I used to smoke cigarettes. There were a whole lot of reasons why, none of them good.

I was only 12 or 13 when I started and it was an act of rebellion. My friends smoked. And it seemed to provide a short term comfort during a time when I was generally unhappy.

Like I said, there were no good reasons. Then, ultimately, it became a habit.

I remember thinking that a cigarette and a cup of coffee were great pleasures. I looked forward to the first cigarette of the day and the last one before I went to bed. And all the other ones in between. But I hated it too.

I quit smoking when, in my 20s, I started running regularly. It was in the heat of Southern California. While bounding through orange groves, I regretted every cigarette I ever smoked. But more importantly, I felt the strength and vitality of my body as I never had before. It was glorious!

Through this experience, I learned something about pleasure – what real pleasure is and what it isn’t.

I have come to understand that my body was craving something. And it was a good craving. My body wanted stimulation. It wanted to be worked. It wanted to breathe.

What I learned was that there was a truly fulfilling way to meet that craving. And smoking wasn’t it. It was a very bad substitute.

In a weird way, smoking was a response to the craving. There was a strange kind of pleasure to it. But it made me feel awful. My lungs felt awful. My whole body felt awful. And I felt awful, knowing that I seemed to be uncontrollably addicted to tobacco.

Think about the person who never learns what their body really wants. And it’s not tar and nicotine.

It’s oxygen.

It’s blood pumping, muscle flexing, deep breathing movement. What I learned when I ran was that there is something that truly satisfies the urge of the body and makes me more alive. And it’s not something that kills a person on the installment plan.

A smoker is settling for toxic stimulation instead of physical exhilaration. Instead of letting their body respond to the impulse for self expression, the smoker is trying to satisfy that impulse in another way. And it doesn’t work.

I can imagine myself at my current age, having gone through life to this point as a smoker. What a different life I would have led! What a different body I would have! There are things I have done in my life that I would never have done. And people I would never have met.

I’m not writing to you because I am “anti-smoking.”

I’m writing because this same issue is present throughout so much of people’s lives.

People get stuck — and we do not examine our habits to see if it’s meeting our craving in a healthy way…

So it isn’t just smokers who suffer from this kind of problem. In so many areas of their lives, people are taking in toxicity instead of finding real pleasure and happiness. It may be toxic stress, toxic emotion, toxic people. . . While it may stimulate, it doesn’t bring fulfillment.

And so it is in anyone’s life, and for every facet of our life. For some, there are keys to creative living they discover. And so they make a creative choice.

For others, they never find those keys. Their life goes in a different direction.

This is about our lust for life. There are people who believe that our desire for pleasure, happiness and fulfillment is wrong. Or even sinful. Some believe that we should resist the urge to have those experiences. I don’t.

I believe that there is a healthy, life-giving way to know joy way beyond the expectations of most people. To have that experience, we have to respond to the creative urge within us in way that leads to fulfillment, not disaster.

These experiences and learnings are what led me to write my book, Becoming a Sun: Emotional and Spiritual Intelligence for a Happy and Fulfilling Life.

And this is what is behind the Becoming a Sun workshop I have created based on the book. In the workshop, there are 7 experiences that will provide a profound insight into the significance of your own life story. You will be able to see the issues that clearly challenge your life (possibly places where you might be stuck) and be able to access creativity in new and empowering ways.

It’s an experiential, customized program that will impact your life through the use of Emotional and Spiritual Intelligence. You will be able to connect with your life purpose and calling and be inspired to move forward as never before!

Let’s free ourselves from negative messages and beliefs so that we can live a happy and fulfilling life — let’s Become a Sun!