On June 19 2018 05:22 Shalashaska_123 wrote: Hello, QuadroX.
I don't think you have to change your lifestyle like others are suggesting. I say you listen to your body. If you're feeling super tired after work, then go to sleep once you get home. Play BW in the morning after you wake up. Try it for a little while and see how it works for you.
People aren't suggesting he has to change his lifestyle. They are suggesting that it will help, and they are certainly right.
I think you're also misunderstanding what he means by "tired". I don't get the impression he is sleepy. A better way to think of it as drained/lethargic/sluggish.
Playing in the morning if possible is an excellent suggestion...however if he has important work to do, multiple hours of taxing BW is likely to leave him in a poor state for doing quality work.
You're Terran? You could try playing Protoss on workdays...
jk
Nice to read about all the ways in which many other people have had their share of attempts to combine a working-life with a stable routine of playing BW.
If you have 3 hours, I'd say 1-2 hours of play after 1-2 hours of resting are better than 3 hours of worn-out play.
When you play, be conscious of your non-optimal situation. Take out the pressure, make an after-work-account if you need. Set a reasonable goal for your condition like trying to work on your play's stability/solidness in the basics instead of achieving great plays. Prepare yourself to lose games due to a lower attention span or multitasking-ability.
L_Master, thanks for the advice! By the way I started my BW gaming from watching your youtube VODs for noobs and you keep helping me lol.
Yeah by tired I meant drained/sluggish whatever, not necessarily sleepy. English is not my first language, so it's hard to distinguish.
Highgamer,
You're Terran? You could try playing Protoss on workdays...
I'm Zerg, good joke btw :D
When you play, be conscious of your non-optimal situation. Take out the pressure, make an after-work-account if you need. Set a reasonable goal for your condition like trying to work on your play's stability/solidness in the basics instead of achieving great plays.
I don't care what meaning of the word, "tired," QuadroX intended, it's not a state one should play (let alone practice) BW in. If sleep is as important as you said in your previous comment, then he should avoid using the computer before going to bed according to this article. Drinking coffee should also be out of the question late at night. Playing BW in the morning is the best solution in my opinion. Doing so for 3 hours or less will not leave him in a poor state for doing quality work later in the day, though only QuadroX himself can judge that.
On June 19 2018 06:27 Shalashaska_123 wrote: Hello, L_Master.
I don't care what meaning of the word, "tired," QuadroX intended, it's not a state one should play (let alone practice) BW in. If sleep is as important as you said in your previous comment, then he should avoid using the computer before going to bed according to this article. Drinking coffee should also be out of the question late at night. Playing BW in the morning is the best solution in my opinion. Doing so for 3 hours or less will not leave him in a poor state for doing quality work later in the day, though only QuadroX himself can judge that.
Depending on the OPs situation, I agree with you that morning BW would be the most ideal for the OP, all else equal.
However, I disagree strongly with the bolded. I'll explain why. This is no different than saying someone who is interested in being a competitive recreational athlete that works a physically demanding 9-5 job shouldn't train after work. It's the nature of the beast.
If you never train at all, you won't get any better. For the average person, going out and trying to run even 2 or 3 miles after a hard day at a labor intensive job would be a brutal endurance feat. However, there are guys out there that can work a demanding job for 8-10+ hours, then still go bang out a 10 mile run in 50-55 minutes day in, day out. How did they get there? By training when they were tired from work. The body adapts to the stress put on it. As long as you can recover, greater stress will produce greater adaptation.
Mornings can be a good time to train, but I'll use the runner analogy again. Let's say you work a demanding 10 hour construction day. A decent runner is certainly capable of banging out a morning 10 miler, and then going and getting through his construction job. However, that 10 mile run WILL drain energy. It will make his job seem more demanding and possibly make him more prone to physical mistakes or injuries....not good on the job outcomes. If he isn't worried about optimum performance it may not be a big issue, certainly some good amateur athletes elect to train in the morning even with physically demanding jobs. That said, it will detract from performance. If QuadroX has an important programming job and is worried about his position, performance, or in any way excelling at his job, several hours of morning BW will 100% hamper his work ability. BW might be fun, but it's unquestionably mentally demanding. He will have less overall mental energy and focus left over for work after burning off a decent bit on BW. It's not like he will be unable to work, but he will be at 98, 95, 90, or maybe 70% of his typical capacity. He knows his situation. It's possible this is an acceptable tradeoff, but it's also possible it isn't.
If it isn't, then BW in the morning isn't an option.
Your concerns about night practice are valid issues. Coffee, or rather caffeine, closer to bedtime can be a problem. So can light from the computer messing up sleep cycle and melatonin production. That said, we are individuals. Some people can take a good shot of caffeine and use the computer until they go to bed and sleep like a baby. Other's wouldn't fall asleep until 4am if they tried that. Only way for the OP to figure that out is to try different things and learn what works and doesn't work for him. In my experience, caffeine for evening practice is likely to not work will and hamper sleep. People that can take reasonable doses of caffeine within a few hours of bed and sleep well seem to be in the minority. There is a pretty good chance he can use his computer until a half hour or hour before he goes to bed and sleep well.
Only way he finds out is to play around with the different options himself.
Thanks for your long reply, L_Master. I agree with you that he should try different things and see what works best for him because we're all different.
On June 19 2018 06:50 ne4aJIb wrote: I am tired of life
Same tbh.
Seriously though, I think most people will find out if they're overly tired just chugging water will really help out, if you don't have a rigorous schedule/routine with drinking water all the time. Dehydration and being tired has been linked with all of these traits.
I also think it's not fair to say "don't play tired" why not? I remember Day9 talking about his friend who trained/played in all conditions because otherwise you give yourself excuses when conditions aren't "optimal". I try to do the same.
I also think it's not fair to say "don't play tired" why not? I remember Day9 talking about his friend who trained/played in all conditions because otherwise you give yourself excuses when conditions aren't "optimal". I try to do the same.
Do you remember which podcast/episode by any chance?
Okay so, I actually wasn't serious about the Cocaine thing, I wouldn't put that into your practice regimen, it is not safe.
Instead, I would advise you to try Meditation, and Marijuana after practice sessions (if it is legal where you live), eating healthy, exercising, and slowly increase your training regimen time, over time, and your body will begin to build more and more muscle memory, in more places than one, so it is easier to practice for longer durations of time.
Also the drug references, aren't serious, and are only jokes, everything else is serious.
There is no direct "lifehack" (Coffe is unnatural stimulus so I suggest to avoid it). There are helpfull tips:
1. Sleep is around 50%. Sleeping well everyday is key to keep your mind fresh. IF you are failing at this, focus all your effort here first. Its the largest factor.
2. Eating well, not too much, drinking enough water, physical exercise. All these will have a positive impact in the long run.
3. Short term improvements from a shower or a short nap can help but dont always work same way and on everyone to the same degree (sometimes I feel out of place after a nap for example).
4. If you cannot concentrate or have fun playing, reduce the amount to a bear minimum, even to the point of not playing at all. Good practice beats large amount of bad practice (as the bad gets rooted into your muscle memory).
5. Kill alcohol and stop smoking (if you smoke). After I did it I improved my reaction time and long term focus by a significant amount. Only problem is if you have to go thru detox (I had from smoking), but well worth it.
6. Keep your house clean. Might sound stupid but the order and cleanness helps somehow... not sure how.
To add to already very good answers, a good question to ask yourself is if work is stressing you up or not. If so, finding the root cause of the stress and dealing with it would be the longest lasting solution. But that's not a hack.
Sleep, nutrition and exercise are great suggestions; have you also considered mindfulness meditation? It's quite underrated; can complement very well too.
An known easy hack for programmers who need to "keep going a little more" (in this case for gaming after programming) is moderate sugary food near the end of the work day (btw engineer here). It's actually on Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman (Nobel laureate), seems to work in practice. Not recommended as a routine though; sugar is bad for you.
lol man if you are tired being a programmer that sits on a chair all day long "solving problems" then I would assume you have low health and should start doing some sport instead of playing bw
On June 20 2018 02:46 iFU.pauline wrote: lol man if you are tired being a programmer that sits on a chair all day long "solving problems" then I would assume you have low health and should start doing some sport instead of playing bw
On June 19 2018 19:47 iCCup.Trent wrote: To add to already very good answers, a good question to ask yourself is if work is stressing you up or not. If so, finding the root cause of the stress and dealing with it would be the longest lasting solution. But that's not a hack.
Sleep, nutrition and exercise are great suggestions; have you also considered mindfulness meditation? It's quite underrated; can complement very well too.
An known easy hack for programmers who need to "keep going a little more" (in this case for gaming after programming) is moderate sugary food near the end of the work day (btw engineer here). It's actually on Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman (Nobel laureate), seems to work in practice. Not recommended as a routine though; sugar is bad for you.
About sugar why do people think it's bad? I saw Flash eating chocolate playing ASL. Your brain needs sugar as far as I know to work better.
On June 19 2018 19:47 iCCup.Trent wrote: To add to already very good answers, a good question to ask yourself is if work is stressing you up or not. If so, finding the root cause of the stress and dealing with it would be the longest lasting solution. But that's not a hack.
Sleep, nutrition and exercise are great suggestions; have you also considered mindfulness meditation? It's quite underrated; can complement very well too.
An known easy hack for programmers who need to "keep going a little more" (in this case for gaming after programming) is moderate sugary food near the end of the work day (btw engineer here). It's actually on Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman (Nobel laureate), seems to work in practice. Not recommended as a routine though; sugar is bad for you.
About sugar why do people think it's bad? I saw Flash eating chocolate playing ASL. Your brain needs sugar as far as I know to work better.
Your brain does need "sugar"....but in the body that's a wide term. More technically it needs glucose. This means that any form of carbohydrate is decent sugar. You can get "sugar" from eating rice, potatoes, pasta, vegetables, fruit, any starchy foods, etc.
The reason "sugar" as we tend to think of it: soda, candies, cookies, etc. isn't great is for a few reasons. First is that it doesn't contain much or anything in the way of nutrients. Fruit is sugary, but has all kinds of useful vitamins/minerals + fiber. The other reason it isn't great is because of the digestion and insulin response to sugar. It's hard on the body. The simplest explanation that get's the idea across is the crash and burn idea. Consume a bunch of sugar and your buzzed and energetic for a while but then feel like crap and crash harder later. It's also just rough on metabolism, and highly inflammatory, especially over a long time.
Having a piece of chocolate before a match isn't a bad thing. A small amount of sugar to "top off" your energy levels works. Eating a ton of sugar though, like a full soda, candy bars, or other such things isn't so great. In quantities larger than that it's outright terrible for you.
Honestly, an analogy to cocaine isn't too bad. You take some cocain and you'll probably play some focused, high quality BW till it wears off. Same for a sugar rush. That doesn't mean it isn't hard on the body and quite unhealthy in the long term, especially in consistently high quantities.
On June 20 2018 02:46 iFU.pauline wrote: lol man if you are tired being a programmer that sits on a chair all day long "solving problems" then I would assume you have low health and should start doing some sport instead of playing bw
Haha yea it's possible. Though not guaranteed. Even someone in great shape can get mental fatigue from a long, hard, "thinking" day. I get absolutely pummeled when I have fucked up and need a big 8+ hour cram session the day before an exam and am in excellent shape.
This might even be what you meant, but the bigger reason he might be in bad shape is because he has a desk job and then plays BW for several hours after. That's usually not a recipe for being healthy or fit. I think I mentioned it OP, but if that is an accurate description of you, then adding some easy-moderate cardio to your routine will make a noticeable impact on health, fitness, energy levels, and focus.