Overcoming Addiction Quotes

Being negative only makes a difficult journey more difficult. You may be given a cactus, but you don't have to sit on it.

The biggest potential for helping us overcome shame is this: We are “those people.” The truth is…we are the others. Most of us are one paycheck, one divorce, one drug-addicted kid, one mental health illness, one sexual assault, one drinking binge, one night of unprotected sex, or one affair away from being “those people”–the ones we don’t trust, the ones we pity, the ones we don’t let our kids play with, the ones bad things happen to, the ones we don’t want living next door.

If you want to know if someone was meant to be in your future, then remove all the worldly things about them from your mind. Don’t think about their looks, the intimate moments or their personality. Now, think about how they made you feel, how they improved your life and what virtues they possess that push you to want to become better. Did they bring you closer to God? Did they bring you to your life mission? Did they ever lie to you, betray you or made it impossible for you to feel comfortable speaking your mind? When you remove all the shine from a diamond, it becomes a glass rock. What value is it then? See beneath the surface and you will know who your future is with.

As a society, we assume that humans naturally run from emotions like suffering, helplessness, and hopelessness, but the truth is these emotions are highly addictive and far easier to indulge in (in a perversely satisfying way) than positive emotional subsets. Better yet, when you convince others of your helplessness, some people begin to regard you as a victim—someone to be adored and protected. 

I was afraid to let other make any decisions, because I had no confidence they would be concerned for me.

I count him braver who overcomes his desires than him who conquers his enemies; for the hardest victory is over self. Aristotle

I did not add that we would pass by a bookstore on the way. It's an addiction that cannot be easily explained and can rarely be overcome.

The trick to overcoming addiction is thus the realignment of desire, so that it switches from the goal of immediate relief to the goal of long-term fulfillment

Being in a real relationship was supposed to fix the kinks in our lives. It should’ve made our problems easier. We no longer have to pretend. We can be ourselves. We’re free from one lie. Isn’t this the part where our love overcomes our addictions? Where our problems magically solve from a kiss and a promise?

It shows that no matter what type of parents you had, or addictions you were faced with, you can overcome anything that stands in your way and become a better person.

Whatever people think of us is between them and God and not our concern.

This book is dedicated, with love, to Bobby, who has found the only pound of pure- Faith in a Loving God.

I'm beginning to have second thoughts regarding the validity of Gloria's theory that I can overcome my heroin addiction by the simple process of shooting up vast quantities of speed with her twenty times daily.

Americans, in particular, are used to high stress and immediate gratification, both of which feed addictions.

Instead of recovering, it seems that addicts keep growing, as does anyone who overcomes their difficulties through deliberation and insight.

To be sure, they have had the occasional success, but there is little chance that North America will develop a functional land ethic until it finds a way to overcome its irrational addiction to profit.

Treatment for dependency at substance abuse treatment centers must change if alcoholism and addiction are to be overcome in our society.

If you’re losing the battle against a persistent bad habit, an addiction, or a temptation, and you’re stuck in a repeating cycle of good intention-failure-guilt, you will not get better on your own! You need the help of other people. Some temptations are only overcome with the help of a partner who prays for you, encourages you, and holds you accountable.

What are you addicted to: being thankful for your blessings or moaning about your problems?

Keep a journal of disappointments, failures, and self-destructive actions. It’s important to write this down because these are the kinds of things your self-serving bias will want to forget or minimize.

..begin by talking about the kind of existentialist chaos that exists in our own lives and our inability to overcome the sense of alienation and frustration we experience when we try to create bonds of intimacy and solidarity with one another. Now part of this frustration is to be understood again in relation to structures and institutions. In the way in which our culture of consumption has promoted an addiction to stimulation - one that puts a premium on packaged and commodified stimulation. The market does this to convince us that our consumption keeps oiling the economy for it to reproduce itself. But the effect of this addiction to stimulation is an undermining, a waning of our ability for qualitatively rich relationships.

Co-dependent was used interchangeably with the term enabler—someone whose life was out of control because he or she was taking responsibility for “saving” a chemically dependent person. But in the past few years the definition of co-dependency has expanded to include all people who victimize themselves in the process of rescuing and being responsible for any compulsive, addicted, abusive, or excessively dependent person.

A ship doesn't sink because it is in the ocean in the midst of a storm. It only sinks when the hull is breached, and the ocean get inside it.

Don’t let the situation say stop to your true purpose;say stop to the situation. Situations are situations and you are you

Changing a Habit is Never Difficult. Difficult is to Address Your Unwillingness to do it

After a childhood chock full of unpredictable parenting, the adult child of the addict is anxious, worried, and secretly insecure.

…there is rarely any rhyme or reason in suicides. They can be a cry for help gone wrong, or a punishment to those you’re leaving behind, or one fateful twenty-minute window when you lose your bearings and can’t find the reasons to go on.

Children of addicted parents experience the lack of predictability as highly anxiety-provoking. As adults, they are therefore at significantly higher risk to have anxiety disorders and to become addicts themselves than are people who were raised by non-addicted parents. Being a good parent most of the time and a horrible parent once in awhile creates insecure, anxious adults who are just waiting for things to go wrong.

This is the type of love story that deals with real fucking problems. It's a story about forgiveness and unconditional love, and it shows how much a person can change, really change, if they try hard enough. It's the type of story that proves that anything is fucking possible when it comes to self-recovery. It shows that if you have someone to lean on, someone who loves you and doesn't give up on you, you can find your way out of the darkness. It shows that no matter what type of parents you had, or addictions you were faced with, you can overcome anything that stands in your way and become a better person. That's the type of story After is.

It takes a strong person to stand up to his or her fate and overcome the obstacles that stand in the way of freedom and success, but I believe in you.

Our minds may be like some computers that can have a lifetime of wrong information stored in them.

Breaking down does not have to mean reaching a catastrophe.

An addict needs shame like a man dying of thirst needs salt water.

Overcoming love addiction is possible, just as it is possible to transcend co-dependence and rebuild a healthy relationship with ourselves and others.

Knowing who we are in Christ sets us free from the need to impress others.

A family is a cracked mirror that nevertheless reflects us accurately.

But don’t go on a “digging expedition.” We don’t have to try to “figure ourselves out.” The Holy Spirit guides us into all truth (See John 16:13). It is a progressive work, so be patient and let God take the lead.

Intention of seeking attention is an addiction. A vicious cycle which damages your health, finances and relationships. It will NOT improve your self-image, increase your self-worth or fulfill the need of genuine praise.

There is a lot of research to suggest that we feel better overall as we are progressing toward our goals; we have a sense of purposeful involvement, we give ourselves mental pats on the back for being so good and industrious, our self-esteem is enhanced, and our general life satisfaction is raised.

Like alcoholism and drug addiction, nihilism is a disease of the soul. It can never be completely cured, and there is always the possibility of relapse. But there is always a chance for conversion -- a chance for people to believe that there is hope for the future and a meaning to struggle... Nihilism is not overcome by arguments or analyses; it is tamed by love and care.

teenagers are almost a different species than the rest of us, particularly in social situations.

Neuroscientists know now that bad habits have a physical existence in the structure of the brain; they become the default circuits when we are faced with temptation.

When we don’t have anyone else, we develop a deep relationship with God that will carry us through anything life brings our way. The

I strongly encourage you to be careful not to let anything become more important to you than it should be. Keep God first so He can bless you with other things you desire.

The seven manifestations of broken bonding are psychosomatic illness, violence and aggression, addiction, depression, burnout, stress reaction, and organizational conflict.

When people want to hear yes, and you tell them no, they never like it. But those who are truly your friends will give you the freedom to make your own decisions. They

In the brain, Creating excuses is as addictive as drugs. The only way to overcome this is by getting over yourself and doing the hard job.

Everyone needs to take control of his or her own life by making sense of it. It doesn’t matter how conventional or unconventional that process is.

Suicide is a permanent question.

It seems like the value you attribute to something, more than its inherent value, influences your expectations, and your expectations, to a great extent, influence the life you live.

But [as for me personally] it matters very little to me that I should be put on trial by you [on this point], and that you or any other human tribunal should investigate and question and cross-question me, I do not even put myself on trial and judge myself. (1 Corinthians 4:3)

Think about the stigma that is attached to the idea that alcoholism is a disease, an incurable illness, and you have it. That's a terrible thing to inflict on someone. Labeling alcoholism as a disease, a cause unto itself, simply no longer fits with what we know today about its causes.

Avoid triggers. If you’re an alcoholic, stay out of bars. If you’re a depressed or impulsive shopper, don’t go shopping. When you have to, go in with a list, rush in, and rush out. If you watch too much television, don’t sit in your favorite chair. In fact, move it (or the TV) to another room.

People often attempt to compensate for this loss of hope by comforting themselves with “consolation prizes”: easy but self-destructive habits like too much TV, too much junk food, too much shopping, not enough exercise, endless video games. And sometimes they distract themselves with riskier behavior: alcohol and drugs, debt,

There are two types of approval: one is from people, and the other is from God. We want people to approve of us, but if we become addicted to their approval, if we have to have it and are ready to do whatever they demand to get it, we lose our freedom. If we trust God for approval, we are freed from the addiction of approval.

Perhaps the best antidote and preventive for burnout is the feeling of solid connection with the people in our lives. When we can share our frustrations with family and friends, our burden is eased and we can get new perspectives.

Avoid enablers. These are people who make it easy for you to perform your self-destructive behavior. People you go on a smoking break with. People who encourage you to take risks. Your partner, if he or she encourages you to be lazy or feeds you too much food. Try to enlist these people in your reform efforts, and if you can’t, put some distance between you.

The Gnostics believed that exile was the essential condition of man. Do you agree? I do. The artist and the addict both wrestle with this experience of exile. They share an acute, even excruciating sensitivity to the state of separation and isolation, and both actively seek a way to overcome it, to transcend it, or at least to make the pain go away. What is the pain of being human? It's the condition of being suspended between two worlds and being unable to fully enter into either.

I've experienced the feeling of about a dozen different drugs simply from a good conversation. I think, more often than not, that's why people get addicted. They want a high that's available only if they overcome their fear of connecting to others.

we have a plastic brain that changes in response to our experience. It bears repeating: The brain doesn’t tell us what to do; it is part of a system in which our life experience teaches our brain what to do. So you can practice mindfulness, will power, overcoming procrastination, and other healthy new skills with the confidence that you are changing your brain. Each day’s practice does some good, and if you slip and fall off your diet or exercise program or mindfulness practice, all that you have learned before is not undone; it’s still there in your brain waiting for you to get back in the saddle.

Get up with the alarm, shower, get dressed, and have breakfast. Without much effort, you’ve already put yourself in a good position for the rest of the day. If you have to struggle to get out of bed and decide every single day about showering and breakfast and what to wear, you’ve put yourself in a depleted state before the day has really started. The person who’s taking care of herself without thinking about it, getting to work on time without procrastinating, has much more will power left in reserve when important decisions come up. This is why people with high self-control consistently report less stress in their lives; they use their will power to take care of business semiautomatically, so they have fewer crises and calamities. When there is a real crisis, they have plenty of discipline left in reserve.

Get ready for change Identify what you need to change Let go of old habits to make room for change Learn new coping skills Incorporate the changes into your life

When you’re tense, you tend to do what’s familiar and wrong instead of what’s new and right.

In Christ, we are a new creation and are defined by His Life, not our bad behavior!

The Birthright of a Child of God God has already provided everything we need to be free in Christ

Having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross” (Colossians 2:15).

Your quality of life is not determined by external factors, but by how you interpret external factors.

The most common fear is the fear of being judged or criticized. You build layers of tension that gradually poison your life and distort your thinking.

In Tibet, the word for meditation is gom, which means “to become familiar with one’s self.

Applying effort is more than just reading a book on recovery; it is about bringing some of the tools that have been suggested into action.

Our goal is to offer you better alternatives to coping with life’s challenges and disappointments.

What unites us all as human beings is an urge for happiness, which at heart is a yearning for union, for overcoming our feelings of separateness. We want to feel our identity with something larger than our small selves. We long to be one with our own lives and with each other. If we look at the root of even the most terrible addictions, even the most appalling violence in this world, somewhere we will find this urge to unite, to be happy. In some form it is there, even in the most distorted and odious disguises. We can touch that. We can draw near and open up.

You need to deepen the quality and intimacy of your relationships with other people. Our culture is being shaped to isolate us more and more from each other. Addiction is becoming an epidemic. When you have deep and meaningful relationships, your chances of unhealthy addiction are far less. The following are four principles for overcoming harmful defaults in your environment.

People believe they lack will power, but will power is not something you either have or don’t, like blue eyes. Instead, it’s a skill, like tennis or typing. You have to train your nervous system as you would train your muscles and reflexes. You have to take yourself to the psychic gym—but with the certainty that each time you practice an alternative behavior, you’ve made it easier to do next time.

We must learn to say no and not fear the loss of relationships. I have come to the conclusion that if I lose a relationship because I tell someone no, then I really never had a true relationship at all.

Bertrand Russell wrote that the best way to overcome one’s fear of death “is to make your interests gradually wider and more impersonal, until bit by bit the walls of the ego recede, and your life becomes increasingly merged in the universal life.” He goes on: An individual human existence should be like a river: small at first, narrowly contained within its banks, and rushing passionately past rocks and over waterfalls. Gradually, the river grows wider, the banks recede, the waters flow more quietly, and in the end, without any visible break, they become merged in the sea, and painlessly lose their individual being.

The truth is, we in our own resources cannot forgive. However, since Christ is our life and lives in us, we realize that forgiving is what we as holy, righteous, and loving people do. It is our very nature to do so.

Do not focus your gaze on things that are wrong, for what you see, slowly begins to penetrate you. You are addicted to fixing your eyes on the wrong; you pay attention only to what is wrong inside you. The angry man concentrates on his anger, and how to get rid of it. Though he wants to get rid of the anger, he is actually concentrating on that white line of anger within him; the more he concentrates the more he is hypnotized by it. Don’t worry! Everybody is! Don’t focus your eyes on the anger, but concentrate on compassion. Concentrate on what is right. As the right gets more and more energy, the strength of the wrong gets weaker and weaker. Ultimately it will disappear. This happens because energy is one; you cannot use it in two ways. If you have utilized your energy in becoming peaceful, you would have no energy for restlessness. All your energy has moved towards peace, and if you have had a taste of peace and serenity, why bother to become restless? You can maintain your restlessness only if you have never known the flavour of serenity. You can dive into the pleasures of the world only if you have not tasted the divine.

The devil delights in reminding us daily of all our mistakes from the past. On Monday he reminds us of Saturday and Sunday’s failures; on Tuesday he reminds us of sins committed on Monday, and so on. One morning I was spending my time with the Lord, thinking about my problems and all the areas in which I had failed, when suddenly the Lord spoke to my heart: “Joyce, are you going to fellowship with Me or with your problems?” It is our fellowship with God that helps and strengthens us to overcome our problems. We are strengthened through our union with Him. If we spend our time with God fellowshipping with our mistakes from yesterday, we never receive strength to overcome them today. Meditating on all of our faults and failures weakens us, but meditating on God’s grace and willingness to forgive strengthens us: For by the death He died, He died to sin [ending His relation to it] once for all; and the life that He lives, He is living to God [in unbroken fellowship with Him]. Even so consider yourselves also dead to sin and your relation to it broken, but alive to God [living in unbroken fellowship with Him] in Christ Jesus. (Romans 6:10-11, emphasis mine) Our

I think the greater danger is that those who think they understand the process [of overcoming our attachments] are likely to try to make it happen on their own by engaging in false austerities and love-denying self-deprivations. They will not wait for God's timing; they will rush ahead of grace. I have seen it happen when ascetic practices have become overinstitutionalized, and I have engaged in it myself when I thought I could engineer my own salvation. It does not work.

You will notice in Scripture that Jesus never tried to defend Himself, no matter what He was accused of. Why? Because He knew the truth about Himself, and that was the important thing to Him. He was not addicted to approval from people; therefore, He was free from the tyranny of what they might think of Him or say about Him. He was satisfied by the knowledge He possessed of Himself. He did not need anyone else’s approval except His heavenly Father’s, and He knew He had that. True

You know what makes a person a fighter? It's not the amount of punches he can throw, or how long he can last in a ring. It's when he shows real courage and strength to overcome his battle wounds and scars. You have scars, killer. Own up to them.

Remember that anything you bring to your life again and again will not give you the same excitement as it gave you the first time. It can only lead to addiction, not happiness. - HDH Bhagavan Sri Nithyananda Paramashivoham, in the book "Living Enlightenment

The challenge for human beings is not how to avoid suffering, but how to face the pain that is inherent in our lives, and how not to create more suffering by our desperate attempt to avoid pain. Addiction is, perhaps, the most desperate measure we employ to escape suffering.

Let God begin to rewrite your story. Invite him to show you your past through his eyes. Ask him to surface good memories you have forgotten. He would love to do it. There is healing to be had there. There is a replacing of regret with mercy. Though our past has shaped us, we are not our past. Though our failures and sin have had an effect on who we are, we are not defined by our failures or our sin. Though thought patterns and addictions have overwhelmed us, we are not overcome by them and we will never be overcome by them. Jesus has won our victory. Jesus is our victory.

Donna made it obvious that not only is addiction a developmental journey, but it’s a journey that continues through the period of recovery. In fact, by the time I’d finished my interviews with Donna, the term “recovery” no longer made sense to me. “Recovery” implies going backward, becoming normal again. And it’s a reasonable term if you consider addiction a disease. But many of the addicts I’ve spoken with—including Donna—see themselves as having moved forward, not backward, once they quit, or even while they were quitting. They often find they’ve become far more aware and self-directed than the person they were before their addiction. There’s no easy way to explain this direction of change with the medical terminology of disease and recovery. Instead of recovering, it seems that addicts keep growing, as does anyone who overcomes their difficulties through deliberation and insight.

Reflect on why your life is precious. Ask yourself: “What inspires me to live?”   • Reflect on the fact that death is unavoidable, and on how you want to live your life. Ask yourself: “How am I being in this life? What am I doing with my life?”   • Reflect that actions have consequences, and on some of the consequences of your actions. Ask yourself: “What actions have been a gain to my life? What actions have been a cost in my life?”   • Reflect on the ocean of inevitable suffering, the waves of sickness, aging, and death that one day will come even to you. Ask yourself: “What am I feeling right now?

Always – but especially when suffering - surround yourself with those who inspire you to lose yourself more honestly, to love others more thoroughly, to live life more fully, and to trust God more wholly. Huddle with those who care for you and those who are exemplary in their encouragement, patience and understanding of others. Hang out with those who strive to put God and faith at their center. Pray for peers, friends and mentors who will not only encourage you to be your best independent, strong, and vulnerable self all at the same time – but also sincerely humble. Pray that their angel dust will transcend you when even the smallest flecks of their contagious warmth and permeating beauty fall upon you. Then ever pray that you may have the opportunity to likewise ease and nurture others in such authentic ways; thus honing such a charitable, other-oriented nature of your own, – a miraculous healing balm – a buffer of pain if there ever was one. Know this is the most powerful antidote for fear and sorrow; the most effective – and addictive – cure-all known in all of creation; an elixir for that otherwise, elusive kind of happiness – the kind that weathers, endures and remains in all seasons and conditions.

Letting go of resentments is not the same as forgiving the other person. You don’t have to forgive the other person if you don’t want to. Let go of your resentments because it’s good for you. Let them go, because if you don’t, you will continue to poison yourself, and they will become part of the baggage you carry.

Ultimately, what helped me understand addiction and how I came to be ensnared was first realizing that we all suffer some degree of addiction. While not all of us give our lives over to it as much as I did, or get tangled up in chemical addictions, the fact remains that all humans suffer, all look outside themselves to manage that suffering, and all get stuck in feedback loops that run through the same wiring in our brain that alcohol addiction runs through. The second thing that helped me pull apart my own addiction, and thus understand how to approach it and overcome it, was breaking it up into two distinct parts: the root causes, or the things that drive us out of ourselves to cope, and the cycle of addiction, or what happens to us biologically, spiritually, socially, and psychologically over time when we use an effective but addictive substance or behavior in an attempt to regulate ourselves. I call it the Two-Part Problem, and in order to heal, we need to address both parts.

Here’s a simple intervention to show what a little change in your negative narrative can do. First-year college students who receive worse grades than they anticipate are highly likely to drop out. Some conclude they’re just not college material, while others, who have a positive narrative, will absorb the news and decide to work harder.

When we have been mistreated, it seems totally unfair to just forgive those who have hurt us. We feel someone needs to pay for what has happened to us. When we hurt, we want to place blame. We want justice! We need to remember God is just (See Deuteronomy 32:4). His Word promises He will eventually make everything right that is wrong, if we will only trust Him (See Isaiah 61:7-8).

The world is deep in debt and going deeper all the time trying to buy what God offers for free: acceptance, love, approval, worth, value, peace, joy, fulfillment! The bigger house won’t make you feel complete; you will just have more square footage to clean. The newer model car won’t do it; you will just have bigger payments. The promotion at work is not the answer; you will just have more responsibility and probably be required to work longer hours.

Not moderation, but elimination is the ideal in regard to evolution-retarding habits. In a sanitarium for dope-addicts it may be advisable to allow patients temporarily a restricted — but at the same time gradually diminishing — use of narcotics. Similarly it may be advisable to condone that sex-addicts (that is to say: all those who have habituated themselves to sexual acts) do not suddenly break their habit, provided they will gradually overcome it. But no sane person can opine that a continuous use of drugs should be prescribed for the dope-addicted patients — not even in a so-called moderate degree. Still less that it should also be recommended for those who are free from the addiction. As little reasonable is it to claim that quasi moderate sexual activity must continually be indulged in by those who are addicted to such acts, and that also it should be recommended for all who are not so addicted.

your mind is your biggest ally. It gives you the capacity to choose where to focus your attention so that your actions align with your true self. As you’ve seen from the stories we’ve shared with you, recruiting and directing the mind is difficult, especially when you are dealing with anxiety, depression, addiction, or unhealthy habits. Why is it so hard to engage your mind and overcome the habits fueled by deceptive brain messages? The answer lies in your brain—in the way it is wired and how it functions.

In Alcoholics Anonymous they say you need to have faith in a higher power to help you overcome your addictions. You can’t do it alone, they say. I like that approach. Perhaps if we have faith — trust and commitment, that is — in the universe we live in as God, we can work together to find the solutions we so desperately need. We aren’t living things inhabiting a dead universe. The universe we live in is, just like us, an expression of life itself. Once we understand this, we will start taking better care of our world and of one another.

In the defensive structure of covert depression, the ordinary limits of the self are transcended through intoxication in one of two ways. In the intoxication experience that I call merging, the usual boundaries around the self are relaxed or even dissolved, causing feelings of boundlessness and abundance. In psychoanalysis this experience is called “oceanic bliss.” The relaxation of self-boundaries lies at the core of intoxication with drugs like alcohol, morphine, and heroin. Various forms of bingeing—eating, spending, sex—can provide this same sense of expansion. Such ecstasy can also be achieved in love addiction, where the love object is felt to be godlike and thus fusion with that person brings rapture. In such cases, one projects omnipotence, or divine abundance, onto another person and then depends on that person to validate one’s own worth. Engaging in such a fantasy is to some degree a universal and celebrated part of falling in love, but the love addict falls in love with the intensity of infatuation itself. Romance is not a prelude to intimacy, but a drug administered to soothe unacknowledged pain.

One of the major reasons why it’s hard for us to get over dysfunctional paradigms is our habit of selective attention. We’re more likely to register experiences that support our beliefs, and forget about—or just not see—those that run counter to what we want to believe. The basic principle of interpersonal psychotherapy, a highly respected method, is this: The reason it’s so difficult to change problem behavior is that the behavior is based on beliefs and attitudes that are continually validated by other people and by selective inattention to results that contradict those beliefs.

In the Kübler-Ross model, there are five stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. The model is supposed to apply to most major losses. Stuff like death, breakups, dealing with your parents’ divorce, overcoming addiction. In general, it works. But for Haruka, and she imagines most others like her, the smart ones, the brave ones, there is another stage: revenge. That’s not the same as anger, revenge. No. Anger is a much simpler concept. An easy emotion to tap into. Primitive. It’s rooted in the limbic system, the amygdala. A banging of the fists and stomping of the feet and overall feeling of “I’m mad!” Anger can be reduced to an emoji, or several with slight variations. Although, they’re usually a little too cute for what’s at the core of that actual emotion, anger. It can be very scary when witnessed. Revenge is more complicated. More sophisticated. It’s also less scary-looking, almost clinical when carried out. It would take at least two distinct emojis to express properly. More like three. Something to depict a wrongdoing, something to show contemplation, then lastly the victim committing an evil act with a calm, satisfied smile.

A good marketer can sell practically anything to anyone. Tobacco is literally dried, decaying vegetable matter that you light on fire and inhale, breathing horrid-tasting, toxic fumes into your lungs.121 At one point marketers promoted smoking as a status symbol and claimed it had health benefits. Once you give it a try, the addictive nature of the drug kicks in, and the agency’s job becomes much easier. If they can get you hooked, the product will sell itself. Since the product is actually poison, advertisers need to overcome your instinctual aversion. That’s a big hill for alcohol advertisements to climb, which is why the absolute best marketing firms on the globe, firms with psychologists and human behavior specialists on staff, are hired to create the ads. These marketers know that the most effective sale is an emotional sale, one that plays on your deepest fears, your ultimate concerns. Alcohol advertisements sell an end to loneliness, claiming that drinking provides friendship and romance. They appeal to your need for freedom by saying drinking will make you unique, brave, bold, or courageous. They promise fulfillment, satisfaction, and happiness. All these messages speak to your conscious and unconscious minds.