some thing are up to us and some things are not

Epectetius say something like: some thing are up to us and some things are not. Further, he goes on to say that our conceptions, opinions, desires (want), and aversions, are in our control, and others suggest that our ability to reason, agree with reason, reject the reason, in other words, our power of choice is within our control.

Now where am I going with this? Well, we have the power of choice, so we can choose to use or not. That is within my power. When you pray for potatoes, we need to be ready and pick up the hoe as required. That is the choice we have use or not is up to us, within our power. Nothing says we need to like it, just do it or not.

Now we can use reason with a cost benefit analysis, as many time each day as we need to to convince ourselves that we have choice, and what is the right thing to do. We can lever off our values, but first we need to know what our values are. I will suggest that our values start by knowing how to separate the things are up to us from the things are not up to us, reason and the power of choice in our minute to minute decisions.

I am Fred, and I have a behavioural addiction condition or persistent habit. Today I chose to not use, and live in recovery.