Be Honest With Yourself

Now we are back to loving the truth. People who use the excuse of their body being the problem in an addictive situation are not only in danger of alienating themselves from being able to love their own physical being and thus reducing their quality of life, but they are also indulging in a form of self delusion which prevents them from ever dealing with the problem.

A bit like someone telling a police officer that his car wanted to drive through the red lights because it likes moving but not stopping. It is true the car will not stop at the lights of its own accord. This is simply Newtonian physics, "every body in a state of motion will remain in a state of motion unless acted upon by a net force....". However this is why we have a brake pedal, if we ever let the car tell us when and where to stop then we are no longer doing the driving the car is. We will have abdicated our humanity, instead of rising above the physical aspects of our being and thus ennobling them we have fallen below it. By doing this we degrade ourselves and become less than the beasts of the fields.

Self delusion is rife in many human minds, and is potentially a very great evil, in its worst form it allows the greatest of despotic monsters to believe they are actually angels. In its milder forms it merely hinders mental growth, saps your ability to perform and gets you into all sorts of relationship troubles while at the same time making you a problem for everyone else. Getting into the habit of being honest with yourself is to do yourself a great kindness.

However, like all good habits being honest with yourself will require nurturing as a habit, you will run into mental flak from all your bad habits, none of which will like the idea of your being honest with yourself. In the long run, if you keep working at trying to understand why being honest with your self should be good for you the rewards will be well worth the effort. Think of it in terms of our gardening analogy, if you plant a tomato plant in your garden and then just leave it, it will probably be dead in a few weeks, and even if it survives you will get very little fruit from it, however properly tended it will produce much fruit and be a real positive addition to your garden.