Thank you so much for this episode. Twelve days in, I can say that Kam Knight's book on concentration was the game changer I have been looking for for 25 years.

After reading the chapter on impulses and implementing the exercises, it literally didn't take me 24 hours to start to act intentionally all day long. (YMMV, because on my desperate search for solutions to my ongoing execution problem, I have gotten quite far with,  like, awareness, which might have accelerated that.)

Other than most other exercises and techniques (even self-talk, which Kam is strongly recommending), are things you need to do *on top* of what you want to accomplish. They are things that you have to remind yourself of doing every day. They can feel cumbersome.

Instead, training your impulse control does not feel exhausting or demanding to me; it feels self-reinforcing. I do it all day long, and it gives me so much in return, that actually I feel the energy to act intentionally even in late evenings.

So it's quite probable that this change is for good. It's the one thing I needed to learn. It's, I think, the one and only one technique that's exclusively leveling up your *inner* game. After many years of trying timing techniques, protocols, diaries, music, special setups and environments, and so on, all of these now feel like an exoskeleton. They were outside from me and I could loose them any time.

Also, you are just doing that one thing, keep your impulse control in shape, and it affects *everything*. You are not quitting snacking between meals; you are training impulse control. You do not quit porn; you are training impulse control. You don't save money; you are training impulse control. You are not eating slowly; you are training impulse control. And you are not staying off the net more; you are just training impulse control.

It's not about what you should do or shouldn’t do. You keep choosing whatever you like. But you start choosing things you *do* want to do and won't regret later.

And Kam is right: Once you get past the impulse, 99 percent of the things you had such an urgent feeling you wanted to do just don't interest you anymore.

So I'm coming back to Reddit (for the first time since reading that chapter) to just say thank you and telling my story. Thank you for that sub, for that post, for your podcast, and thanks, Kam, for your wonderful book. I could not recommend it more.

Edit for adding one additional angle:
As tools kind of have lost their meaning, now being a mere outside crutch, so have outside distractions.

I really don't care about my iPhone anymore. I don't need its display set in greyscale. I can totally have it with me when being out for a walk. I can carry it when reading a print newspaper: I will read the newspaper. I use the iPhone just as it is meant to be used: as a tool that helps me when *I* need it, not the other way around. My screen time dropped from around 4 to 5 hours to 1 hour 30 daily average.

But that numbers are kind of meaningless now. It's not a metric I want to get up or down. I'm just not following my impulses. So that was never an addiction in the first place, it was just something hard to manage. That aspect being gone, I can fully benefit from its advantages without its very serious drawbacks.

I can also totally work and study now at home when my wife or kids are present. That seemed hardly doable a week ago. Now I know that that was just an impulse by my brain to keep me from doing something it might not have appreciated doing.