How Candy Crush taught me everything I need to know about reaching my goals

Like everyone else in the world, there are some aspects of myself that I am not so proud of.  I'm not a patient person.  I tend to forget things - especially boiling water.  I have little to no ability to delay gratification.

And I love me some Candy Crush.  I love the challenge of it, I love the squench sound the candy wrappers make, I love when the deep baritone voice says, "Divine!", I love when I switch a candy ball with a striped candy and a bout of spastic candy carnage ensues.

As I said before, I struggle with delaying gratification - especially when it comes to healthy habits.  I'm more of the "enjoy things now, don't worry about later till you have to" mindset - and I am 100% positive that this is a large part of the reason that I am overweight, and why I don't stick to healthy habits for the long haul.

With this in mind, it shouldn't come as much of a surprise that I am one of the millions of people that has spent money on Candy Crush.  It seems ludicrous when you think of all the good use that such money could be put to - and of course, the good things that could be accomplished in the time that one spends playing the game - but spending money on the game isn't so surprising when you consider what seems to be a growing societal problem concerning immediate gratification.

There's a thrill that comes with beating a level - a thrill more quickly felt when you're willing to spend 99 cents here and there to get power-ups, extra moves, extra lives, etc.  At some point, however, I made the decision to stop spending my hard-earned money on a freaking app.  I decided that if I was going to beat a level, it would be the old-fashioned way: on my own.

Today, I beat a level that I have been stuck on for weeks.  I'm not kidding you.  Weeks, perhaps even over a month.  And friends, let me tell you, the thrill was completely different than the one I felt upon beating a level with some monetary cushioning.  It felt more grand, more filling, and more solid.

It just felt better.  In every way.  I know that this is how it would feel to finally go the distance and apply what I know about healthy eating and exercise habits for more than a couple weeks at a time.  If I can just learn how to harness the discipline, to avoid buying those figurative power-ups, I know that when I get there, the taste will be sweeter than anything I've experienced thus far.

When all is said and done, using shortcuts only cheapens the high.  Yes, you "win", but at what cost - both literally and figuratively?