Only By way of Understanding
Bad habits whose negative consequences are not obvious, consistent and severe are the habits that a human being will go in circles of quit and relapse for a long time. Such habits are like truths mixed with untruth, they are pleasures mixed with pain. It is for this reason that it takes a very long time for someone to deem the habit unacceptable to them hence quit.
The surrogate ways which are really the delay of an inevitable relapse is approaching quitting bad habits by way of adherence to a prescription such as it is not healthy, or it is bad for you, of doing for benefits, or quitting because of motivation to do so that was picked from some source etc…I don’t believe in them because they have not worked in my experience, they do not answer the question of what is in it for me? They are insincere because they are largely an imposition upon oneself to live up to an idea or a rule hence ineffective.
What I have found to work is if the individual realizes over an over again that such and such habit is unsustainable for whatever reason that is personal. It has to be personal and deep not an imposed idea or a conclusion reached by sheer rationalization. I am sure that an alcoholic knows rationally that alcohol is harming him as an idea but if he consistently sees the negative consequences of his habit and it becomes totally unacceptable that they continue in that path then they will just stop. Rationalization is not deep enough, it is not a strong enough motive to stop anything.
The thing to look at when trying to quit an habit is honesty, one has to really be honest with themselves to avoid playing empty games of quitting and relapsing over and over again. One has to examine without biases, just plain honestly what his ‘negative’ habit does for him. The ‘what is in it for me’ question. The answer to this question has to be personal — that is directly within ones own practical experience, if someone has read a lot or consumed a lot of content, he or she tends to be clever. He will give himself an intellectual, spiritual or some conceptual answer, which really is a non-answer and hence fails to see the immediate reality of his situation. Why this examination? Because if there was nothing in it for you no one would continue indulging in a certain habit.
Why this sort of approach, because habituation is in the domain the mind, it has to do with how the mind works. One has to work in accordance with how the mind works in order to be effective in trying to stop an habit. The mind cannot be approached blindly, it has to be approached with understanding. The reason why a prescriptive modality does not work in quitting habits is because the mind see the insincerity of the prescription, hence chews it up and spits it out. It does this every time. It is in the interest of the mind to achieve a higher level of existence but if is forcefully taken to that place it will resist and retaliate, it will create all sorts of turmoil within the human, it is only until the human’s quest is sincere and absolutely non negotiable that it will acquiesce to the person’s will. It is for this reason that all things must be approached by way of understanding and not by force…
