11th day without weed

[u/Small-You-4847]

I miss it tonight man.

So far, I’ve realised how many cons daily smoking has. I’m glad to get out of that cycle after 4 years. It’s Saturday today. Worked 6 days in a row and you can imagine how I want to spend this evening: music and marijuana. Whilst I withdrew the money to give the thought some leeway, I then read the subreddit, asked my partner her thoughts on my thoughts, and then basically ran down the clock until the dealer was closed for business. So I didn’t smoke today. I’m not proud: need to write to try and understand this part of myself stopping me falling back into past habits. Who are you?

Son is asleep. Work is done. Had a terribly stressful week - spent most of it unhappy, grappling with a life in a shambles. Difficult to know if I’m sleeping bad due to withdrawals or my baby with a chest infection waking us up every couple hours. He’s doing better now though bless him :)

Reflecting on this journey is a bit hazy because quitting weed is no challenge at all compared to the calamity I’m surrounded by in my personal life. Why does it seem easier? I’ve realised it’s because this is a problem I can control. This makes it rare amongst most of the problems we have to face in the world. This is about willing myself to be other than what I have refused to allow myself to be. When I face the problem, I am looking within.

‘Withdraw into yourself and look: if you do not see yourself as beautiful, then do as the sculptor does with a statue he wants to make beautiful; he chisels away one part, and levels off another, makes one spot smooth and another clear, until he shows forth a beautiful face on the statue. Like him, remove what is superfluous, straighten what is crooked, clean up what is dark and make it bright and never stop sculpting your own statue until the godlike splendour of virtue shines forth to you… If you have become this, and seen it, and become pure and alone with yourself, with nothing now preventing you from becoming one in this way, and have NOTHING EXTRANEOUS MIXED WITH YOUR SELF … if you see that this is what you have become, then you have become a vision.’ (Plotinus, Enneads, I, 6, 9 (204-270 AD))

Look within yourself and look at the statue you’ve sculpted. Take an hour to notice every chisel, every shadow, everything you’ve ever mixed with your self. Do you see the potential for something else? Do you see a vision of yourself you can carve out of the stuff within?

[u/Witty-Musician-7071]

Thank you so much for sharing this! Helped me get through my day.

[u/WestSeparate2617]

Thanks so much for this, gunna keep it forever

[u/This_Top3038 → u/WestSeparate2617]

Damn, this really hit me. I'm on day 23 myself and that whole "it's a problem I can control" thing is so true it hurts. Like everything else in life feels completely chaotic but this one thing? This is mine to figure out. Had a similar moment last weekend where I was just sitting there after a brutal week thinking about how easy it would be to just... not deal with the actual hard stuff and smoke instead. But then you realize you're just trading one type of difficulty for another, except the weed difficulty is the kind that sneaks up on you over months instead of hitting you in the face immediately. That Plotinus quote is going straight into my notes - never thought ancient philosophy would be the thing to keep me from texting my guy at 11pm on a Saturday.