How to Replace Self-Harm in Your Daily Routine

I'm really into organization methods at the moment — I've watched dozens of videos on how to set habits, timetables, how to manage tasks and so on. A bit nerdy, but surprisingly soothing.

So a couple weeks ago I stumbled upon a piece of advice from what seems like the Bible of productivity YouTube: James Clear's book Atomic Habits. The idea that to set a habit, or to lose one, motivation and willpower are not enough and that a strong habit is instead based on identity. If you can convince yourself that you are 'the kind of person that does X', then it will be much easier to actually get yourself to do it on a daily basis: 'if you wanna eat healthy every single day, it's better to think of yourself as a healthy person'.

That seemed to me like a very clever idea, and at the same time it stirred up some indefinable sadness and irritation. I was like: well, what if I don't wanna be a healthy person?

 

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Ok, hear me out: I do wanna be healthy. I mean, I like having a functional body and mind (at least, I imagine I would like it), but the idea of good health being a part of my identity somehow feels upsetting to me. This is something I realized when I quit smoking, a couple months ago: I had to go under a pretty heavy surgery and smoking would have affected my healing. I dislike necrotic skin as much as the next fellow, so I did what I was told and smoked my last fag a month before the surgery.

It ended up quite fine on the physical level — I didn't suffer many withdrawal symptoms and the very desire to smoke quickly faded out. Emotionally, though, the few weeks before the deadline were very harsh. I was afraid I wouldn't be able to quit, of course, but mostly I was experiencing a strong feeling of loss and an mild identity crisis. I felt like I was renouncing an important part of my self-image; most of all, I couldn't for the life of me picture myself as a non-smoker, let alone a former smoker, those insufferable, condescending pricks.

For a number of reasons in my personal construction, it is important to me to not do the right thing. And when 'the right thing to do' proves itself to actually be the right thing to do this time, it's a pretty fat pill to swallow. It's hard to find a replacement to this kind of loss: what do you do when you have to do reasonable shit — but not because you wanna be reasonable — but also kinda...?

I think we easily forget something about replacing bad habits: sometimes it's not enough to replace the physical stuff — in this case, e-cig can do the trick —, you may have to replace the very fact that it is a bad habit. I mean, how many of us started smoking because we wanted to cross a line? How many people despise the very principle of 'eating healthy'? How often do we refuse to do something because it feels too reasonable, too adult, too good?

 

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James Clear's advice is, in a sense, right: if you don't find a way to reconcile your habits with your identity, you'll either give up on the formers or feel repressed in the latter. But it doesn't mean it's a one-way road: bending your sense of self to match your materialistic necessities doesn't seem like a long-term solution. What you can do, however, is find other anchors to such and such parts of your identity than this one habit you're trying to get or lose.

One of the many things I was trying to express in smoking was: I don't care about my body. And, well, that's obviously kind of a lie — if I didn't, I wouldn't have quit smoking and I wouldn't even have got the surgery in the first place. What I mean, I think, is: I don't care about my body in the way I feel like I'm supposed to (which brings us again to the attachment to rule-breaking). So how do I find a way to express this part of myself in a way that, paradoxically, doesn't hurt me?

The good news is: your sense of self is not about actuality, it's about narratives. Culture tells countless stories about what you can and can't do, what you should and shouldn't do. These stories are often being justified on the basis of what is good or bad for you, whether or not it's actually the case. You obviously believe a lot of them, with more or less faith, and you can use that belief at your advantage, although it's more often than not used against you.

For example, there is a very strong story out there, that tells that sex is bad, that it's unhealthy to have it too often, that penetration is an instrinsic violation, etc. That story (very simplified here) has a social utility, which is to regulate sex practices amongst men and women. I don't think it's true : I know when I'm having sex that I'm not doing anything morally wrong, that I'm not hurting my body, nor abandoning some irrecoverable self-worth.

But still, some part of me believes that story. That makes me associate sex with feelings of fear and shame, but also feelings I personally have towards that which is forbidden and dangerous: excitement and pride.

Of course, I hope that one day the story that tells that sex is good and enjoyable will come top in the charts. Just like I hope there'll come better stories about non-monogamy, psychedelics, queer parenting, body modifications and video games, just to name a few. But in the meantime, we can use the feelings those stories make us feel in a way that's fulfilling and empowering.

Also, am I disappointed because that conclusion is a bit too wholesome? Absolutely.