So today after waking up to some of the following scenery, I really decided it was time for a change! Results in Starcraft 2 have not been spectacular as of late, and I am actively thinking of ways I can turn them around and start delivering good performances again in the game I love. To jump right into things..

This is what it looks like:
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The Room:

I've been smoking cigarettes for about 6 years now. Im up to about a pack a day, and I feel like I'm heavily addicted to them. Being a SC2 progamer, it's not easy when you are playing a series and you have that strong urge to have a cigarette. Overall it's just a completly useless and bad habit to have, that costs a lot of money and makes a lot of situations more stressfull, rather than relieving stress which is what people originally use it for.

Other than smoking, I also have pretty disgusting health habits. Some of the people in the SC community may know that I used to be a lot bigger - over 300 pounds.

Before:
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After:

I have succeeded before living healthy for a long period of time and managed to lose about 120 lbs in the course of 8 months. After picking up SC2 again though, my workout habits slowely started to decline and are no pretty much non existant. Because of the hours theres a ton of garbage (gas station) food. I've been gaining weight and I want to make a change where that's concerned as well. I figured the best way to give these lifestyle ideals a good headstart is by sharing them with the community.

Today will be the last day I will smoke a cigarette, and the last day of junk food and other bad nutricion as well. The next 5 days are probably going to be hell, from smoking a full pack of cigarettes a day to zero. I don't know if I'll be able to sleep well, or what kind of side effects I should expect. I thought a fun way to keep myself distracted from whatever may happen - is just to play a shit ton of starcraft. I have 2 big tournaments coming up in November, MLG Dallas and LoneStarClash, and if I just do nothing but play Starcraft 2 for 8 days while beating a bad habit, I think nothing but good could come out of this for me.

Other than obvious downsides of smoking, such as smell, cost, and addiction, it also makes your heartrate increase and has a bad influence on your brain. I don't think this is good for a starcraft progamer. I want to try and compete and be as healthy and fit as possible from this point on - we are cyber 'atlethes' after all.

Tonight I will clean out my room, make it look super clean and neat! I think that will help make a new start in a good direction. Tomorrow I'll take new pictures of my room (the place I will stream from). And I hope if there is anyone out there that also wants to make some lifestyle changes, will join me now in making changes. It doesn't have to be tomorrow when I start, but think about it, and live a little healthier, nothing bad can come of it!

First thing I'll do tomorrow is go to the gym and then I'll stream for 10 hours - everyday untill I go to MLG Dallas to compete, and you guys can watch me struggle with beating this addiction, support me, make fun of me, whatever!

But I know now that I've told EVERYBODY about this, I won't fail :D

My personal goals:

-Becoming a non smoking person over the course of 1 day...2 days... 1 week.. 1 month..forever.
Living a healthy lifestyle that attributes to becoming a better progamer overall. Fitness, physhical health, mental health are all linked and living a healthy life should contribute to better results in the game.

-Being happier. (Of course!)

Short term Goal:

-During this 8 day heavy stream stint before MLG Dallas, I will Absolutely, Unquestionably, obtain rank 1 EU GM!! :D (This is just for fun, and to motivate myself haha)

-You can expect from me to stream 10 hours for the next 8 days each day, untill I go to MLG Dallas to compete

No matter what happens I will update on twitter - wether it's sleeping problems, headaches or anything else, aside from the hours a day ill be on stream and you might see me squirming away on the floor screaming for a cigarette. Everybody whos tried knows what a bitch it can be to cold turkey quit smoking, but hopefully after a little while I can start tweeting about how much nicer it is to breathe, and all that good stuff.

As a Follow up of all this I will post a VLOG at some point during or right atfter MLG Dallas, recapping the whole experience.

Hope you guys enjoy the show tomorrow, and most of all I want to call on people that enjoy SC2, or even ones that don't, that want to make a change in their life to pick up the axe and start axing away in the following days, and we can start living healthier (This bunch of emo crap should appeal to the American Spirit around here - note ret.)

Tomorrow people will laugh at me for this but in the end I hope to see the benefits and I just wanted to make it fun. And If I can get one other person to quit too then this would be a great succes also

As I post this the whole room is clean and all the traces of ashes or cigarettes are 99% gone - it was too dark to do it 100%. And tomorrow we start this battle with sc2 as the remedy :D Lets GO!

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I already posted this on reddit, but also wanted to post as a blog here. Team Liquid is my team and I'll of course also be fighting for this community. Thank you all that continue to cheer for our team!
the reddit link is here: http://www.reddit.com/r/starcraft/comments/11yp9g/quitting_smoking_with_sc2_stream/

HawaiianPig

Canada5139 Posts

October 23 2012 20:12 GMT

You've proven that you have the strength and willpower to shape up when you dealt with your weight, you can totally do it again with smoking. Good luck man

dGHaiL

United States177 Posts

October 23 2012 20:13 GMT

Hihi Ret,

Big fan. Best of luck in achieving your goals!

From a psychological perspective, avoiding situations or places in which you used to smoke may help you on your drive to quitting. It may be helpful to avoid doing certain activities if you used to smoke while doing them, for example: if you typically had a beer while smoking a cigarette, it may be beneficial to cut down on drinking as well, as the two stimuli (alcohol intake and nicotine intake) can be linked in that way, and having a beer may increase your urge to smoke.

Hope to see you streaming more often! I always click yours first if it's up on that sidebar.

Jaaaaasper

United States5668 Posts

October 23 2012 20:13 GMT

Good luck man i'll watch as much as i can.

Grettin

31937 Posts

October 23 2012 20:14 GMT

Good luck man.

JDub

United States975 Posts

October 23 2012 20:19 GMT

Don't discount the helpfulness of products designed to help you quit smoking. I have not personally smoked, but I have friends who have tried to quit and after a few weeks got right back into it. I think products like Nicorette can really help make quitting easier.

Edit: Good luck! You're one of my favorite pros and I'm rooting for you

ClysmiC

United States2182 Posts

October 23 2012 20:20 GMT

Nice man! Good luck! I think quitting cigarettes will definitely increase your quality of life, and hopefully your new motivation can positively impact your SC2 results as well. Gogo Ret!

Bumblebee

2733 Posts

October 23 2012 20:21 GMT

I have absolutely no doubts on this. You will do it. Let's do a good effort on finding some proper food at events even though it can be really hard at times! ^_~

Teodice

Sweden600 Posts

October 23 2012 20:21 GMT

Looking good Ret! I wish you the best of luck and looking forward to your stream! Keep us updated and do not loose faith!

Best regards, annoying player manager WCS Europe Globen! :D

TheEmulator

PrairieLand13470 Posts

October 23 2012 20:23 GMT

#10

GL Ret. I will be cheering for you along the way

United States6116 Posts

October 23 2012 20:24 GMT

#11

Good luck.

I'd been smoking for about six years as well when I decided I'd quit. I'd tried quitting seriously thrice before, and all ended in failure.

I tried switching to electronic cigarettes my most recent attempt, and to be frank, as long as you really just don't enjoy smoking anymore, they work in weening you off. It took me a while to shop around and find a brand I liked, but now that I have, I haven't had a cigarette in three months. I haven't had a strong desire to have a cigarette since the first week or two of switching to e-cigs (except once at a party where I was very drunk -_- ).

Over time I've been smoking even the e-cigs less and less. I use disposable ones, and I used to go through one in about five days at first. Now one lasts me around two to three weeks.

If you're struggling with the cold turkey, I'd recommend looking into e-cigs. I won't recommend a brand to you (I don't want to make it look like I'm trying to push some referral shit), especially 'cause there's tons of reviews and resources you can find if you look around. Most smoke shops carry e-cigs now anyway (don't know about Europe, though).

Anyway, quitting smoking is a bitch! Good luck! You've been a badass since the BW days (:

FuDDx

United States4817 Posts

October 23 2012 20:24 GMT

#12

I quit smoking on June 15th. Been using the E-cig that Mondi recommended its great!!

Edit: I had been smoking heavily for 19 years, the last 3 or so smoking roll your own non-filter. I still love the act and idea of smoking a cig but I have managed to stay strong with the e-cig Ive been using .

http://www.e-cigarette-forum.com/forum/ the TL of e-cigs

Edit #2 Brand I use is a local supplier of e-juice and they sell the ego brand I have a Ego-titanium + Show Spoiler +

http://freedomsmokeusa.com/

United States6116 Posts

October 23 2012 20:25 GMT

#13

What brand do you use, Fudd?

ForTheDream

Germany1028 Posts

October 23 2012 20:25 GMT

#14

Good luck man!

GornWood

Germany119 Posts

October 23 2012 20:25 GMT

#15

I am sure you can do both. Lose your unhealthy addiction to smoking and junk food! By the way, I also think you can go ahead and win MLG Dallas

I wish you good luck of course, but remember that quitting will be hard not only at the beginning but after like 2-3 months you should really be careful to not start again.

ketomai

United States2677 Posts

October 23 2012 20:27 GMT

#16

Awesome ret! I remember you've tried quitting before, it's definitely not easy. Perhaps you should quit a little more slowly, use that motivation to decrease the amount of smokes. DJwheat recommends those electric cigs things if you've never tried those.

GL! :D

Bunn

Estonia875 Posts

October 23 2012 20:28 GMT

#17

Good luck!