Cigarettes
An Intellectual’s Guide to Overcomplicating a Simple Boring Habit
We’re all going to die anyway, so why not light a cigarette?
Friday, I’ll have an opportunity to buy a pack of cigarettes as I’m trying not to vape.
What I realized smoking cigarettes or vaping is both temporary. Cigarettes last a few minutes, and vaping lasts about a week.
About a year ago, I came up with a theory called Recursive Identity Modulation (RIM). It’s a framework for understanding and influencing behavior by observing the feedback loops between identity, attention, emotion, and action.
Identity → Attention → Behavior → Evidence → Identity
The loop repeats.
Examples:
Depression can become a self-reinforcing identity loop.
Addiction can become a self-reinforcing reward loop.
Confidence can become a self-reinforcing competence loop.
Spiritual growth can become a self-reinforcing meaning loop.
The key question becomes:
What recursive process am I reinforcing right now?
Below, I realized I was feeding the fatalist-hedonist loop and using theology to protect the habit.
The Fatalist-Hedonist Loop: Weaponizing Theology to Protect Habits
When an identity loop wants to protect a self-destructive behavior, it doesn’t just make excuses; it builds an entire philosophical fortress.
By fusing Nihilism, Hedonism, and Fatalism with a distorted view of God’s Sovereignty, the brain creates a bulletproof justification system that completely paralyzes personal agency.
Here is how the four gears of that machine lock together:
1. Nihilism (The Slate-Cleanser): It starts with the ultimate macro-justification: “We’re all going to die anyway, and nothing ultimately matters.” This flattens the moral weight of any choice. By declaring the big picture pointless, it removes the immediate guilt or long-term consequences of a bad habit.
2. Hedonism (The Void-Filler): Once Nihilism clears away meaning, a vacuum is created. The brain hates a vacuum, so Hedonism steps in to fill it: “If nothing matters, I might as well chase immediate, cheap pleasure and enjoy the ‘simple things’ right now.”
3. Fatalism & God’s Sovereignty (The Ultimate Off-Ramp): To completely seal the loop and remove responsibility, the brain weaponizes theology. It reasons: “God is entirely sovereign. He already knew I would do this, and He allowed it to happen. Therefore, this action is technically part of the pre-written script.”
The RIM Analysis: The Passive Spectator
In the language of Recursive Identity Modulation, this combination alters the core Identity node.
I shift from being an active participant in your life to a passive spectator of a pre-determined movie.
The Trap: If God allowed it, and nothing matters anyway, then my behavior is completely shielded from change. I essentially use the grand scale of the universe and theology to justify a low-level biological craving in the Basal Ganglia. I am no longer responsible for putting a wrench in the gears, because I’ve convinced myself I don’t even own the wrench.
Breaking the loop requires stepping out of the spectator role and realizing that observing the machinery is proof that I have the agency to rewrite the code.
I may have overcomplicated this. It’s just paper and tobacco. I’m planning on not burning it on Friday.
If I do, well, I have this as a reference for my thought process.