Quitting Smoking

I had this comment from a woman named Chrissy. I followed it up with my comment on SMOKING.

Chrissy writes this on my blog:

Having seen a close friend going through a tough period due to a disease caused through tobacco I made it my personal mission to spare as much other folks as is possible from the very same experience, but soon I realized that regardless of how great your arguments are it’s very difficult to have a smoker stop smoking, not necessarily because your arguments are not good enough and not necessarily because the smoker isn’t happy to stop but simply because nicotine is really a more addictive drug than heroin and cocaine (scientifically confirmed).

Next , I found out there is in fact a method to quit smoking without stopping smoking, thus leave the smoker their pleasure and also habit but preserve him from the harmful effects of cigarette smoking.

The Things I am talking about are e cigarettes. You can read about many of the side effects of smoking cigarettes and how an [url=http://electroniccigarette0.com/]electronic cigarette[/url] could help you quite smoking or simply permit you to follow your habit and get your kick without the harmful negative effects associated with cigarettes on my web site http://electroniccigarette0.com

P.S. I really hope this will not be deleted because of having a link to my webpage as I merely attempt to inform and help.

Love

Chrissy M.

JFD (the creator and author of this blog)  Responds:

Chrissy: I was a smoker. I found it easy to quit. I quit three times, the final time has lasted, oh these past 30 or so years. I quit “cold turkey” the day the very first report came out. I had one Camel left in its pack, put the pack in the glove compartment of my car, and that was it. I think that was on the very day Queen Elizabeth got married. I was going to work very early in the morning and the nuptials were being broadcast on my car radio. I heard the report, and my mind took over. Simply, I accepted the scientific report as true because I judged the claim of science, with its rigid controls in place, to be true and if true, then I had only to choose the logical outcome, put in play my great desire to lengthen my life. It was an act of volition, the capability of conscious choice and decision and intention, the act of making a choice that has some very strong motivation behind it, for that is what will is, a fixed and persistent intent or purpose, determination. I have plenty of that. Those who cannot make stopping smoking such a determined act? I cannot understand that weak state of “humanity”.

I said I quit three times. That was because I saw others smoking at the break between acts at a play, and I recalled what great fun smoking was. Fun crowded out reason. So I made a determined act to re-start; in spite of the report, recreational use of smoking took over. Then I started hacking, reminding me of the warnings. The fun crowds out the sense of danger. Then the second report came out, verifying again the findings. So I stopped. I went through that stopping-starting syndrome (a pattern of symptoms indicative of some disease) one more, and final time. Each time I quit was “cold turkey” (complete and abrupt withdrawal of all addictive drugs or anything else on which you have become dependent).

I knew I could do it. How did I know that and find the will to do it? I believe that the desire to live life longer is the giver of the strength of volition. Determination. One (meaning me) can rightfully claim superiority in making decisions for a conscious rationale, a fundamental reasoning process in balancing alternatives, and I developed the power of reasoning for my own, long-term good.

Reasoning has to be studied. Reasoning comes from study that defines it. That study is a respect and understanding of science, which has evolved the human being over many years. Science is the ultimate good of human life. Science is a way of seeing and defining. People locked hopelessly in the iron cages of addictions do not, sadly, have that way of seeing life.

My hacking was a reminder. I said to myself, and that saying to yourself is the function of “mind”, I do not want this terrible hacking. My lungs must be taking a beating, and I am on my way out if I do not quit for the third and final time. I love life more than I love smoking. To love smoking more than life?! Smoking has to go. And all that took, maybe, a minute to think about. I can make such quick decisions where there is a history.

Frankly, it is hard to see people who cannot reason themselves out of what proves to be a bad habit that has dire consequences. It is a deficit of volition growing out of a reasoning process that arrives at the good, and lengthening life is a good. [STOP THERE! I am interrupting myself here. (10-11-12) I have noticed that I have begged the question: What is a ‘deficit of volition’? Probably, a mental faculty of a drive to make a choice out of cortical control of the life one is given to live. The deficit? If that is not inherited, then it must come from learning how to avoid making choices, and probably from parental influences that omitted choice-making modeling or instruction or opportunities to make decisions. The question from parents comes out and the young learner answers, weakly, “I dunno.” The parents let it go at that. “Why didn’t you do what you were told to do?” “I dunno.” “What would you like for your lunch?” “I dunno.” Little stuff, the macadam of the roadway into the future.]

Seeing the consequences is critical, envisioning the future of continuing the addiction, and balancing that against the alternative outcome of having ceased the addiction. In that, I may be denying the power of the physical operations of addiction. I win!!!

I also had the bad habit of “over-eating”. I ballooned. So I stopped, the how and why I have explained. And so it goes.

Your gadget, Chrissy, is a mechanical-assisted, not volition-reasoning-assisted cure. The age of technology! Some people need that, I guess. A good that comes from hardware, not from the human ability to choose the good, just the ability to choose the right hardware. The technological “fix”, or solution, seems quite robotic, short-circuiting reason. Let the gadget do it. Something basically human has been missed. The “fix” is in.