On following my own advice
G'day reader(s). I wrote this post a while ago, but felt more like writing to clear my head, rather than necessarily intending to post it. It started as a vent, and then I decided to expand it a bit. Having polished it up a little bit, I think it might be a useful read, so if you get in a negative headspace, remember that others do that too, and if you are aware of it, you can take steps to fix it. Without delaying any further, here's said vent:
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Just going to have a bit of a vent/whinge today. Some nights I just lose entire hours to playing on showdown mindlessly. Especially if I'm feeling frustrated with myself and how I'm playing It can be a bit of a vicious cycle, as I play to try to get a game that I'm happy with, or even sometimes even just to win a game.
Some of it comes down to procrastinating other IRL tasks mostly, but still, it's frustrating to get in that negative battling habit and then keep battling even when I know I'm not playing well.
Then again, I have found myself generally exerting better control in my Battle Spot practice though, generally limiting the number of battles unless I specifically want to emulate a long competition, and writing notes helps keep me focused. That's that's a positive. I still have the odd day where I'm not focused on Battle Spot either - although that comes down to me recognising my mental state I think. It turns out that even when I try specifically to concentrate, being past a certain level of tired muddies my mental processes enough to impact my battle performance beyond what I can overcome in that session. That's something I'll have to work on, and keep in mind for competitions, both online and IRL.
And despite the former complaint, here I am as an article author advocating people schedule their time and plan their playing. I guess it's a case of do as I say, not do as I do sometimes. At least I'm aware of it. The lesson here is probably that even people who appear organised and disciplined have times when they just slack off a bit mentally. So don't beat yourself up too much when you do, but be aware of it, be aware of if you can afford to do that, and fix it if it needs fixing. Awareness of yourself, your mental and physical state, and your decision making is actually pretty important towards being your best you on a given day.
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Well, that's the end of that vent, hope it didn't drag on too much for you. Until next time.
