, Research Paper
You may not recognise me at first. But trust me, you know me well. I’m the voice that makes you crave those “Light and Tangy” potato chips, and the mocha cream puff – the one with inch-thick cream and smooth lemon vanilla custard, sandwiched between light choux pastry with mocha flavoured icing on top, drizzled with chocolate. Do you know who I am now?I’m the reason you smoke 20 cigarettes every day – you try to give up, but we both know you always cave in and smoke all the more. We both know you’ll never give up. You like it too much. In fact, you need one right now, don’t you? Go on: have one. You know it’s no risk, even sensible Logic tells you that people get killed just crossing the road. “We’ve all gotta die sometime” – right? And, don’t worry about that cream puff – you can walk the dogs later to work the calories off. Ok, so we both know Procrastination will come along and you’ll put it off until tomorrow – but don’t worry about that now. You need a cigarette and one more is not going to kill you (not right now anyway). Why not enjoy the moment? Got ya! See: it works every time!Remember the other day when you “chose” not to go to school because, after all, you weren’t going to miss anything important, were you? That was me. Ha! There you were, snuggled in your fluffy doona, sleepy, and warm. As you woke, you sensed the dark clouds outside dimming the room, and you heard the rain splattering on the roof and lashing at the windows, and it was such a good idea to stay there wasn’t it? Yes, you certainly thought so at the time. You missed the start of a new topic at school, but hey, you’ll catch up. Of course the first thing you’ll have to do is finish catching up on the theory you missed from before … but you can do it … later. Things always work out – just go with the flow – hey, I wouldn’t want you to worry now, would I? Trust me!Trust you? Now that you’ve revealed your true colours I realise what a fool I’ve been. I’ve listened to you all along, going against what I truly knew was good for me, all the time unaware of your power over me. It was you that talked me into going out for dinner and to see a movie with friends the other night when I knew I had an assignment due the next day. Better Judgement tried to get through to me but couldn’t be heard over your alluring False Logic. Better Judgement tried to tell me that I could catch up with friends another time, but you told me that there was no need to miss out on an enjoyable night. You lied and said I could quickly finish off my assignment when I got home. You and your friend, Self-Sabotage, tricked me! I had to stay up into the early hours of the morning to finish that assignment – I got three hours sleep. And, what’s worse, I wasn’t happy with what I handed in. It could have been much better, if I had had more time…It was also you that made me buy those new jeans when I couldn’t afford to. They were on special, you kept reminding me – I’d save $40 by buying them now. At that price, you said, they’d be sold out in a few days. It was an opportunity too good to pass up, you said, so I bought them. I was late paying the rent because of you! Trust you? Never again!And, now that I know you are the reason why I haven’t been able to quit smoking, you can expect that to change too! Don’t bother trying your tricks on me any more. I’m going to quit smoking. I know how you work now and that means that I’m the one with the power. I know how to extinguish your efforts to control me. And I’ve got help: I now have Inner Strength to stop me from falling for your False Logic, and I have Self-Preservation to remind me to cherish my physical and mental health. I listen to Reality and Truth now. They tell me that smoking is bad for my health, that it makes me, and everything around me, smell … and it’s burning a huge hole in my pocket. So, Temptation, how does it feel to be powerless, impotent? Surely you don’t expect me to continue smoking now that I know how you lie to me, trick me and put me down. You think I’m weak do you? Well, you’re going to wish you never…Oh shut up and cut out the stupid rhetoric will you? Have another cigarette and a glass of wine – you know it’ll make you feel better, and then I won’t have to put up with all of this self-absorbed rubbish any more. Enough is enough!Oh … Ok, sorry if I upset you.