Public policy, social issues, gender politics, religion, civitas, and other taboo topics fall under the hammer of Shava's iconoclasmic force of natural philosophy.
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To a friend quitting smoking
Wednesday, August 27, 2003
11:25 PM
First, I think folks should be proud of trying. Nicotine is fully as addictive as opiates, for some of the same reasons -- yet we don't make quitting smoking the heroic thing that kicking heroine would be. Jon you are a hero. You are moving mountains in your personal reality, and of course it's hard, but we know you can do it, and those of us who've been through it feel for you because it SUUUUUCKS! ;)
I started smoking in my early 20's, when my group at work would be in design meetings in a literally smoke-filled room for six hours a day. It was starting to make me insane. My best friend suggested that I buy a pack of cloves, light one up, and just leave it burning in the ashtray. Since most people don't like the smell, they'd have to either stop smoking, or put up with it.
I started just lighting it up, and then started to take a pull or two (second hand smoke is easier when you are smoking too). I only ever got up to about two cigs a day.
But then I realized I was addicted, and the bad things about cloves started coming out in the presses. I decided to quit.
Now, to me, nicotine urges are visceral. They are just as strong as real hunger, or real lust. So I said to myself, "Self, you have a pretty healthy libido. And in the spring when the boys come out with their spandex bike shorts and their bikes, you could just melt. Hell, you could just jump one of those puppies and wrestle him to the grass. But you don't. And it's all social conditioning. It's all personal discipline. So if you don't have to jump the next cute boy, you don't have to light up this next cancer stick. It's as simple as that."
And every time I feel like lighting up, I remember it's no more powerful that the urge for sex. I'm just nicotine celibate.
For years, because I knew I am still addicted, and I know I can (LITERALLY) stop any time, I would smoke every so often just socially when I was with other smokers. Or every so often when I was REALLY REALLY TENSE -- because Barb's right, its comforting, it goes straight to the limbic center in the brain.
But since my dad died last year of emphysema (essentially...) Joseph has asked me to please never smoke again. And I've promised him and stuck to it.
Good luck!
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