The “Jumping From A Great Height” School Of Changing Habits.

Have you ever stood at the top of a tall building and heard a voice in your head whisper at you to jump?

I don’t mean that you genuinely considered committing suicide, nothing that dramatic, I mean that sometimes it’s as if there’s a part of you that believes you’d be fine if you jumped, and dares you to try.

This same part of us is behind more realistic temptations like smoking and drinking. Again, it tells us that we’ll be fine even though we know we won’t. It’s just that consequences won’t be so immediate, or messy.

Indulging in a habit that we know is bad for us can be fun, but it’s fun in the same way that falling through the air is fun. It’s exhilarating, and life-affirming and even occasionally liberating, but we know that somewhere below us there will be consequences. The ground is waiting.

So we have three options:

1. Hitting the ground.
2. Don’t jump.
3. Figure out how to use a parachute.

But instead of thinking of these as discrete choices, it might be more helpful to think of them as steps along a path. Well, consider them in this order though, that way we still end up with a parachute at the end.