Quitters, Inc.

How serious are you about quitting smoking? No, really. How serious?

How serious are you about what you want? Achieving your goals? Living your dream? What are you willing to do? To sacrifice? Just how far will you go to achieve your goal?

On the Stephen King fan bandwagon and was again taken by another short story that’s also not that easy to find was called “Quitters, Inc.”

This one really hit home as it went to extremes that might seem mean spirited or evil, but I thought it was, ahem, educational.

Quick synopsis: “Quitters, Inc.” is a company that will guarantee to get you to stop smoking.

That’s it. That’s the story. How do they do it? Aha, that’s where it gets interesting. If you’d like to listen or read the story and not know the secret, stop reading because I’m going to callously give it away now.

They blackmail him. They threaten him with “we’ll torture your wife and son if you smoke again.” There are more details, but that’s about the gist of it.

So, easy, right? Just stop smoking and nothing bad will happen. For me, it’s a bit like red light cameras. People complain about them, but I say, “If you don’t like them, just don’t run red lights.” The cameras are simple, they only work if you run the red light. So just don’t do that.

To not have your wife tortured, stop smoking. That’s it. End of story.

Where I found it educational and “matter of fact” was when you apply this to any goal, any challenge, anything you’re up against. The only real question for all success is:

How much do you want it?

What are you willing to sacrifice? How hard are you willing to work? How patient are you? How much more are you willing to do compared to the next guy?

I don’t’ think I’m oversimplifying when I say that these so-called difficult challenges are rather easily overcome:

• Losing weight
• Quitting smoking
• Getting into shape

Those are all, relatively, short-term challenges that really just beg to ask, “How much do you want it?” If you don’t really want it, you won’t really get it. I’m not sure it can get simpler.

If you up the ante and start taking about, say:

• Changing careers
• Raising kids
• Moving to another country

These just involve more moving parts and will take longer and more:

1. Passion
2. Perseverance
3. Patience

But if you truly want it, you can achieve it. Maybe I’m overly simplistic, but that’s how I see it. Everything is pretty much a flavor of how much you want it.

If you don’t really want it, there will be excuses, delays, misery, sadness, guilt, blame, and did I mention excuses yet?

If you really want it, there is only passion, perseverance and patience. In that order.

So, the only question is:

What do you really want?