New Years Resolutions

You can see on the RSS blog post from the Quit Nail Biting Now blog on the bottom right of this page that Britney Spears announced recently she wanted to quit nail biting in 2009. Then she went on to say she does not do too well at keeping her resolutions. I admire her courage to talk publicly about her nail biting problem. It is contrary to my idea for starting this blog. That is, I never wanted to discuss my nail biting with anyone, well at least before I was able to finally quit. It was just too embarrassing of a topic to be brought up by me. When anyone asked me about it, I would quickly change the subject.

So, despite all the craziness surrounding Britney this past year, it seems she is just like the rest of us in that she is trying to deal with a nasty habit of nail biting. And, like most of us, she makes resolutions that she already knows she will break.

I had to think all this through carefully when I was doing the trial and error research that led me to the breakthrough that allowed me to quit nail biting for good. That is, learning how to stop nail biting for good is a very difficult thing. I know I had tried and failed repeatedly over the years. So, I knew I couldn't just keep trying the same thing over and over again. I had to come up with something new.

What I came up with is a combination of commitment, serious self-commitment, visualization, determination and techniques that I could easily, quietly, secretly use anywhere anytime under any circumstances to help me quit. Even then, I didn't have full success until I came to grips that I had to really want to quit more than I wanted to bite my nails. That was hard as I realized my nails and cuticles were sources of soothing that I subconsciously did not want to give up.

I also realized you can't just use aversion therapies like bad tasting polish to quit. I have nothing against them. But should they be powerful enough to get you to quit for a while, you are still defenseless when the urge to bite comes days or weeks after you last put on the polish. If you don't have a way to deal with the temptation to bite at a high stress trigger moment, you are bound to fail. Realizing this and having practiced routines that I could employ when such a moment came along and having proper tools, i.e., ceramic nail file and cuticle clippers always available were all part of what I needed to quit.

Having given you a glimpse into the intricate details of my learning to quit process ought to be enough to let you know why I don't think New Years Resolutions give any real nail biter good odds of learning how to stop nail biting for good.

If you really want to quit biting your nails for good, follow the advice in my How to Stop Nail Biting book. It costs about the same as a bottle of bad tasting nail polish and comes with a 90-day moneyback guarantee. Click on the book image on the top right of the page to get more details. I will teach how to manage your habit for a lifetime, not for a weeks in the early part of the year.