“I had always thought of my drinking as a failure of will. And what if it was actually a failure of attention?”
Search Engine · Tech Strategy & Big Tech · October 2026
O'Gieblyn on the idea her memoir is built around, which she took from a line of Simone Weil's: that we should try to cure our faults by attention and not by will. She had come to believe willpower couldn't get her out of an addiction. What Weil gave her was the thought that by the time a temptation arrives the contest is already decided, by what you have been paying attention to before then.
Transcript
…in their addictions and like remembering what it was like, you know, remaining in this ongoing dialogue with yourself. And when you do have thoughts about drinking, like really taking time to respond to them and saying like, no, that's a lie and not just letting the fantasies fester in your mind.
…felt like I was tracking was an evolving belief you had about the way to manage like your own divided self. Like it felt like you were shifting from an idea that it was about willpower and practice. And in the end, that it was maybe about something that was like slightly more complicated than that.
…where she says, we have to try to cure our faults by attention and not by will. And I was so fascinated and mystified by that quote. I mean, on one hand, I read this like shortly after I came back from the relapse. So this idea that will had limits, that I couldn't will myself out of an addiction was very much something I already believed. But attention, I had never really thought about before. I had always thought of my drinking as a failure of will. And what if it was actually a failure of attention? You know, what if it was that I had, you know, not stayed the course in this commitment to something that was working and, you know, paid enough attention to that part of my life to ensure that it continued working. Because again, once you get to that point where you're faced with a temptation or decision, like the battle's already up by then.
Maintaining a habit of attention, that also requires discipline, but it feels like a discipline that I can actually reasonably commit to while knowing that like for me, like I've eaten four popsicles today. I'm on a diet. Thank
you for sharing that. Yeah. I walked out of the kitchen
and my partner saw me eating a popsicle and was like, didn't you say you wanted to eat healthily? And my brain flashed to the wrappers of three other popsicles.
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