A couple of years ago I quit smoking, and to help myself along, I read a book called Allen Carr’s Easy Way to Stop Smoking. (It is a really excellent book for that purpose, and I highly recommend it.) Now, Allen Carr’s basic premise is twofold: First: you have to accept that smoking is not a habit, it is a drug addiction; and Second: the only way to quit smoking is to never have a cigarette again. He goes on to explain that smokers have brainwashed themselves into believing that smoking helps them in some way—calms them down, allows them to focus, makes an event feel more celebratory—when the truth is, all smoking a cigarette does is temporarily satisfy the craving for a cigarette while reintroducing into your body the very substance you will once again crave. What you need to do to quit is to undo the brainwashing that cigarettes help you in any way, then suffer several weeks of physical withdrawal—a feeling Carr likens to a physical longing, but not unbearable—and then never have another cigarette again. Oh, and a positive frame of mind is essential. When you experience a craving, you’re to take this as a sign your body is transforming into the body of a non-smoker, and you should cheer, “Yippee! I’m free!” Well, I followed his advice, and it worked. The other day, I was sitting alone in a Mexican restaurant and wondering whether it is possible to quit people, and good old Allen Carr came to mind. Maybe it’s because I recently ended a relationship, and also have not been spending much time in my city, and my body has been experiencing very similar sensations to what it did when I gave up cigarettes two years ago; it’s a physical ache that comes and goes, that’s almost painful, a sort of gaping emptiness, a void that needs to be filled. It often seems like the only way to cure myself of this craving is to give in—to return to him, to sleep with someone new. . . . Not until you tear yourself from everyone you love does it appear that you are actually physically addicted to people. The longing for a person is almost identical to the longing for a smoke. It’s weird. Anyway, I am not a stoic. My response to withdrawal—which has been to flee into semi-soothing rebound relationships—has prevented me from being able to stand before you today and declare with confidence that it is possible to renounce people, to bear the weeks of physical withdrawal symptoms, and thereafter attain the qualities that Allen Carr claims the non-smoker is in possession of: health, energy, wealth, peace of mind, confidence, courage, self-respect, happiness, and freedom. But though it wasn’t recent, I have spent time alone in the past, and in my memories of these times—the happiest times of my life—I really did seem possessed of substantially more courage, confidence, self-respect, freedom, energy, and peace of mind than those times when I’ve surrounded myself with people. And if that’s the truth, and my memory’s not lying—why go out? Allen Carr advises smokers who are considering quitting to put the following three questions to themselves, and I think we can also ponder them as we consider whether it is worthwhile to try to be cured of our addiction to people. As the smoker considers smoking, we ask of socializing: i. What is it doing for me? ii. Do I actually enjoy it? iii. Do I really need to go through life paying through the nose, just to stick these things in my mouth and suffocate myself? i. What is it doing for me? As I suggested earlier, we get together with people to satisfy desires—the desire to love and be loved, the desire for sex, talk, companionship, good times, all those things. To which Allen Carr might retort: “We talk about smoking being relaxing or giving satisfaction. But how can you be satisfied unless you were dissatisfied in the first place?” And truly, who has ever been satisfied by people? A few weeks ago, for instance, I was deeply insulted by a conceptual poet from New York who had come to my town to do a reading. I admire his work, so I went—knowing as I left my apartment that I was risking my admiration for him—What if he is an asshole? I asked myself, closing the door. Never mind, I replied, turning the key, for my curiosity surpassed my fear.