I've watched the self-destruction that seems to be pervasive this week, edged around the periphery of tender feelings, clamped my mouth shut for fear of retribution, sat on my hands to head off precipitous responses, turned my snark-o-meter to an all time low due to severe absence of tolerance. I do this because I realize that when someone is addicted, they are selfish, it's ALL about them.
When I picked up those cigarettes in the first place, it was ALL about me. I had to pick up the cigarette, I had to light it, I had to inhale. For whatever reason I began smoking, it was a personal reason that I may have thought involved others' opinions or emotions, but in truth, it was ALL about me.
When I let that addiction rule where I went, who I went with, how long I stayed, the car I rode in, the hotel I stayed in, where I shopped, where I ate, where I lived, it was ALL about me. Sure, my family was with me but I allowed an addiction to rule their lives as well, because it was ALL about me.
When I decided to quit, no one's pain was quite so severe, no one's withdrawal had as many complications, no one's personal life was quite as difficult as mine. Because my addiction made me important, my release of that addiction was even more important. My way was the right way, my issues unique, no one had ever quit like me before. Because I was at least trying, it was ALL about me.
Maybe the biggest lesson an addict needs to learn, and what I've seen that successful quitters here have learned, is that NOTHING is ALL about you. If you can't take a few moments to realize that there are other people around you, real people in unique situations, you may not have your quit in place. That there are quitters that may have more knowledge than you, that may understand more than you, that have moved on to a place where they can turn and help the addict behind them, then you are still thinking like an addict, you still think it's ALL about you.
Today I honour those who have given up not only smoking, but the addict's mind-set that "it's all about me" and adapted the "it's all about US" mantra. Those quitters who renounce the gang mentality of high school, the "us" versus "them", "friends" versus "foe", "jocks" versus "nerds" and focus on "smokers" and "non-smokers". Those quitters who have decided to help someone as blind as me open my eyes, whether I wanted to see the truth in what they had to say or not, and to understand that in this journey, there is no success in trying, only in doing.
