12 steps of wow recovery

I think there are two types of people in this world; addicts and non-addicts. For addicts, you can get addicted to just about anything. For me, my drug of choice is WoW. Here is a twelve step program from the Wiki. This twelve step program originally started from Alcoholics Anonymous.

These are the original Twelve Steps as published by Alcoholics Anonymous:^[11]

1. We admitted we were powerless over WoW—that our lives had become unmanageable.

What is unmanageable? It means (to me) that your life has been put on hold, relationships and health jeopardized. We are powerless over people, places, and things. That includes the people who play and the game itself. We can't control if others want to spend their lives playing the game, and not participate in the game of life.

2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

Once you realize you have no power over anything but yourself, you realize that if you are going to break the addiction it's up to you. If you believe in a higher power, fine. I don't, not really. I believe in myself though, and I believe I can stop destructive behavior through shear force of will.

3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.

To me, this means that I'm tired of answering to the game. Want to do something in real life? Consult with the guild,make sure it doesn't conflict, or let down the raid team down.

4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.

I think this means recognizing that I have an addictive personality, and with the recognition seeking to do a better job safeguarding myself, so I don't get into something too deep.

5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.

I think this means apologizing to the family members and friends who you let down, while being addicted to WoW. That, plus a plan of action to rectify the wrongs.

6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.

I don't believe higher powers have the capacity of modification. I believe this power must come from you . Regardless, the knowledge that you are an addict is a powerful recognition.

7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.

Maybe this means destroying the game and the media (CD/DVD)? I think if you are a serious addict the only way to give it up is to give up your broadband access or your computer. Not sure if most addicts are ready or need this step. I plan to taper off, i'm not sure it can be done. But i'm going to give it a shot.

8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.

Pretty self-explainatory.

9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.

Pretty self-explainatory.

10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.

I think this means that your road to recovery is never complete and you could relapse at any time.

11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His Will for us and the power to carry that out.

I'm not sure what this means to an atheist. I think focusing on constructive things builds your will-power and self-esteem. So maybe that is the message here.

13. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to WoW addicts and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

You gotta preach it IMO. Its so easy to log in, discover twenty things you 'need' to do, then you're emeshed all over again. You can't blame the company (blizzard) as i've seen many do, its like blaming alcohol manufacturers for alcoholism.

WoW Addiction

I wrote about this before on here (somewhere, gotta find). Anyway here is a interesting site about wow addicts after they break the addiction.

So...after Phalea and BRK left the game to spend more time with family, and visiting that site, it was time for a wake-up call. Recently things have been rough; both of us are extremely stressed, but whereas I saw WoW as a stress relief, it actually made my wife more stressed. So...I'm going to try hard to scale down WoW time. That means no more going home, heating up something, and eating in front of the computer. No more playing on weekends all day or during the day at all. I'm going to try to limit my WoW time to 5 hours a week.

Am I an addict? Well, life would be better for us if we didn't play, but it would be hard for me because the only friends I have are online. However I dont sit in front of the computer for 12+ hours a day, I haven't lost anyone (yet) due to playing, haven't lost my job due to playing. Certainly it hasn't helped my career, but my career is of the type where if you are going to get ahead you need to be both talented and willing to invest 60-80 hours a week. 40 hours a week gets you nothing but a paycheck.

I think the game is a symptom but not the problem per se. It's like alcohol, if you are abusing alcohol you are doing so to mask other problems. But I can see it developing into the problem. You can't meet friends because you are online all the time. You can't have normal relationships because that would take up all your wow time. And it doesn't really matter that all your friends (people you know in real life) are WoW addicts. It just means there is more people on the sinking ship.

However, I find myself asking continually what is better? Is it better to go out with buddies and drink instead of get online and play with them? You are still socializing the same amount. Is it better to sit in front of the TV with your spouse instead of playing with them? I think for us the answer is yes because we can have normal conversations and its a limited time frame, whereas when we play we are focused on the game at first and its hard to have real conversations.

People say WoW is cheaper and healthier than drinking. Yeah, but again it's all the missed opportunities in life. You give up healthy meals, working out, and relationships. You miss out on career and life development, for an endless circle of pixel satisfaction, which is completely virtual and lacking.

Anyway i'll attempt to chronicle my recovery here in the hope it helps someone.