set goals. Personally, I also suggest that you make the reward less frequent over time so that the completion of the work becomes the desired result; rather than just a means to attain the reward.
It’s most effective for long term behavioral modification if your reinforcement drops off steadily, and becomes randomized (as in, may or may not appear, randomly selected each time according to a decaying probability curve).
When I was at university I couldn’t work at home at all and I had to force myself to go to the library on campus and work there. I later learnt I had ADHD though, so that didn’t help.
I often have cravings for food on my period. I try my best to work around it but it can be very difficult.
