“If you correct your mind, the rest of your life will fall into place.” ~Lao Tzu
I know how you feel.
You know you shouldn’t eat that cookie, but it’s as if there’s something from deep within that compels you to move your arm forward, pick it up, and consume it in one, grandiosely guilty gesture.
You find yourself performing entire series of behaviors—like reaching into your pocket, picking out the pack, getting the cigarette, and lighting it—without even realizing what you’ve done until you’ve got the thing in your mouth.
You promise yourself you won’t complain, judge, or gossip, and there you are giggling about that thing she’s wearing or rolling your eyes at the person in front of you in line who’s taking ages to pick out her coupons.
You wake up in the morning with the full intent to exercise, feeling faint pangs of guilt with each passing hour on the clock, each hour with its own special excuse. “Too early” becomes “Too hungry” becomes “Too full” becomes “Too late.”
You mean to meditate, you really do, but you spend the whole time bothering about all the items on your to-do list and getting chest-clenching reminders of all the things you’ve forgotten. In the end, relaxing stresses you out even more.
What is going on? Why is it so difficult to just do what’s good for you? Why does it seem so easy for other people? Are some people biologically equipped to be emotionally and physically healthy? Are their lives just easier and more stress-free than yours?
It’s much too easy to say that people who do what’s good for them are different from you somehow. However, it’s even easier to reply to such claims with “You can do it!” or any endless refrain of motivational and inspirational slogans.
We’ve all heard that we can do it if we set ourselves to it, so all the motivational tapes make us feel even worse when we, as if possessed by demons, reach out and pay for the very fries that we spend hours regretting.
That’s because motivation isn’t the answer. Neither is willpower. I found this out the hard way.
Once upon a time, I tried to quit smoking. I failed. I thought I’d failed because I hadn’t picked a proper replacement behavior and because it wasn’t the right time.
In reality, smoking was the least of my problems. I was extremely close to a mental breakdown. I didn’t see it that way, but I knew something was wrong.
The same way that you can become obese over ten years by eating just a little bit extra at every meal, I became just a little bit more mentally ill every day. It was barely noticeable because it was so gradual. I was acclimatizing to my misery as I was plunging into it.
Have you ever been drawing or writing something and suddenly made a mistake? It just makes it worse when you try to cover it up, but you can’t seem to stop. You just keep making it worse and worse the more you try to fix it.
Well, that was my relationship with my body, my mind, and my life.
As the pressure began to build, I kept ignoring obvious signs of my distress. I remember rubbing at my face, thinking that the dark circles around my eyes were from smudged eyeliner. Except they didn’t rub off.
I remember getting nightmares night after night. I remember when I started eating meat again, after abstaining for nine years. I remember when I stopped exercising and started smoking double the amount. I remember when I started drinking every day.
I felt, more and more, like I didn’t really care much about my body, like it could rot for all I cared.
It wasn’t until I became suicidal and started hearing voices that I started to panic a little. Obviously, something was wrong.
So, I decided to quit smoking. Obviously it was the smoking.
Genius, right?
The first time I tried, it failed. Within about twenty-four hours of stopping, all of my mental symptoms worsened tenfold. I was a wreck. I reached back for a cigarette.
I waited a few weeks and tried again.
Within two weeks I had a mental breakdown, which I must say was one of the most amazing things that had ever happened to me. It was a beautiful moment between me and myself.
Suddenly, all that had been extremely complicated and confusing became simple and easy. I faced a choice: change or die.
Choosing to change meant getting on my knees. It meant surrendering to a higher power I couldn’t define or see, and trusting that, even though I wasn’t in control anymore, something would carry me through and help me heal.
There, I found peace.
And yet, my journey after the breakdown was extremely rocky.
I would fluctuate between peace and distress. For a while, I would be happy, peaceful, and joyful. I would treat my body like a temple and feel this intense, building urge to just take care of it, to give it nourishing care and tenderness.
Then I would crash. I would reach back for old vices and the same old insecurities.
After a few months of fluctuating, I crashed again. This time, I ended up in the hospital with meningitis. I knew the moment I got admitted that it wasn’t a coincidence. I knew I’d done it to myself.
Staying in the hospital was sort of like going to prison.
I was being punished for the way I’d been treating myself. I was being punished by my own body, by my own self.
I remember reading that, if you were to go to bed as a non-smoker and wake up the next morning with all the symptoms of having smoked for ten years, you’d rush yourself to the emergency room. You’d think something was horribly wrong.
The only reason that people smoke for ten years without much worry is because the consequences come on so gradually.
For ten years, I’d ignored the effects of my self-hating, self-destructive thoughts the same way that I’d ignored the effects of smoking cigarettes. I couldn’t ignore them anymore.
Lying in that hospital bed, in excruciating pain because the doctors refused to give me narcotics considering my “history,” I realized that the reason I kept hurting myself was because I believed I deserved it.
I was always telling myself that I wasn’t good enough. I was always judging my body. I was always comparing myself to others and deeming myself unworthy.
After I broke down, I started being more loving to myself but, soon enough, the old habits returned.
Lying alone in that hospital bed, I learned my lesson. I realized that self-love was not an option. If you don’t love yourself, you’ll destroy yourself and do what’s bad for you. There’s no middle ground.
After I got released, I got to work. I read some books, made some plans, and, more importantly, embraced myself.
I quit smoking, re-embraced vegetarianism, started exercising again, and opened my first blog. I decided to pursue my dreams at any cost and to take care of myself, because I deserve it.
It’s not that I’ve discovered some magical willpower formula that’s helped me combat cravings for cigarettes. I just haven’t craved them.
It’s not that I force myself not to eat meat. I just don’t want it.
Doing yoga, writing a book, starting a business—these weren’t hard. They were meaningful and enjoyable. It was destroying myself and ignoring the effects of it that was hard.
In the end, I’ve realized that a craving is never just a craving. A craving is a signal that something’s missing. An urge to restart old, destructive habits is always, always a sign.
If you can’t seem to do what’s good for you, then maybe you don’t think you deserve what’s good. If you feel compelled to hurt yourself, maybe you think you deserve to be hurt.
At the end of the day, I realized that I didn’t need to quit smoking. I needed to quit hating myself.
I didn’t need to start exercising. I needed to start respecting my body.
I didn’t need to stop drinking. I needed to stop numbing my emotions.
I didn’t need to watch my calories. I needed to watch my thoughts.
Inside each of us, there’s a state of mind where being good to ourselves, others, and the planet is effortless. Don’t try to do good or be good. Just find that state of mind, and it’s all downhill from there.
Editor’s Note: Vironika has generously offered to give away two copies of her new book The Love Mindset: An Unconventional Guide to Healing and Happiness. To enter to win a copy, leave a comment below. You can enter until midnight PST on Monday, January 6th.
Update: The winners have been chosen: Tiffanie and Belinda.
About Vironika Tugaleva
Vironika Tugaleva (also known as Vironika Wilde) is a poet, spoken word artist, activist, and award-winning author. Vironika believes in the medicinal power of honest words and tough truths. When Vironika isn't writing, she loves stargazing, singing, and eating pickles (sometimes, all at once). You’re welcome to follow her on Instagram (@vironikawilde), check out her latest book, Love & Gaslight, or get a free preview of The Art of Talking to Yourself.
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Though I run this site, it is not mine. It's ours. It's not about me. It's about us. Your stories and your wisdom are just as meaningful as mine. 
Hello Veronica, and thank you for sharing. It’s as though you wrote this article for me, just now in this moment. I am battling the same, and the thoughts are the same,,,,, I have even come to the realization not too long ago that quitting the smoking habit is about loving myself, yet still the habit is here… something pushes me, just one more…. I so wish to love and better take care of this body that carries me…. and I think I do, but self-sabotaging actions arise, and I feel overcome by it.
I have found that state of mind but very briefly. It hasn’t taken much for me to be thrown back into my normal routines and loops. I know I can do it but I don’t know the way there. I don’t see which change to make which makes it harder to get back there.
I love your style of writing – made me smile and nod a few times – and I look forward to reading more of your work.
Thanks for this post.
This post summarizes my experiences exactly, and has helped me put a mile marker in my path. I need to keep a realistic view in my progress. I am on the path to find that self love. Thank you for this post. I am still trying to find that pure love inside, and to learn the difference between loving myself and rationalizing that I love myself. My sources of fear in life are not perfectly clear, but I appreciate posts like this that help me open my heart.
As someone who grew up in an abusive, dysfunctional home, this really strikes a chord with me. Sometimes I forget how many negative messages about myself I’ve absorbed and accepted as true without realizing it, and how those same thoughts must be fueling my efforts at self sabotage.
I can relate but I haven’t found a way to stop my bad habits yet…
What a lovely article Vironika! Although the thought hasn’t occurred to me before, it makes a lot of sense that rather than all the trying-to-do/be… All we might actually need to do is cultivate that state of mind.. I’ve been getting some cravings that I shouldn’t lately. My opinions of it havnt changed but I’m 100x more tempted now than 2 months ago. And I agree with you it’s probably a sign so now I’ll just aim for that state of mind.
Hi Vironika, thank you so much for this great post. I realise I’ve been neglecting myself a little recently. After changing my diet, getting into a good exercise routine and meditating regularly, I’ve recently been slipping back into the same old routine. I told myself it was all because I don’t have the time and money to buy good food and keep going to yoga etc. but I can see now that’s just an excuse. It’s strange how we so often neglect to do things that we know make us feel good, as well as being beneficial for or health. Thanks again for the reminder. I’ll be back in my yoga class tomorrow morning!
wow, lots of good truths here – very well written and heartfelt. thanks for sharing your story…i needed the reminder! <3
Great article, just what I needed to hear at this time of year!
Probably one of the best articles I’ve come across in a long time. Thank you for sharing your truths 🙂
I’m contaminating the people around me. Every living thing in the house is overweight. I never even realized how overweight I had become until I started dating again. One man told me I was ugly, fat, whiny, and disruptive. Wake up call. Now I am surrounding myself with happier, more positive people in an effort to re-train my negative thoughts.
Perfect timing for me to have read this. Thanks.
Wow, I am a huge believer in signs, and this is one. I’ve been struggling to quit smoking cigarettes lately, and literally a few minutes before receiving my Tiny Buddha daily email, I was contemplating just having one. I’m not depressed nor insecure, but I know I do have a few things missing in my life that I need to focus on. I’m lazy and I don’t like doing things that are difficult, that is my problem. This post was a nice snap back to reality. Great post and very inspirational, thank you for sharing.
I feel like I’m so broken that it’s no use to even try. I haven’t been able to find a job for ten years and now after two degrees, I’m still unable to get a job. I feel like i’ll never get a job and continue living in a place I don’t like. I was suicidal on new years eve but I think i’ll keep trying to live. but I have so much anger….I’ve had it for over 30 years and I realize that anger just makes everything worse. I hate being in my predicament, my life and being paralyzed by fear. I want to live my life but feel I can’t…and without a job I can’t even financially support myself. as usual, I got up late feel like crap, and opened my tiny budda daily email and read your section. I’m curious to learn what love mindset is all about and want to live the life I deserve. thanks for sharing this post.
Dear Vironika and Tiny Buddha ~~ I so love when I “read something for someone else” thinking I will forward to them and the article is so beautifully crafted for me. Thank you. Yes, I will also forward, but this one is for me who appreciates the loving reflection and reminder. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. With love ~ heatherlaree
Thank you ever so much for writing this piece. This in particular made me
cry: “If you can’t seem to do what’s good for you, then maybe you don’t think you deserve what’s good. If you feel compelled to hurt yourself, maybe you think you deserve to be hurt.”
It has been almost a year, and I don’t know how someone I loved could just walk away when it truly, is not because of me and is no fault of mine. And yet, secretly, I blamed myself. I am using your quote as my cellphone’s wallpaper to remind myself from now on that I don’t deserve the bad, I need to love myself more.
Thank you for this incredible post, it is very inspiring and so touching !!!
I CAN’T BELIEVE HOW FATEFUL THIS ARTICLE WAS FOR ME!!!! 1,000x, thank you! My life changes RIGHT. NOW.
I would love to be part of the draw to win The Love Mindset: An Unconventional Guide to Healing and Happiness 🙂
This post coincided so perfectly with what I’m reading and working on right now (The Voice of Knowledge), I can’t NOT know the universe is smiling at me. Thank you! Would love to read your book!
I needed this reminder. Sometimes I wait to make changes because I don’t feel it is the right time or I’m waiting to see if things change for the better without me having to initiate it. Thank you for writing this.
Thank you for this wonderful post!
Thank you for your insights and inspiration! We are going through a time in our family that is painful and emotional for us all, and this advice is so appropriate for all of us! Thanks again, and here’s to a happy, healthy, and strong new year!
This is amazing… You are powerful!! I love it. Definitely a source of inspiration. I believe that it is no coincidence I came across your article. It is a sign. THANK YOU!
This really spoke to me and reinforces what I know deep down. This last part especially that you wrote!
I didn’t need to start exercising. I needed to start respecting my body.
I didn’t need to stop drinking. I needed to stop numbing my emotions.
I didn’t need to watch my calories. I needed to watch my thoughts.
Thank you for this post, I have been reading and reading self helps, Tiny Buddha and various other motivational and inspirational blogs, etc. but none have resonated with me like yours. I, too, have had a gradual change into misery combined with yo yo periods of doing well but could never maintain them. Thank you for hitting home for me and opening myself up to admit that I may not think I deserve the life I so desperately want and have been trying but failing to get. Admitting it is the first step and practicing self-love is the next. Thank you so much!
Thanks for sharing. It spoke to me . i can relate to it.
Just like many others we have all embarked – or attempted to embark – the journey that you have ventured down, as a behaviourist this is my career choice. I have been going to school implementing interventions and believing there was much more to just finding a replacement behaviour, manipulating antecedents, increase/decreasing dimensions of behaviour etc.
Since I do regret to falling under the rest of the world with their “spending time on their busy life trying to buy more time”, I have lacked individual thinking as well as being able to reflect off others (not to mention we’re all pre-wired to believe our stream so bouncing ideas off people in my field may not be best).
What hit me the most was where you had said its not motivation or willpower. I really was starting to believe the rest of the world “maybe if it was a different time, place, around different people”. This changed my theory without changing the outcome and took away that one extra variable.
“A craving is just a signal that something is missing” We’re all told that we should have consequences to our actions, repercussions to our behaviour, but has anyone thought that behaviour is our consequence? it is our repercussion?
Thanks for giving me an extra something to think about and an opportunity to express something I am very passionate about.
Oh my goodness, your article is EXACTLY what I needed to read today. THANK you!
As someone who is going through an existential crisis, this hits home. I am struggling to figure out if I am going to change or die.
Thank you for the beautiful reminders! I was headed down that destructive path again without knowing it. Loving my self again!
Thinking about your idea of “maybe you think you deserve to be hurt”
or hurting. I recently discovered I have been walking around with blinders on… Like a bulldozer, destroying everything in my path. Much of what you write about, state of mind, is difficult. I copied and pasted a few of your lines into my email as a daily reminder. Thanks.
Thank you so much. That was truly inspiring. Thanks for sharing your vulnerability to allow access to your strength!
Boy do I need this right now. For the past four years, after an awful end to a destructive relationship, I resolved to learn to be happy with me. I was off to a great start, exercising, learning about proper nutrition etc… The first two years of my journey went great. I got into the best shape of my life, ate healthier and considered competing in a figure competition. I have suffered with low self esteem most of my life and finally felt comfortable in my own skin. I was centered spiritually as well. Then I met a man, dove into a relationship and started a downward spiral within a year. The man is great! I think I just dont know what the difference is between love an infatuation. Being the perfectionist I am, I went to an extreme of being healthy ALONE. Now I am not sure how to climb out of this negativity and find my center/balance again. 2013 was a tough year for me in regards to my physical, emotional and spiritual health. All of a suden I feel lost again. Not sure where to begin the healing…
This information is familiar yet eludes me. It certainly speaks to me. I hope to find this state of mind.
Thank you for this article. It made me tear up also. I know that underneath all the struggle is just a lack of love for myself….I plan to change this. Thank you for opening my eyes 🙂
Thank you so much for this passionately crafted post. I have been fighting the good fight with anxiety since I quit “numbing my emotions.” I believe that healing is possible and its lovely to have that reinforced through your own story. With a father who is victim to the psychology/pharmaceutical industries who attempted suicide when I was 17, I have battled separating myself from that looming black cloud of my fathers “problems.” The more I’ve learned about spirituality, healing, self love, the more I’ve wanted to help him save himself, for some reason I see my value in not just whether I can love myself, but if I can be successful in helping him heal, love himself, and be free from self punishment. It’s almost as if I feel guilty for dealing with these life problems better than he has. I’m on the right road and reading posts like yours encourage me to forge forward on my journey. Thank you.
This article has happened onto my path at a very tumultuous transition in my life. I feel that my struggle has made me feel more alive than ever – not because I enjoy pain, but because I can finally identify what exactly it is that I need to remember and what I need to forget. I feel a positive change inside me that has resulted from making a series of difficult but necessary decisions – that will ultimately fuel a better life. Thank you so much for posting – really puts things into perspective.
This post rings so true with realizations I’ve recently been enlightened with. Thanks for sharing your growth and helping others move in the right direction!
Thanks so much for this important piece. I have been struggling after a series of difficult life transitions to take care of myself and find drinking and smoking to have increased while exercise and eating well have decreased. Thank you for bringing me hope at a time when things have started to look hopeless for me.
What a powerful post. It touches me in a way I can’t quite describe. Lately, it seems as if my motto is “I don’t care”. I don’t care if the house is clean. I don’t care if I’m overweight. I don’t care, I don’t care, I don’t care. And I feel like it’s the beginning of a road I don’t want to go down, but every now and then, I just don’t care.
There isn’t any advice in this post that I didn’t already know, but it comes when I know I need it most. It’s time to remind myself that I DO CARE.
I am having a hard time hating myself right now. Feeling undeserved and guilty. After 4 years of traveling, learning an teaching as a coach. Now I feel that I came back to a worst point in my life. Empty hands and pregnant. I am depressed and I know is up to me and changing my view. But I felt a force that doesn’t let me o maybe does not want to. I get tired. Your article gives me hope to start again. Thanks
Beautifully said – you are speaking my language! 🙂
Hello. I hate myself. I’ve experienced this to and fro cycular motion for a good 2 years and I don’t know what to do. I have no purpose, which is made extremely more frustrating as in the past I’ve achieved states of such bliss and contentment. I don’t know why I can’t feel that way anymore. Yes, I’m babbling about myself to try and get this book, I need help. I’m currently getting help from a mental health lady but it’s not working. I’ve been suicidal for too long and feel even more embarrassed with myself for not having any guts to just do it. I’m numb, empty and have become far too great at pretending not to be to my friends and family. I just had a good old cry to my mum and she offered me comfort, but I still feel isolated due to the unusual sensory perceptions that I have, I know people are there for me but it’s hard to accept when you’re going through something so strange.. blehh. This post made me feel good.. I would love to have this book. I wish everyone in the comments section could be teleported to a nice comfy room together and just smile at each other for a while, knowing there are people behind the screen that can relate :]
beautiful article – thank you
Thank you so much for sharing your experience, and for giving me some hope.
I’m a recovering alcoholic and addict. Thank you for writing this article. It’s hard to word what paragraphs like the ones above mean to me, so I’ll just say it helped a lot. You’ve helped make my day special.
i know everything is harder if you don’t have a job your not happy in your living situation live with family or people that love you understand you try and find someone to support you and what your going through everyone needs some1 to lean on i have a very similiar situation to yourself and ive been in and out of rehab and prison and on the streets without a support system since i was 18 now approaching 27 quickly i have to use what i have to succeed all be it only a family with love and good intentions in there heart to want to see me happy and assistance from an entity within the united states government you can change your prospective with peace and love i stopped on you comment after about 40 comments and i wanted to personally say to you you will be ok things will get better
this is my life…this is my self hatred, my disgust, my vicious disappointment with my soul, my will power, my body, my looks, my fears, my failures, my hell. it’s been my whole life, but especially intense since my dad died 3 years ago…he was the small presence who always loved me. i was safe with him, and now he’s gone. how do i touch that elusive center in me that is supposed to be the love i’m desperately seeking? is there a ground zero to start from? or is a slow building of individual thoughts and choices?
I am new to *Tiny Buddha* and I just wanted to thank you for sharing a little piece of you! I think at some point, we all feel so very alone in our struggles and people like you, who are willing to share, can make all of the difference in the world!