You are fortunate if you have learned the difference between temporary defeat and failure, more fortunate still if you have learned the truth that the very seed of success is dormant in every defeat that you experience.

Napoleon Hill

A few years ago, I quit smoking after many, many attempts. Over the 20 some-odd years, I’d tried cold turkey, patches, inhalers, you name it, with varying amounts of success, but had never succeeded in giving up permanently.

Then, one day I’d read a great book, The Easy Way to Quit Smoking by Allen Carr, which gave me the lightbulb moment I needed which was, basically, the only thing stopping me from quitting permanently was fear; fear that I would live the rest of my life missing smoking and the fear that I would never be able to enjoy myself ever again. After all, every pleasurable experience in my life was either followed by, or done in conjunction with, smoking: eating, drinking, socializing, laying on the beach, enjoying a beautiful view, getting away from my desk at work, sex; all of them.
My Eureka Moment

Once I’d read this, and it really sank in, and was made to see that there are millions of people who have never smoked who live perfectly happy lives, I began to believe that I could do it, too. I saw the “pleasure” of smoking for what it was, the satisfaction of an addiction and finally understood that your brain will play tricks on you to get what it wants. In this case, it wanted the chemical hit of nicotine to satisfy all it’s little rattled and deprived receptors. You see, my brain had made satisfying foreplay of all the rituals of smoking to keep me doing it. You form attachments with your smoking paraphenalia. Maybe you roll your own, as I did, and have a nice tin or leather pouch to keep the tobacco in or a beautiful, shiny, tactile lighter that someone gave you as a gift. You not only have the ritual of taking the cigarette out of its box, but of rolling it, too. You make a real physical connection with this object before you put it in your mouth. It’s really hard to give that stuff up. Harder, in fact, than kicking the physical addiction, which really is the easy part.

I finally truly believed that I had an emotional attachment to a habit I didn’t want. I didn’t want to smoke anymore. I wasn’t quitting for health reasons or for my partner or children but because I WANTED TO. So, I formed a mantra (“I don’t want to be an addict anymore”, it was true and I believed it) and repeated this to myself every time the urge hit. It was a nightmare at first, and only seemed to get worse for the first 3 weeks or so, but after that, I would go whole days without thinking about it, then weeks, then months and then, one day, I not only didn’t miss it, I didn’t WANT to miss it either. I was GLAD I’d quit and happy to never smoke again.

I had successfully changed my mindset.

I’d made up my mind to quit, and I did. No patches, no hypnotherapy, no acupuncture, no crutches. I wanted it, so I got it.

Now, looking back as a non smoker, and in the interest of changing my self talk and limiting beliefs, I realize I hadn’t “failed” all those times, I was practising. Every time you try but don’t achieve your expected result, you must learn from your attempt. In every situation where we attempt to gain something, and try again and again without quite getting it right, we call it “practice” be it sports, music, art, dance, whatever. When a violinist plays the same piece over and over and over until it’s perfect, no one would say they were failing repeatedly, would they?

However, when we talk about behaviour we want to stop, yet aren’t able to, we call it “failure” and this is just putting more unwanted Christmas jumpers in our emotional baggage.

I have not failed 700 times. I have not even failed once. I have succeeded in proving that those 700 ways will not work. When I have eliminated the ways that will not work, I will find the way that will work.

Thomas Edison

You can make different choices

So, every day, I know that something in my head is stopping me from achieving my dreams and I won’t stop searching/contemplating/thinking/pondering/examining until I find it. For instance, I know for sure that sometimes I snack when what I really want is just a hug. Naughty, naughty, tricksy brain.

Your vision will become clear only when you look into your heart. Who looks outside, dreams. Who looks inside, awakens.

Carl Jung

In the meantime, I’m practising being the person I want to be and I’m slowly changing my mindset about my eating habits and remembering that my brain is playing tricks on me again. This change doesn’t happen overnight (it didn’t when I quit smoking, either), but my new mantra is “I can make different choices”. This, too, is true and I believe it utterly and it’s true for you, too. If I don’t get it right, I chalk it up to experience, think about why I did what I did, resolve to choose differently next time and move on.

There’s nothing wrong with giving in to temptation and having your slice of cake. Just not every day, and not the whole cake. It’s your choice, after all.

But before you eat it, remember, you can make a different choice.