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Comment by najqh | Hacker News Reader

Nah, doesn't work for me. I know the games I like; they are all old and I know I love them. I don't follow the news on new games at all. I simply can't concentrate on the games I like for more than 15 minutes. I get distracted, I alt-tab out all the time, and eventually I close them. It's the same with movies or books. It takes a superhuman effort for me to sit still and watch a movie.

If anybody has any recommendations on how to proceed from here my fried brain and I would be eternally grateful :P

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I feel related to this. I wish I had a way out to tell you but I can only provide comfort in the thought that someone else feels the same.

I think a big part is the constant dissatisfaction, that time is wasted, and I should be doing something more productive. I start a movie, I see where this is going, this is not even that great -> I should be doing something else... I play a game, I understand the mechanics, I see the grind ahead -> I should be doing something else...

It's a negative loop like doomscrolling a news site. Very few things are truly offline and I don't think about the time I'm wasting.

But computers, they give me the best, and they give me the worst of myself.

I'm 35, I'm an addict as well. I suffer from a grinding omnipresent feeling of wasting time.... I have a wife cery anti drugs. My cou try has legalized weed... Very rarely use it... Once a year maybe. But I have incredible rich experiences being stoned, being in the moment. Maybe to truly check out we need some form of drugs... Dopamime shots retain us, THC gives us temp relief?

I find it helps a little to remember that learning and observation are skills and humans, like other animals, 'play' for a reason. Even if you didn't 'produce' anything, you practiced your skills of observation and deduction, which are survival skills.

I'm also someone who has to have a real 'reason' to do things. The best short-circuit I've found is finding the value in my own desires.

Two suggestions:

(1) Try learning a highly complex game like Dota 2. You can't alt-tab (well, you can, but you'll likely die fairly quickly), and the sheer number of things going on at once will require your full attention... but there are still many small things that you can succeed at that will keep it fun while you're learning.

(2) Consider doing some "concentration training" where you engage in a non-media activity (that's still enjoyable) in order to improve your concentration. For instance, for me, this is programming - unlike a movie (which I also get bored while watching), I can dedicate my entire brain to programming and still not be bored - but it's still enjoyable for me, and doesn't feel like work.

> Dota 2

Don't do that, highly addictive.

Only for specific personalities. I'm somewhat prone to Dota addiction, but 14 out of the 15 people I play with are not, and in both my case and that 15th person we've managed it with some difficulty.

For most people it won't be an issue - you're far more likely to not enjoy the game at all.

Maybe the real question, why do you want to do thise things? Because games and movies don't matter that much, really. Nor do books, really.

You dont need to force it. Try something else. Try different hobbies to spend time with.

And also, old games are not as good as nostalgia has us remember. Maybe you are alt tabbing, because the books you ate picking, movies you watch were good for past you. And now your interests changed and they don't fit you, actually.

You may just need to change genre.

You make a good point, and I think there is fear in that the hobbies that we used to enjoy get replaced by something less substantive, even less “productive” - scrolling for endless content, engaging in short-term meaningless comment threads like this, consuming information that the brain forgets within hours.

Yes, but also it can be signal that old hobbies are not right for changed lifestyle, changed experience and so on.

> Because games and movies don't matter that much, really. Nor do books, really.

Games and movies, sure. But books?!? Oh yes they do!

Yeah, I know, weird. Dunno why I think that way. But I do.

For the same reasons as TFA, I guess.

Meditation. Unironically. I haven't kept up with it because I'm a lazy person who's been too busy having a mental breakdown, but I find I often end up pulling something up when my attention wavers or I have a stray thought that pulls me out of the moment. When I meditate, I'm more aware of my thought patterns and can notice stray thoughts as stray thoughts (as opposed to boredom or disinterest; they're surprisingly hard to differentiate sometimes, at least for me.)

>I know the games I like; they are all old and I know I love them.

>I simply can't concentrate on the games I like for more than 15 minutes.

Maybe you should try playing something different. A new challenge might encourage you to concentrate more and/or build neuroplasticity, and you could find some satisfaction there.

go visit an arcade. crazy enough there are still companies out there making new arcade hardware and the benefit of being out of your home, in a place dedicated to gaming, will help you concentrate.

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