Wow -- I really, really try to stick to one blog a day, but the responses to my earlier blog got me thinking, and I want to write this down before I forget it!!
The response was to the people-pleasing element of what I was talking about and that it is a form of dishonesty. But what struck me so hard a few minutes ago in reading those responses was that even though I have quit for longer periods than 25 days during my 50 year smokathon (even once for almost 3 years) I NEVER had any kind of revelations about myself during that time. I was, as Allen Carr says, "white knuckling" it. That meant that even for almost three years, because I thought I was missing something, I was simply a person who didn't smoke at the time. I really don't think I ever thought of myself as a non-smoker.
What a difference now! First of all, I have had a pretty darn happy quit so far, and I can't see EVER going back. And because I understand so much more now -- duh, I've been an addict all my life -- it is changing my life in really unexpected (and kind of wonderful) ways. This is the first time I've thought of it this way and I got pretty excited about it. I knew from the very beginning that this quit was different, and I was so right!
