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Comment by pugets | Hacker News Reader

Maybe that’s true, but it doesn’t provide me with any comfort. I’m only going to live once. When I’m old and bound to a chair (hopefully due to frailty and not because a psychiatrist strapped me to it), I want to feel like I achieved something more than a passive human existence.

All these hours spent consuming forgettable garbage on Reddit, YouTube, Facebook, and in video games… these are hours not spent learning recipes, making music, writing programs, lifting weights, or practicing Spanish. If I could channel my energy towards these things, then the long-term payoff would be much more enriching. Not only that, but I’d probably be a happier person if I was disconnected from whatever daily drama social media wants me to care about.

If I spend the next 10 years of my life the way I spent the last 10, I’ll approach my midlife with no discernible talents, ambitions, or meaningful lived experiences.

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> All these hours spent consuming forgettable garbage on Reddit, YouTube, Facebook, and in video games… these are hours not spent learning recipes, making music, writing programs, lifting weights, or practicing Spanish. If I could channel my energy towards these things, then the long-term payoff would be much more enriching. Not only that, but I’d probably be a happier person if I was disconnected from whatever daily drama social media wants me to care about.

I do all those things and I still waste a ton of time on Youtube.

And it's fine; your brain cannot dedicate all of its waking time to high-intensity intellectual endavours, you just end up burning out.

I worked full-time and studied for a few years. Remarkably, I still had a share of free time, but I couldn't do anything "productive" with it as I had no mental energy to do perform these tasks. You _have_ to just hang out and do nothing.

The most productive people I know waste a ton of time outside of their chosen specialty, and it's not a coincidence.

This is such a key insight. For me at least, “time management” is really about managing my energy levels more than anything.

You should spend as much time as possible on your phone / the internet. When you die you won't have access to it.

There are plenty of people who consider the alternative activities you listed just as meaningless.

But if you ACTUALLY want to do those things and you don't because of internet addiction. Then you need to break it.

Positive and / or negative reinforcement.

By some snack or drug or something you really like and set a goal of no scrolling for whatever is a reasonable time limit. If you achieve it have the treat. Gradually up the time limit and increase the reward.

Negative reinforcement would be harder. It has to be something you actually don't like and drive no sense of purpose from. A lot of people will do something like pushups, but then they just see it as the cost.

Possibly since your fear is wasting time, when you catch yourself doing it. Then purposefully waste time without scrolling. Like time out.

Your positive reinforcement can't be related to the addiction though.

You’re saying one thing and doing another.

It’s not on anybody but you if you end up living a passive human existence. Either change what you’re doing or accept that your dreams will stay dreams.

Their comment doesn't blame anyone for their situation.

If they see their comment as a negative thing (which I think it’s clear that they do), then lack of blame is exactly what you don’t want to see. They need to be blaming themselves, not nobody.

Self-blame doesn’t help in most cases. Self-recrimination easily leads to guilt, self-loathing, and defeatism.

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