Why smokers cannot see smoking for what it is. There are three main reasons smokers cannot see what smoking is.
- From the time we’re born the brainwashing has started. We’re told smokers receive great pleasure from smoking. Why should we not believe them? Why have they invested so much money and taken such risks?
- The physical withdrawal from nicotine involves no pain it is merely an empty insecure feeling. The feeling is inseparable from hunger and normal stress. These are the times you light a cigarette and regard this feeling as normal.
- The real reason you fail to see smoking in the true light is because it works from back to front. It’s when you’re not smoking that you suffer from the empty feeling. In the beginning the process of getting hooked is subtle and gradual in the early days. You regard that empty feeling as normal and never blame it on the cigarette. The moment you light up you receive an immediate boost or buzz and feel less nervous and more relaxed. You give the cigarette credit for your feelings.
The reverse process of smoking makes it hard to kick the habit. To understand this panic picture a heroin addict who has no heroin. You have seen many programs on heroin and the withdrawal from the drug. Picture how the addict now feels when he can inject himself. Imagine the addict plunging a needle into his arm. Do you think he receives pleasure or does the thought fill you with horror? Non-heroin addicts do not suffer from the panic feeling and heroin does not relieve this feeling. Heroin causes the panic feeling addicts feel when they inject the drug into their veins. Like heroin nonsmokers cannot understand the panic feeling of a smoker when his supply runs out. Nonsmokers look at smokers and cannot understand the pleasure you receive from smoking. How you can stick that filthy cigarette into your mouth and light it. How you can receive pleasure from inhaling the filth into your lungs. What is funny is smokers cannot understand why they do it either.
Is smoking relaxing and gives you satisfaction? How are you satisfied if you’re never dissatisfied at all? Why do non smokers not suffer from the nervous state you feel? Why after a meal non smokers feel relaxed and smokers feel un-relaxed until they satisfied the nicotine monster? The answer to these questions is smokers find it difficult to give up smoking. They believe that giving up smoking is giving up a genuine pleasure. It is necessary that you understand you are not giving up anything at all.
Smoking leaves an empty, insecure feeling that triggers smoking into believing they need a cigarette. The feeling is identical with hunger for food but smokers will not satisfy the hungry feeling and food will not satisfy the cigarette craving. Smokers believe they receive genuine pleasure from cigarettes. Many smokers find it difficult to understand there is no pleasure in smoking. Smokers argue “how can you say there is no pleasure in smoking because when I light up I feel less nervous.”
Smoking and eating seem similar but are exact opposites:
- When you eat this is to prolong your life and survive. When you smoke it shortens your life.
- Food tastes good and eating is a genuine pleasure experience that you enjoy throughout your life. Smoking does not taste good and involves breathing foul and poisonous fumes into your lungs.
- Eating does not create hunger it relieves hunger. The first cigarette you ever smoked started immediately the craving for nicotine in your body. This nicotine craving cannot be relieved by another cigarette but instead adds to your discomfort and you suffer the rest of your life.
The media and cigarette companies have you believing that smoking is a habit. Smoking is not a habit and the only reason you light that cigarette is to satisfy the empty insecure feeling you have. Do you think that eating is a habit? If you believe eating is a habit try breaking it. You need to eat and breath to survive. You do not need to smoke to survive. Smokers have to relive their withdrawal pangs at different times and this is their only habit. Smoking is a drug addiction and the nicotine that is in your body needs satisfying at different times of the day. The truth is smoking is not a habit but a drug addiction.
Society has you believing that smoking is a habit. Smoking is no more a habit than eating is a habit. Smoking is a drug addiction. When you first started to smoke you had to force yourself to learn to cope with the nicotine withdrawals. Over time you started to buy cigarettes regularly and had to have them to cope with the withdrawals from nicotine in your body. If you found yourself without a cigarette the panic sets in and as the days pass you smoke more and more.
The nicotine in your body increases over time. Your body becomes immune to the effects of the nicotine and needs more nicotine to satisfy the craving. You only have to smoke a short time to experience the withdrawal pangs. After the first cigarette the withdrawal pangs have started but you do not realize what they are yet. After lighting up your cigarette you feel better. This feeling is not comfort but a feeling of being nervous and less relaxed. A nonsmoker does not have the nervous spills and tension a smoker has in their lives. Being a smoker you go through your life with the discomfort and nervous feeling the nicotine withdrawals have on your body. The drug addiction to nicotine is controlling your life and the only way to get out of this drug addiction is to give up smoking.
In this step we have identified why smokers cannot see smoking for what it is. We have compared smoking to eating. You have to understand that society will have you believe that smoking is a habit and it is hard to break. Smoking is no more a habit than eating and breathing are habits. You keep smoking because nicotine is a drug and you’re addicted to nicotine. Once you can clearly see what smoking is you can start to understand what the effects of nicotine have on your body. Opening your mind to understanding that what you do is not a habit but a drug addiction. You have to see smoking for what it is. Smoking is a drug addiction and not a habit.