Old Sins Revisited

One would think that after one has spent almost two months without Nicotine, one’s addiction would finally be under control. Unfortunately, that is not the case. I stopped smoking 59 days ago, and lately I have been haunted by memories of my mistakes, which I have made in the past. At first, I was very surprised, because I honestly thought that I had made peace with this part of my life. Luckily for me, my internal addict revealed the name of the game soon after the memories started to haunt me. Its impatience ruined its master plan for luring me back to the ranks of the smokers.

I should probably be the happiest person on earth, because I was able to dodge the bullet once again. It is a shame that I am not that lucky. I am pretty sure that every one of us has made mistakes. However, I am a perfectionist. My mistakes always remind me that I am far from being perfect. I have learned to tolerate that fact, but perfectionism will always be one of my soft spots. I am aware that I cannot change the past, but I am still irritated, because I know that I will spend the next weeks dealing with all the things in my past, which I regret. Isn’t life a bitch?

I have got a message for my internal addict. I will not start smoking again. It does not matter, what my internal addict tries to do, but I will not give up. I don’t care, if I will feel like shit, but at least I am not smoking. It does not solve any of my problems, and at the moment, smoking cessation seem to be one of the rare things I can honestly be proud of. I might be a perfectionist, but I am not stupid. I understand that minimizing the amount of mistakes I will make in the future, will make me feel better about myself. In fact, I will start minimizing my mistakes right now by saying NO to my urge to smoke.

A friend of mine once told me that i should not be so hard on myself. It is a good advice for a person in my situation. I am not the first person in the world, who has stopped smoking, and I will not be the last one. My experiences are not unique, and it is normal to make mistakes as long as you learn from them. It hurts my ego to admit this, but I think that an important part of my healing process is to stop acting (and thinking) like a drama queen, and concentrate on my smoke free future.