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My longest relationship has been with a pack of cigarettes. At first, this chemical romance felt like a kind of performance, a behavioral cosplay of my art-school peers, who appeared to be perpetually surrounded by a cloud of Camel Blue. Later, while ignoring a rather obvious addiction, I tricked my brain into believing smoking had a soporific and soothing act, inhaling a cultural narrative that it exuded the nihilist style of a 1960s French actress. The reality: Smoking is abjectly gross, zero-gain, and unglamourous. The premature aging, the lingering smell, the constant headaches and chest pain, the fact it’s literally killing you—all of it, no thank you. As Alexa Chung once said, “I gave up smoking (again), because as much as I loved them, they didn’t love me back.” So here I am: 40 days cig-free.
The world’s leading cause of avoidable premature mortality, tobacco smoking is a scientifically proven, virtueless vice. Broadly speaking, a vice is a “bad habit” or a “weakness of character.” But, in the spirit of honesty, it would be a disservice to claim to be a poster girl for wellness in other ways, as I find joy in a plethora of so-called “guilty pleasures.” To steal a Natasha Lyonne (who also quit cigarettes recently) school of thought: “I fucking love a vice.” Is that always an inherently bad thing? Could some “vices” even yield a positive outcome? Context is everything.
Take the F-bomb, for instance, which was artfully dropped a total of 3,021 times over Succession’s four seasons. Despite having parents who are pretty lax when it comes to dinner-table profanity, swearing’s make-up has, for me, long been painted “foul.” It is explosive, rude, indecent. A tick to be tamed. This is a skewed representation. “People use it as much for expressing enthusiasm or sympathy as they do frustration,” explains Emma Byrne, author of Swearing Is Good for You: The Amazing Science of Bad Language. “It also helps to bolster our physical and emotional resilience.” Otherwise known as lalochezia, one of the most underrated of terms: essentially vulgar vernacular relieves emotional stress or pain. “It’s like having an extra octave,” Byrne adds. “If you’ve ever tried to play the piano with only the white keys, you’d be really limited in the kinds of things you can play… sometimes swearing is absolutely the right note.”
There’s something intensely liberating about this language. Without verbal insult, with good intentions, it has the power to help us navigate or signal how we’re feeling. It can make us feel better. Induce belly laughter or stunned speechlessness. During the pandemic, it was shared speech, small talk with near strangers, gossip, we so deeply craved. Despite the latter’s historically negative connotations, Xinyue Pan, an assistant professor of psychology—whose research explores the evolution and functions of gossip—applies a neutral definition here, as merely an exchange of “information about a third party.”
This can be affectionately benign information. Moreover, it can foster intimacy between friends; introduce us to nice colleagues; or warn us of toxic people. “Even when we’re talking about celebrities, gossiping might be useful,” Pan stresses “to show our stand.” As the Parallel Lives author Phyllis Rose writes, “gossip may be the beginning of moral inquiry, the low end of the platonic ladder which leads to self-understanding.”
Mythologies around our social behavior extend to every facet of our life. Nutritional inaccuracies still linger, like a hangover from early aughts diet culture, which vilified chewing and cruelly encouraged women to replace two meals a day with a bowl of cereal to drop a jeans size (seriously). “Demonizing food groups can be really detrimental to the joy of food,” explains medical scientist and nutritionist Federica Amati. “A healthy pattern is built over weeks and months of dietary choices, and it is about variety and abundance of foods with space for foods that bring us joy, as well as those that bring us energy, strength, focus, and health.” Dark chocolate, for instance, isn’t the enemy, containing “a source of magnesium, iron, copper, flavanols (a type of helpful plant chemical), and fiber. It is thought to be helpful in reducing the risk of high-blood pressure, including in pregnancy, and in boosting brain function, as well as lifting mood.” Also, it’s yummy!
“The science around nutrition is evolving all the time,” explains Rosamund Dean, integrative nutrition health coach and author of the Well, Well, Well newsletter. “Coffee used to be something that was generally thought of as bad for you. Now I think it’s completely turned around.” My mind goes back to a café in Rye, with tables featuring the myriad benefits of a cup of joe. The secret to a great sex life? Two coffees a day, according to one story. A stretch, yes, but not without some morsels of truth. “Coffee is undoubtedly good for most of us,” Amita says. “It reduces the risk of heart disease, reduces the risk of death from any cause, and improves concentration.” However, she points out, there are people who simply don’t like coffee—for its taste, stimulating effect on the gut, or simply the impact it may have on sleep. Ultimately, “genetic differences, as well as physiological differences, change whether coffee is helpful or not.”
Still, so rarely does the TikTok “health” jury reward this kind of nuance. It’s too boring for the algorithm, a space that thrives on fear-mongering clickbait. That can make you feel like Marie Antoinette for eating a slice of red velvet cake. Frankly, it’s a bit depressing. “That extremist approach is so rife on social media,” agrees Rosamund. “People are like, ‘This is awful,’ or ‘This is amazing for you,’ and there’s no middle ground.” Is there a gentler approach? “If you have a slice of cake, for instance, and beat yourself up over it, the whole experience is riddled with guilt and stress. Whereas if you’re like, I’m going to have some of this cake, I enjoyed it, it’s done, it’s not necessarily healthy, but it’s a pretty positive experience for your health, because it makes you feel good.”
“Lots of research shows you’re more likely to overindulge if you feel the shame beforehand, whereas if you have a healthier attitude to it and you’re like, I’m gonna have some chocolate, you’re less likely to ‘binge.’”
Just maybe, then, we need to give up giving up everything—except smoking, which we can all agree will always and forever have no redeeming qualities. As for the other stuff? It pays to ask yourself whether what you’re doing, saying, consuming, is really harming yourself or others. Acknowledge that sometimes our vices do not have to be an all-or-nothing affair. Embrace the mindset of Brooke Shields, who once revealed, “As I’m getting older, I’m enjoying my vices so much more, because I feel like I’ve deserved them.” Fuck it, why not?