I’m very, very susceptible to addiction, but the thing that makes it easiest for me to curb a habit is to pretend I’ve already moved past it. If I think about junk food, I intentionally think of overly sweet, salty and artificial foods and (internally) express my distaste. With smoking, I think of the smell of an ashtray in the rain; with drinking, I think of cleaning up day old beer with a hangover.
Saying “I don’t really have a sweet tooth” is what made me lose my sweet tooth.
This is very good strategy. Like the infamous “fake it till you make it”. But actually vocalizing it makes it even more powerful.
If anyone remembers the movie Closer from 2004, there’s a scene where Clive Owen’s character refuses a cigarette while almost failing at it. He settles it with a phrase: “I’ve given up.”. You can see he is not completely sure about that, but now that he said it out loud, he made it true.
I’m very, very susceptible to addiction, but the thing that makes it easiest for me to curb a habit is to pretend I’ve already moved past it. If I think about junk food, I intentionally think of overly sweet, salty and artificial foods and (internally) express my distaste. With smoking, I think of the smell of an ashtray in the rain; with drinking, I think of cleaning up day old beer with a hangover.
Saying “I don’t really have a sweet tooth” is what made me lose my sweet tooth.
This is very good strategy. Like the infamous “fake it till you make it”. But actually vocalizing it makes it even more powerful.
If anyone remembers the movie Closer from 2004, there’s a scene where Clive Owen’s character refuses a cigarette while almost failing at it. He settles it with a phrase: “I’ve given up.”. You can see he is not completely sure about that, but now that he said it out loud, he made it true.