The Bedtime Challenge

Byjack

Sleep has always been the beast I had to conquer.

Ever since I left my house and went off to college, it has been increasingly hard to go to bed on time.

It’s killing me. I don’t recover from workouts, my mind is foggy, and my memory mists away. My moods feel erratic and neurotic. Energy during the day is a thing of the past.

And yet I cannot stop.

2 am, 3 am, 4 am, 5 am. I keep going to bed late. And sometimes later and later.

I tried so many times to go to be at a reasonable time. I try for a few days, and then I relapse. But we aren’t giving up. We are trying it one more time.

And I didn’t do it alone. My good friend Edgar gave me this kick in the butt:

So what is my gameplan this time? How am I going to succeed when I failed so many times before?

A couple of things:

  1. I will not try to control how much sleep I get
  2. I will not try to control my screen habits
  3. I will not control anything but one single factor, which is my bedtime
  4. At the same time, I will figure out what needs I am meeting by going to bed late and how to meet those needs earlier in the day
  5. I will commit to this bedtime long enough to form a habit

I made a list of reasons why I love staying up late at night:

  • Completely alone
  • Lots of time – no rush
  • Sense of accomplishment (if I feel I haven’t accomplished anything yet it gives me more time to get things done)
  • Consume art
  • Nighttime magical vibes
  • Dread of the next day
  • More time to eat and digest

I realized that not sleeping is incredibly compelling to me. It is far more challenging for me to go to sleep on time than most people. So as a result, I need to keep it simple. Bedtime at 11 PM for the next 66 days, no exceptions. The challenge will end on December 12th. I am two days into this challenge already.

What does this mean?

  • I can eat right before bed
  • I can watch videos in my bed after 11
  • I can get back up, stretch if I cannot fall asleep, then go back to bed
  • I can toss and turn at 11
  • I can get up at 6 am if I have work that needs to be done but I don’t have the time to finish it

In the meantime, in an attempt to meet all my needs before bed:

  • I will silence notifications and try to find some alone time every day
  • I will work to identify a task that is feasible to do and will give me a strong sense of accomplishment every day
    • I will try to get this done early so that I will have larger open times during the day where I don’t feel rushed
  • I will pursue more art and magical vibes
  • I will try to leave gifts for myself the next day so I have positive anticipation(ex: a clean empty sink, plans for something fun)
  • I will try to eat at 8 pm at the latest so I have time to digest before 11

In terms of how to structure the next 66 days, I have not decided yet, but perhaps I will try to focus on each of the needs and strategies every week.

Some additional strategies/thoughts:

  • Turning off all the lights
  • Melatonin gummies

So far, finding a way to feel accomplished/ready for the next day has been a game-changer in wanting to go to sleep. Also, it is easier to go to sleep when bedtime is a hard boundary that is very strict and everything else is quite relaxed (I can still get less sleep and wake up super earlier if I feel I’m not prepared for the next day, I don’t have to go to sleep as long as I’m in bed). Nothing is tempting as a valid excuse/difficult decision anymore.

So tentatively I feel this time will be different. My hope is that after 66 days, I will no longer have to try to go to bed at 11, it will just be automatic, and I will start to cherish my sleep and life in general!

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Sova Fanart 1: Class Unit 1 Day 1

Byjack

UNIT ONE: Sova Model Studies | Day 1 – Portrait

Since this unit was all about model studies, I went into a custom game and used the model as a reference for drawing sova portraits.

I started with this side view of Sova.

Then I did colors:

I really didn’t like the colors. So I tried looking at tutorials.

New rough sketch of Sova:

Followed by a more refined outline:

Then by a painting attempt:

Something wasn’t clicking. I still didn’t like the painting job. I decided to try again and learn from another tutorial on shading.

I tried to color again.

This time I felt something clicked with using large soft brushes and the lasso tool. I used the soft brushes to create nice gradients and the lasso tool for the clean edges. Looking closely at the painter I see that he also uses the smudge tool a lot.

To Love and Lose Love 2

Byjack

I was feeling extraordinary pain in my heart because everywhere I look, everything from TV Shows to notification sounds reminded me so much of her, and I was hit by the realization I may NEVER talk or hear from her again. I may never laugh and smile at something she sent me. I may never be able to tell her something exciting from my life, may never joke around and have fun together.

It was so painful I did a “shamanic journey” meditation in order to connect with my feelings and try to grow from the deep excruciating pain that I feel from losing her. Here are the steps:

  1. Turn on shamanic drumming music
  2. Lay down and close your eyes
  3. Imagine a room in your mind’s eye
  4. Go down from the room into your heart
  5. Meet with the different parts of yourself and ask your questions

My internal landscape was all storm and hard edges. I asked, “How do I deal with this pain? How do I deal with the overwhelmingly painful feelings I feel whenever something reminds me of her? How do I even go on with my life?”

I received the answer: Many things in life I actually put on hold because she took up so much of my life. I can focus on those things. To name a few:

  • Singing – she hated that
  • Drawing – I was too busy with work and thinking about her to work on it
  • My business with my sister – Again too busy
  • Valorant – Too busy again
  • Making other friends – I didn’t care about anyone else

Then I was filled with despair. “What if I forget her? I loved her with all my heart and cherish so many happy memories that I’m not ready to let go of yet.”

I received the answer: There are still many, many things that remind me of her, and all of our happy memories. She will always be with me in a way. I can always turn to those things to remind me of her even if it is painful.

Fitness Challenge 4: The Evolution of the Challenge

Byjack

It’s been officially four months since I posted about this challenge, so I think it is safe to say that this challenge is over…well not over per se, but evolved.

So what happened? First, I got very sick on the tail end of the fitness challenge. It was the sickest I’ve been in years and I lost a lot of weight.

Second, I have split this challenge into about 3 other challenges, two that I am tracking and one that I didn’t track but sort of is successfully completed.

Those challenges are:

  1. The posture challenge. I literally came up with my own posture exercises inspired by some of the most common and popular posture exercises and I’ve literally done it. My posture is much much better than it was before and I continue to improve it every day. What is the best part? I now can tell and feel uncomfortable when in a bad posture. I didn’t document anything and may never do so.
  2. The bedtime challenge. This is a version of a sleep challenge. My latest attempt involves ignoring the whole sleep side of it. Ignoring falling asleep, ignoring getting enough hours, or even habits of turning off electronics. I’m going to make it simple for myself. In the next 66 days (Dec 12, 2023) I will go to bed by 11 pm every night.
  3. The jiujitsu challenge. This challenge was a couple of things but I haven’t completely formed my goals around it so clearly yet. The main ideas I have right now are: getting comfortable and confident in moving and utilizing my body to defend myself, getting stronger and more fit, and mastering a lot of jiujitsu techniques.

So, it is a bye for now on this challenge, but there might be some future retrospective posts analyzing some of the biometric data I gleaned from this challenge.

Valorant 18: Strafe Clearing

Byjack

I’ve been killing it on the aim front. In deathmatch, I absolutely own.

I have been working on a new aiming mechanic, what I like to call the strafing clear. First, I went from silver all the way to gold simply off of working on my site clears. A few things I noted:

  • Practicing in custom matches is extreemly helpful
  • Way more helpful than DM flicks
  • Close angles call for very small clears, big angles are for big wide swings

I’ve been trying to pair this with the counter strafing mechanic and I think I figured out something.

Simply by paying attention to which side of the head you expect your crosshair to be on, you can get a much better strafing shot when you peek/clear an angle.

When you clear, you shoot like normal, if your shot is off, you adjust in the direction you need to.

I'm clearing CT, getting ready to clear the other side of container.
I see the Omen when I clear, I know my crosshair is on his left. So I need to adjust right.
I strafe right onto his head.
Instant headshot.

Let’s say you are clearing one angle, and an enemy pops up on your right. Your crosshair is far to the left of your target, so you quickly adjust, while strafing to the right to line up the perfect flick.

This is extremely useful because not only does this mean that your shots can be super accurate, it means you are moving a lot and making it extreemly hard to hit you (or atleast headshot you).

I think the coolest part, is when you strafe out in one direction, realize the enemy is to the other side of your crosshair so you strafe in the other direction to get the shot.

I also abuse the hit slow (how you freeze if you are hit) to get better accuracy and try to tap the enemy down if I am stopped midstrafe.

That being said, I think that there are a couple of different types of aiming mechanics in Valorant.

  1. Spray control – used for wall spams and smoke spams and long gun fights
  2. Strafing – used for clearing and gun fights out in the open
  3. Distance shooting – used for really far fights
  4. Holding – used to hold again specific peaks

Spray control

  • Got no real strat. Just try to watch the bullet tracers

Strafing

  • Watch the relationship between the crosshair and the head (whether left or right). Details are above

Distance Shooting

  • Use a lot of movement-based aiming for really accurate shots. Tap fire.

Holding

  • Prepare to duck behind cover, spray a few shots and duck back.
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Recap Video Ideas

Byjack

This is a recap of an exercise I did a few weeks ago. I was watching a ThinkMedia youtube video about how to succeed at youtube. He went through and exercise looking at 3 things in this order: passion, proficiency, and profit.

Basically, he said to make a list of all the things that you are passionate about, either things you like or things you hate, and things you do even if you weren’t getting paid to do it.

My list was:

  1. Making money
  2. Finding leverage
  3. Valorant
  4. Corporate life (hate)
  5. Coaching
  6. Challenges
  7. Superhuman abilities
  8. Graphic novels
  9. Children’s books, fantasy
  10. Health
  11. AI
  12. Surface level thinking (hate)

Then, he said to take that list of things and think about what we have at least 1 year of proficiency in, where we have been doing that thing semi-successfully. So I narrowed down my list to:

  1. Making money
  2. Valorant
  3. Feeling stuck in life
  4. Deeper thinking
  5. Coaching
  6. Health
  7. AI

Then, he said to narrow down that further into things that we could build an audience around, something people need or would want to buy. Here was my list:

  1. How to get started with a business
  2. How to aim
  3. How to get unstuck in life
  4. How to unlock your potential
  5. How to repair your body
  6. How to use AI to improve your life

I don’t know if I have any interest pursuing youtube in this way, but it was an interesting exercise to reflect on.