Why don�t people want what�s best for them? Or more specifically, why don�t I?

At the last Smart Recovery meeting I attended, a man who'd been sober for years said that while he thinks he has a handle on not drinking, he needs to work on not WANTING to drink. Whoa, I thought. There�s the golden ticket. Because what�s the point of spending your whole life trying to prevent yourself from doing what you really want to do (unless what you really want to do involves the deaths of innocent people)?

At first this idea -- trying to change what you want -- seemed new to me. Then I realized I think about it all the time in the context of food. Having educated myself about nutrition and weight loss, and having successfully lost weight and enjoyed all the benefits of that, why don�t I only want to eat things that are good for me and will help me maintain my weight? Wouldn�t that make sense? I often fantasize about some blissful yet practical future in which I wouldn�t even consider eating a box of cookies or a tray of junk food at the mall -- not because I�m so well-disciplined, but because I don�t want it. It�s not good for me, so why would I want it?

I don�t seem to be getting any closer to a serene state of not-wanting on the food front, and I�m willing to admit it may not be achievable. Humans do things for reasons other than biological benefit. Still, the strong tendency of people to harm themselves through alcohol, drugs, food, and romance is puzzling. The truth is, when I decide to scarf a whole pizza, or if I decide to go on a bender, I have not made a conscious decision to harm myself. What has happened is that I�ve allowed the anticipation of a short-term benefit to override the awareness of a long-term consequence. In the short term, there really is a benefit to eating a pizza and getting drunk. That�s why people do it. In fact, the celebration of the short-term benefit was a huge part of my old social scene. �What, you have to work tomorrow? Well, fuck it! What the hell! Wow, that�ll hurt tomorrow!� I swear, there�s something exhilarating about making a really bad decision.

I�m no longer living for the moment. At the same time, I don�t want to be always living for the future. I want to enjoy today, but I want to enjoy it in a way that doesn�t damage tomorrow. Which I also plan to enjoy.

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