Statistics Are Powerful, But Not Everything

This was posted as a comment to another post here on the site. It is so powerful and full of brilliance that it’s been added to Words of Wisdom.

There’s a very powerful book in the business world that is still used as a key text book in most business colleges called “How to Lie with Statistics.” Statistics are powerful, but not everything.

This site is filled with tons of testimonials of men and women and the story of their addiction to nicotine. The shame, lack of integrity, insecurity, fear, terror, and guilt for being addicted to something that we know will eventually get to us. It may be a low statistical probability for cancer, but the quitters that quit because they get a scare rarely succeed in staying quit. It’s the ones that quit for a more holistic reason, that understand the power of an addiction and want to be free from that that quit. The quitters that are successful want to quit because they have spent years making promises to people they loved that they would quit, but couldn’t keep their word. The quitters that are successful understand that they are addicted to a substance that also alters how they interact with others. There is a common theme among addicts of any kind and that is that they are not people of integrity or honor, There isn’t a single addict, that at some point in there life, either to themselves or to someone they care about, have said those words of “I’ll quit” only to go back on their word.

If fear is the only reason a person is trying to quit, it may get them across the start line, but it won’t fuel them for the entire journey. There will always be the excuses, statistics, “reasons”, hardships, etc that will make someone that quit out of fear go back to their master and be enslaved again.

The incredible sense of freedom and power one has when they know they have quit, and have the support structure in place to stay quit is not describable appropriately in words. It will bring grown men to tears talking about the joy. The quitter can look the person/people they love in the eyes and can feel like they are truly respectable because of their honor and integrity. They gave their word and kept it. I don’t know of a single person that still chews, that way deep down in their soul doesn’t have that sense of shame…it’s something not quantifiable with statistics or scientific research, but doesn’t make it any less true.

If you want to chew, you’ll give yourself a million reasons to do so. Most of the reasons that are common are given above by various posts. I’ve been there and used all those reasons. It still didn’t make me feel any better about it. It didn’t make me feel better about it because I knew, it wasn’t the truth. Even when it was a statistic. That spidey sensor we are all born with, the bullshit detector if you will, still lets you know that it’s a load of crap. That sensor tells you that not only are you lying to yourself, but you are lying to those you care about and love. And furthermore, you are putting those people that love you, in the precarious place of making them lie to themselves in order to be somehow ok with you being addicted to something. It’s a horrible horrible feeling and a feeling that feeds the addictive cycle because it sucks so bad that you just want to put another one in your lip and forget about it.

If you want to quit and experience what freedom feels like, myself and a whole hell of a lot of people on this site are willing and waiting to help you. If you want to know what it feels like to walk tall again, to look people in the eye again, and to know with every fiber in your body that you are not a liar any longer, but a man or woman of integrity, then I humbly invite you to come aboard. If you are a Christian, I welcome you to experience what it feels like to be able to go to God in prayer without hauling your idol along with you. Freedom tastes a whole lot better than anything you will find in a can. Freedom. People fight for it and die for it every day. I can’t state my feelings about it any better than that.

Most sincerely,
Bronc

NOTE: This piece written by KillTheCan.org forum member Bronc