My dad once got in a small car accident in which his front bumper and one fender were damaged. Easily repairable, yet he considered getting a brand new car instead of just fixing it.  His justification was that, after an accident, a car is just never the same.

Are personal habits the same way?

Once you start a habit, can you really truly “break” it?  Can you get to the point where no one could ever tell you once had this habit?  Could future friends know that you once bit your fingernails by the way you keep them perfectly manicured now?  Could they tell that you once never washed your hands before a meal by the vigorous hand washing now accompanying each dinner?

On a related note, do people always overcorrect for their bad habits as I’ve portrayed thus far?(I have no answer here…just asking)

I guess it’s possible to take a little bad habit and correct it with little to no notice by others.  A good mechanic can repair light damage to a vehicle to the point where you would never know it had been in an accident unless told.

But what about the big stuff?  No vehicle thats undergone an extensive overhaul can be returned to pre-crash status.  It’s just not possible to exactly match every little detail from before.  Is it the same for habits?Can you, for example, stop smoking and never have any signs that you were once addicted?  No “hidden gem” inside your car “just in case” the craving comes back?  No shuddering when you see a cigarette “tempting” you?  No avoidance of people who are smoking for fear of being “drawn in”?  Possible?

Can a recovered alcoholic fit in as if he never had a problem before?  Can it get to the point where the recovered can sit and enjoy a night at the bar without relapsing?  Can they go a step further and drink a beer or two without getting blackout?

Or, are they like an injured vehicle…already had the accident and now unable to return to how it was before?

Once a bad habit cements itself in, one can never be the same…or can they?

The mechanic’s trick?  Cover flaws with character.  Cover the bad with the unique, yet tolerable.  Turn a truck with a broken muffler into a barking dog just waiting to be let off the leash.  Turn  a car that pulls constantly hard left into a vehicle that seems to “glide” across the surface of the road.

Can’t we do the same thing?