So I've read that when you are exerting massive amounts of willpower in an aspect of your life you lose it in other areas. I wish I had read this before shopping myself to near ruin over the last year (I have a budget now!)

I thought I'd try a little experiment.

After work yesterday I didn't have a cig and vowed not to think about it. When my brain whispered "smoke" to me I shot back at it "why?!" and kept myself busy and entertained.

Fast forward a few hours and I am having problems. It felt like the not smoking was going ok. I had pushed back all thoughts of smoking. I chewed on a pen to relieve the fidgeting. But my brain was doing something really really strange to me. It was like a haunting.

Everything would be fine and then I would get a flash of some food or taste, out of nowhere. A very clear picture of what that food looked like on the shelf at the convience store next door. The smell of peanut butter right when you open a new jar like it was in front of me. Mind you I never think about peanut butter ...

I'd push each impulse away only to have another jump out at me a few minutes later. I finally smoked, and the food ghosts disappeared.
Sooo ... maybe I should shoot for 110 pounds and THEN quit smoking?

You can have all those thoughts and not act on them. It's not like you will never have peanut butter again so you better have some just in case. You might find that they pass after a couple days. I don't know about willpower in one area sapping other areas. I find that it's contagious; willpower in one area increases it in other areas. YMMV.

I said that to myself many many times, as soon as I reach my goal weight, I'll quit. Till I thought 'why wait till I reach my goal, if I can quit now?' And i quit smoking, this is my 2nd week. I don't know if I've lost weight, I didnt weigh myself before, but I know for a fact I havent gained. AND I do feel slimmer and healthier.
you should do whatever works best for you. Quitting smoking not only gave me that, but also a huge self esteem boost. Showed me I could put my mind to something and do it, achieve it. Feels amazing.

I've always noticed this, and have even said that in order to lose weight, I always had to drop almost everything else I was doing (or so it seemed), and even getting my masters degree in psych didn't really change how I thought about it, until recently.

I realized (and realized I should have realized sooner, since it's a basic behavioral principle I learned as an undergraduate psych major over 20 years ago) that this is what happens when the behavior is stated negatively.

That is it only happens when you're trying "not" to do something, not when you're trying to "do" things. When you actively do things, it seems that the more you accomplish, the more you CAN accomplish. We all know at least one of those people who somehow seems to do EVERYTHING, and no matter how busy they are, they always seem to be able to take on a new project. There's a saying I've heard in business and social/charity club settings "if you want something done, ask a busy person."

But, "not" doing something requires a lot of concentration. In psych classes we were always taught to set behavioral objectives in positive terms - "doing" something as opposed to "not doing something."

And I've changed my philosophy for weight loss in that direction. Instead of "not doing" goals, I've set alot more "doing something" goals, and it does seem to help. Although, I cannot discount the possibility that this is a coincidence - as I'm now on disability and have all the time in the world to devote to myself. When I was working crazy, mad I always thought that not having to work would make weight loss easy - well it's still not easy. But I can't prove, even to myself, that having the extra time isn't making it doable.

There really is a limit to what we can accomplish on this earth, and prioritizing is the only option. Sometimes weight loss falls to the bottom of the priority list, and that's not great, but sometimes it seems that society sees a fat person as a worthless hunk of goo no matter what else they are doing. You could save the world single-handedly, ending world hunger and discovering the secret to world peace and you'd still be "disgusting" if you had 50 lbs or more to lose.

Interesting.

True and so sad.

I think that in most cases being obese really is a "failure" of sorts. It's something we have a problem with in life. I don't think the problem is in calling it a failure of sorts, but in making it "the" failure in life. It just happens to be immediately visible. That's all. Obesity does not mean a person has any other issues, or that a thin person doesn't. It just doesn't tell us much at all about a person. That should be patently obvious. But society acts like obese people are failures as a person, and thin people are not. And frankly, I think probably the odds are the reverse. When you don't meet society's ideals, you may depend more on inner qualities that matter a he** of a lot more.

Sorry if failure is totally the wrong word. I couldn't think of the word I wanted. But I don't think obesity is just OK - I just think it's ridiculous for it to be the only thing. To ourselves or to others.

I don't *always* wash the dishes immediately. Sometimes, it's the right choice to leave them and enjoy yourself. But sometimes I'm just plain lazy. I don't need to pretend it was OK, but it isn't a big thing in my life either. I don't think saying something isn't OK has to mean guilt and shame and hate.

I'm sure that you're looking for a different word, JulieJ08.

For something to be a "failure," there has to be an attempt. So, if someone was trying all their life to keep their weight in the normal range, but they became overweight anyway, that would be a failure. But how many of us were trying not to become fat, as a clearly stated goal?

I can't honestly say that I was thinking of life that way. I was thinking of what my next tasty food indulgence was going to be. Oh--and then I'd try to lose weight, and then I'd lose it, maybe, and then I'd stop watching, and over time, gain it back. And you know the rest of that merry-go-round.

I do know that I wasn't thinking that I wanted to become obese. No one on this board, I dare say, set out to get fat! It just wasn't what anyone wanted to be when they grew up! But see, we don't get fat after ONE indulgent meal... It takes many. So mostly we get the enjoyment and don't see immediate negative results.

With smoking, it's an immediate high also. And you learn not to notice the negative effects. Of course, the REAL negative effects take awhile--lung cancer, emphysema, heart disease... they don't just hit you overnight.

But getting back to the original question... One definition of addiction is: Deciding not to do something and then finding yourself doing it anyway. This can apply to smoking, drinking alcohol, eating peanut butter...

So, ginny, when you gave in and had the cigarette, you were acting on the addiction. Your craving for nicotine tried to "trick" you by conjuring up food... and so you gave in and smoked.

IMO, smoking is a terrible danger, much more than being overweight. I suggest that you stop smoking ASAP. Don't go nuts with food--but get through quitting smoking first.

Jay

Hee, hee - sounds like me. I'll quit as soon as xxx happens - and it's almost always something like "I'll quit as soon as I win the lottery"

Actually, that seems to be very true for a lot of people. There's another thread with a link to an article with "10 reasons you're not losing weight" and one of the points it makes is that people who tackle multiple goals at the same time actually show a better success rate than those who take one step at a time. Not sure if that would be me though - I did end up diving in whole hog with the eating better and exercising but, if I had actually looked at the whole list of changes I've made before I started making them, I might have been overwhelmed and gone running for the cookie jar.

It really is the same with smoking - you don't take your first puff and become a chain smoker. I can remember very clearly being just an "occasional and only to be sociable" smoker (this was a while ago, quite a while ago ) which gave way to "I can quit any time". Pfah!

Let's see, I was also going to quit if they ever got more expensive than 75 cents a pack. Again with the Pfah.

I know this isn't supposed to be a "quit smoking support forum" but I do think there are a lot of the things I've learned from developing my new WOE plan that I'm going to be able to apply to the "quit smoking plan" that's currently under development (Like getting really good at recognizing the excuses ) I'm always really interested in what other posters have to say about their efforts to quit.

I agree that smoking is a very different type of thing to give up or work on..

I've found that throughout losing weight, it has only given me more motivation to do other things and work on other aspects, but I agree that sometimes focusing a lot on one aspect can take away from something else. In general though, I'm doing better in school and socially too, but when I went into this journey I went into it knowing that weight wasn't the only thing I wanted to change.. and I'm still in the process of finding myself because I'm always changing when it comes to taste and small things like that.
Honestly I find it is easier to lose weight when it isn't the only thing you are trying to improve.. b/c in my case, weight has had a huge impact on how I carry myself and it affected my moods and it made me feel depressed.
That is how it affects me, but it's different with everyone I guess.

I've never tried to quit smoking. I wasn't trying to quit the other night either, if I had thought about it in those turns I wouldn't have made it 1/2 an hour. I was just going to "not smoke". You may not see the difference there but it's huge. Quitting smoking is this big thing, but there are plenty of times I don't smoke. Like when I'm sleeping, or working.

I'm at the stage where I want to want to quit smoking. I wish I wanted to because of the, you know, death ... that and the money. I just love it sooooo much.

I eat too much, smoke too much, spend too much because I get bored. Hysterically bored. Food and new consumer goods are there to keep my mind busy. I always have books on tape. Sometimes I find myself working out with an exercise video on the computer DVD, a DVD on the DVD, and music for tempo. Playing a new video game while watching a new dvd, snacking, and smoking would be the most soothing thing in the world to me.

That is, in fact, how I gained so much weight. How I lost so much was by obsessing about the topic, which was fun for my brain for some reason. Learning everything I could about it, planning things, reasoning through disparate theories and positing my own. But obsessions fade and now I lose out of habit. I don't think this will work with smoking. I don't think I could do both at once.

OH! this is the article that started me on all of this:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/02/op...=1&oref=slogin

Oh, OK. So you're just having a totally theoretical discussion.

Jay