Learn from my mistakes.
Bullying is a euphemism for what I experienced at school.
Students were cruel, and teachers blamed me for being weak and encouraged kids to bully freaks like me.
(The magical 80’s that everyone is nostalgic about were not so magical 🙂
I quickly associated food with being safe. Because after spending 5 hours — every day — at school receiving threats and many days of group beatings, the food in my house, away from all that, comforted me.
It was as if spaghetti bolognese could hug me and tell me, “Relax, mate, it’s going to be okay.”
So from then on, I started bingeing on carbohydrates whenever life got tough.
This made me live many years 40 Kilos overweight, but that was not the end. As the years went by, carbohydrates were joined by nicotine and alcohol: anything that made me feel safe.
I hit rock bottom after two decades of addictions. Then I started a path that continues today because when you are addicted, you never stop being addicted, even if you no longer consume the substance to which you got hooked.
And there are three great lessons that any addict can teach you.
- That you can be addicted to practically anything that momentarily disassociates you from reality (this includes the soap opera you watch in the afternoon 🙂
- If you commit, you can dig out of the blackest, most horrible hole you can imagine.
- That breaking your word puts you back in the hole.
There is no such thing as a last cigarette or drink for me. If I take it, I fall back into the hole and know it.
I have already betrayed myself too many times to continue to deceive myself.
You cannot dialogue with Satan — Pope Francis.
Note: replace the word Satan with the addiction that keeps you imprisoned by your impulses and self-destructive processes.
- You cannot dialogue with tobacco.
- You cannot dialogue with junk food.
- You cannot dialogue with sedentarism.
- You cannot dialogue with alcohol.
- You cannot dialogue with gambling.
You get it, don’t you?
Let’s go on.
In an interview, the Pope affirmed that whoever is willing to dialogue with Satan is lost because Satan is more intelligent than us.
And it is true.
Sin comes from the Latin peccatum and means crime, fault, or guilty action.
Sin is everything that initiates self-destructive processes in you. It is much more than a bad habit.
A bad habit is getting up late. If you continue to do a sin, it ends you: drinking, smoking, eating junk food in excess, etc.
Evil surrounds you and turns your head, and you are lost. — Pope Francis.
Every good addict knows their self-deception mechanisms inside out.
- “I go to the free buffet this Friday with friends, and on Monday, I start the diet again.”
- “I’ll have the last drink, and tomorrow, I’ll quit; we’re celebrating.
- “I’m just going to smoke the cigarette after lunch.”
And every good addict knows that listening to self-deception is the beginning of the end.
Because once you break your word and give yourself one last indulgence, you end up relapsing much harder.
- The one who has quit smoking, and breaks his promise, ends up smoking double or triple what he smoked when he decided to leave.
- The one who decided to eat well binges on junk food because he deludes that he can diet again at the beginning of the month.
- The one who falls back into drinking ends up drinking on the sly until he gets caught and ends up arguing with everyone until he is left alone.
I know this from experience. I have lived it in my flesh; nobody has had to tell me about it.
Pride is behind every relapse.
The “I’m in control” has tripped me up so many times over the years that I have had to admit that my ego gets me into trouble.
Believing myself brighter than a world designed to get me addicted to its products and services is not intelligent.
Billions of euros in advertising vs. your will.
- It’s tough to get unhooked from junk food when there’s an ad for hamburgers at every bus stop.
- It’s tough to get unhooked from gambling if you are chased by pop-up offers from gambling sites every time you surf the internet.
- It’s tough to get unhooked from alcohol if alcoholic beverages sponsor your favorite music festivals.
It’s an epic battle you cannot win unless you are humble.
So, if you have an addiction and want some advice: don’t break your promises when you kick your habit. Never let your guard down because everything is designed to make you relapse. And the only way not to do that is not to trust.
- Brands are not your friends.
- Substances are not your friends.
- Those happy people on TV commercials who tell you, “Call, and we will give you up to 3000 thousand euros for your holidays”, are not your friends; they want you to get into debt and live beyond your means (which is also an addiction.).
What is culturally acceptable does not have to be good for you. You must redefine your life and live it healthily, not how advertising tells you you should.
A virtual hug
AG