Using Weed to Break Bad Habits

After a long hiatus of pot use, I decided to pick up this funky plant and see what it had to offer me. Mostly I wanted to use it for the physical pain that I felt through my life as I have been dealing with chronic pain and anxiety over the last few years. Rather than getting hooked up opioids which are destroying the country and taking American families by storm, I legally was able to obtain some weed for an affordable cost at my local dispensary. The effects on my pain were pretty instantaneous but what I didn’t understand is that pot has some interesting side effects.

If any of you talk with a stoner for an extended period, you can recognize that their thinking is a bit different than an average person. They often take a bit to think about what you have to say, and are a bit more open-minded when it comes to new ideas. I often found myself zoned out a bit when high and started to notice that I would be super focused on whatever I was doing at that moment as long as it continued to gain my interest. Another thing that I started to notice with my friends and myself is that I was more susceptible to suggestion and would tend to believe things more than I usually would as my susceptibility started to increase. I would review these beliefs when I was sober and recall that I would never believe something like that normally but was now questioning if those things were indeed facts. This, of course, was frightening but it came with some positives!

The Positives of Weed

On top of getting stoned and watching some awesome cat videos on Youtube, I also extended my watching list to include the Joe Rogan Experience and other podcasts which are centered around deep and interesting conversations. I also noticed that a good portion of the time Joe was a bit stoned himself. I admired how Joe was open to ideas that were brought up by his interviewees and also his attention to detail even though he was obviously toked out. On top of all that, when I too was high I also was open to the ideas presented by those he was interviewing.

I started to read more into marijuana and research were done on suggestibility and found some interesting correlations. Apparently, there have been researchers who have noticed the same thing. Obviously higher suggestibility is not always a good thing when it comes to keeping a rational mind, but with most everything that has a negative, it can also be used for good, and the same is true with weed.

A Foundation for Successful Change 

For years I have had a personal problem of eating too much bad food (sweets, excess carbs, and so on) and have found that when high these cravings would almost overtake me. It seemed uncontrollable at times as I scarfed down a whole bag of chips. What I also noticed is that if I planned not to eat those things that I so much desired when I was high, I often would have a higher chance of resisting them and choosing healthier options when I was high as well as when I was sober. This struck me as a revelation. What I did next is I made a plan that when I next smoked I would focus on the simple idea that I would eat healthier because I wanted to when I was sober. The plan was pretty basic:

1. Write down or think of an idea that you want to change. Make it very simple and clear as to what the intent is. For me, it was to eat healthy foods because they make me feel good.
2. Smoke some weed.
3. Once high, start to repeat those ideas in your mind over and over again. For me I had the mantra “I eat good foods because they make me feel good, I don’t eat bad foods because they make me feel bad. 
4. Repeat this for as long as possible or until you lose focus on it. You can also read some about your goal or watch some videos on that goal that you preselected before you got high.
5. Repeat this as many times as you need until you break the habit.

I found that doing this for myself allowed me to release some of that desire to eat things that I always knew were bad for me, but for some reason deep down inside I didn’t want to give up. Maybe getting high allowed me to communicate these desires with my deeper self and in the result, my subconscious became agreeable to my viewpoint. Just repeating this practice a handful of times, the desire to eat bad has reduced substantially. Pot can be used to build your foundation to make change.

You Can Do It!

I fully believe that others are able to do the same thing that I have done to change some aspects of their lives for the better. I have been working on eating right and being healthier for years, without much-lasting success until I used this method. I don’t believe that pot makes us lazy or desire to eat bad or anything like that. I think that pot brings out in us what we most desire in life, and when we communicate an alternative option to our patterns in life, we, in turn, can change what we desire.

Currently, our societies view on cannabis seems to be mixed. People see it as a way to help with pain management and deal with some psychological issues, but still, there is pushback from the government to allow for the legality of the plant. I also am aware of some of the negative aspects of cannabis however many of negative aspects of the plant can be used for good. I would suggest that next time you decide to light up, see what positive changes you can make in your life and show your friends, family, and country that weed is a great tool to use to improve our lives.

References:

Franzini, L. R., & McDonald, R. D. (1973). Marijuana usage and hypnotic susceptibility. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 40(2), 176-180. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/h0034435

Bergland, C. (2015, April 28). Why Are Cannabis Users Susceptible to Memory Distortion? Retrieved from https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-athletes-way/201504/why-are-cannabis-users-susceptible-memory-distortion