This time: TEN days, zero tobacco

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thaijeppe
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Re: seven days with zero tobacco

Post by thaijeppe »

Good job so far Manas

If you can stop for 7 days you can stop forever.
Don't start after the 7 days.
I stop smoking 16 month ago and I can tell you the first days are the worst and then it slowly fade away,
today I never think of it, and I feel as I haver never smoked.

Just keep up the good work, you will be so happy when you have abandon that habit

:anjali:
Jeppe
If you let go a little, you will have a little peace. If you
let go a lot, you will have a lot of peace. If you let go completely,
you will know complete peace and freedom.
Ajahn Chah
Justsit
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Re: seven days with zero tobacco

Post by Justsit »

You're kickin' it, Manas!

If I can do it, you can do it.

I grew up in a house with my dad, a three pack a day smoker. The ceiling was yellow over the chair where he sat. He died at 62 after 3 heart attacks. I swore I would never smoke, but when I got to college, somehow I started. Then I worked in bar for a number of years, before Smoke-eaters were invented. I smoked my own, and everybody else's too. I knew I should quit, but I didn't really want to quit, so my half-hearted attempts always ended in failure.
Then I started coughing up pieces of lung. I started to really want to quit.. Still, I was pretty well hooked, and didn't quite get around to it.

Until a guy challenged me.
We were sitting at the bar, and the conversation came around to smoking. We both smoked, and both thought we ought to quit. We teased each other for a while, and then he said..."I'll bet you $100 you can't quit." That did it.
I put the cigarette down and never intended to pick up another one

Well, I didn't quite figure on massive constipation. :tongue: Yes! No cup of coffee and a cigarette in the AM, no trip to the Ladies. For a week. I was so bloated I couldn't close my pants. In desperation, I caved. I smoked 1 butt with a cuppa, and well...success. But I was still determined to quit. So, forewarned being forearmed - I started drinking mass quantities of water for a day or two, then quit again. More water, more water, more water...then, more water.

That was 1982. I haven't smoked one cigarette since.

The jerk never gave me the $100 - he kept smoking.
I still think I won.
Roland
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Re: seven days with zero tobacco

Post by Roland »

manas wrote:Could an ex-smoker tell me, does the desire eventually fade and disappear for good? I hope so.
When I initially quit, I had been smoking about a half a pack per day. My lungs could never handle more than that. That was also the hardest to quit. For about a year, I dabbled with cigarettes, smoking 1 or 2 a week, then It would slowly increase to 1-3 per day. I realized I was getting sucked back into it and quit again, those time with no withdrawals. This cycle occurred about 2 or 3 times over the course of about a year after initially quitting. Eventually I decided I needed to stop feeding the cravings and worsening my already damaged and asthmatic lungs, so I stopped completely. After a while I didn't even think about smoking again except for the rare dream in which I would smoke a cig then wake up very disappointed in myself, even though I was a dream. After that until this day, I only thought about cigs when someone would ask me "are you still not smoking?" Or asking me if I still crave it, which I don't. So the cravings will dissipate. On the other hand, my grandmother quit smoking 25 years ago and still has the rare dream of smoking and subsequent waking up disappointed. It's scary how powerful the influence of nicotine is on one's mindstream.

Keep at it!

:namaste:
"No tree becomes rooted and sturdy unless many a wind assails it. For by its very tossing it tightens its grip and plants its roots more securely; the fragile trees are those that have grown in a sunny valley."

--Seneca the Younger (57 BCE- 65 AD)
Justsit
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Re: seven days with zero tobacco

Post by Justsit »

Some scientists assert that nicotine is as addictive, if not more so, than heroin.
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manas
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Re: seven days with zero tobacco

Post by manas »

Day Five

Still going. Thanks all for the kind comments, I do appreciate every one of them. :anjali:

Once I realized that I had created something I could not, as I explained above, back out of, I decided that rather than 'endure' the cravings, which sounds like slow torture, I would use this week as an opportunity to practice Dhamma more intensively than usual. That way, my mind chafes a bit from the extra exertion, yes, but at least it is not thinking about smoking. I even forgot to check in to this topic yesterday, I was too busy listening to dhamma talks.

Only a few days to go now.

:anjali:
To the Buddha-refuge i go; to the Dhamma-refuge i go; to the Sangha-refuge i go.
jackson
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Re: seven days with zero tobacco

Post by jackson »

Greetings Manas, keep at it! :clap:
You asked if the cravings go away, so I'd like to share my experience, maybe it will help. Like most smokers, I started in High School and smoked about 3/4 of a pack a day. This went on for a while until I decided I wanted to quit, then I quit for a few months here, a few months there, around a year at one point, 20 months another, on and on. What kept happening was that I would start out with strong willpower which would hold off the cravings for a while, but then in a moment of weakness I would succumb to the craving and immediately be right back where I started.
Then I read about a mindfulness technique where you simply be as mindful as possible while smoking and ask yourself just what it is you enjoy about smoking. It took very little time for me to realize I actually enjoyed nothing whatsoever about cigarettes and that I was actually only smoking them to get rid of the feeling of nicotine withdrawl. Repulsion set in and quitting was the easiest it had ever been. No longer was it necessary to exercise willpower, if the desire arose I'd just think back to the last period I smoked and how disgusting and unfulfilling the cigarettes were. So anyway, that was over 5 years ago, and the cravings are practically nonexistent but if the thought does arise it just passes. It has no power.
I've found that with bad habits if I can go two years without acting on them then it's easier to have a proper perspective and see them in their proper light, until then the addiction still holds sway. Anyway, if you make it through this week I say go for another week. Just destroy the tobacco so you don't have to think about it and keep going. Don't think about quitting forever, just take it a day at a time, a moment at a time if you have to.
Best wishes! :toast:
"The heart of the path is quite easy. There’s no need to explain anything at length. Let go of love and hate and let things be. That’s all that I do in my own practice." - Ajahn Chah
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badscooter
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Re: seven days with zero tobacco

Post by badscooter »

Good posting jackson...

I used a "mindfulness technique" to help me quit too.... (its been over 2 yrs for me with no wanting to ever return) I would just sit with the craving and be with it.. I would kinda dissect it to really observe it until the craving would go away... They say nicotine cravings only last a few minutes at a pop so if you can just be with it for a few minutes, it will pass... After the 2nd week its clear sailing...!
Keep going Manas

all the best
"whatever one frequently thinks and ponders upon will be the inclination of one's mind"
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Kamran
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Re: seven days with zero tobacco

Post by Kamran »

Smoking caused my father to die of a heart attack at age 39...

Quitting is the best thing you can do for yourself and your family.

I wish you well.
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manas
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Re: seven days with zero tobacco

Post by manas »

Seven day mark now passed.

I have reached the goal I set. I could not have done this without all the support I received, from so many of you. A heartfelt thank you, to each and every one.

:anjali:
To the Buddha-refuge i go; to the Dhamma-refuge i go; to the Sangha-refuge i go.
Justsit
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Re: seven days with zero tobacco

Post by Justsit »

So...gonna try another day or two? ;)
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manas
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Re: ten days with zero tobacco

Post by manas »

Hi everyone.

I revisited my old habit. I had less than usual - just one smoke. And I now have a slightly sick feeling, the sickly sensation of faint nausea that I used to get with tobacco, long ago. I think that what has happened, is that my body, having discharged some of the toxins over seven days, is telling me something, just like it did in no uncertain terms when I first had tobacco many years back. It is giving a more honest assessment of this substance, something along the lines of "yuk, please stop doing this!"

The seven day stint I made was very challenging, but there was also something about it that i kind of miss. The feeling of renouncing something that is unhealthy for me. Doing something that is hard to do, but bears a pleasant result. The Buddha would agree (I think) that it is unwise to smoke tobacco, even if it is not strictly speaking an intoxicant that causes us to act in reckless ways such as alcohol does.

So, I have decided to do another stint, but I will begin counting from tomorrow. Tomorrow will be a new 'Day One'. This time I will do TEN days with no smoking. I hereby make this publicly known.

Members need not trouble themselves with having to support me so much this time around (unless they really want to). By all means feel free, but don't feel obliged. Because, this next stint will probably not be the last either. But I am making progress towards totally ending this habit, I can feel it.

By the way, I just took the remaining tobacco in the packet - good quality stuff it is, too - and drenched it in water to ruin it, and placed it in the rubbish bin. Last time I hid it in a deserted place, but this time I have thrown it away. I'm going to kick this habit for good, ultimately. But I will do it in stages. So, tomorrow is a new 'Day One' and the beginning of 'TEN days with zero tobacco'.

With metta, and gladness that this forum exists,

manas.

:anjali:
To the Buddha-refuge i go; to the Dhamma-refuge i go; to the Sangha-refuge i go.
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manas
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Re: seven days with zero tobacco

Post by manas »

I do have a question for anyone who knows about this. In my travels on the Internet, I have heard apologists for tobacco say things like, "the Native Americans smoked tobacco, and because it was natural and not processed with chemicals as ours is today, they didn't get the same dire health problems from it, that we now do". That was one of the reasons I thought that, so long as I used organic or chemical free, that it wouldn't be quite so bad. Have any other members heard of such arguments? Don't worry, I'm still aiming to give up regardless, but I'm just curious if anyone else has read such things.

metta
To the Buddha-refuge i go; to the Dhamma-refuge i go; to the Sangha-refuge i go.
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Kamran
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Re: seven days with zero tobacco

Post by Kamran »

I am not sure, but would think cigarettes that had filters on them would be slightly healthier than hand rolled or pipe smoked tobacco that has no filter(unless smoked out of a bong).

Some smokers comfort themselves by smoking the "lite" cigarettes that have slightly less tar and nicotene, but its really just a marketing tactic, and they suffer the same consequences as the regular smokers.
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LonesomeYogurt
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Re: seven days with zero tobacco

Post by LonesomeYogurt »

manas wrote:I do have a question for anyone who knows about this. In my travels on the Internet, I have heard apologists for tobacco say things like, "the Native Americans smoked tobacco, and because it was natural and not processed with chemicals as ours is today, they didn't get the same dire health problems from it, that we now do". That was one of the reasons I thought that, so long as I used organic or chemical free, that it wouldn't be quite so bad. Have any other members heard of such arguments? Don't worry, I'm still aiming to give up regardless, but I'm just curious if anyone else has read such things.

metta
First off, smoking anything is bad for your lungs.

More importantly, the idea that Native Americans actually smoked tobacco for recreation, either in cigarettes or pipes, is a boldfaced lie invented and pushed by tobacco/cigarette companies. While it's true that Amerindians did grow and consume tobacco, it was always done for either spiritual or communal trade purposes, or occasionally used as medicine. I live in an area with many First Nations people and the vast majority of tribal leaders here are adamantly opposed to cigarette smoking as recreation precisely because they consider it offensive in the context of their spiritual tradition. An elder for the Cour d'Alene Indians recently told me that before the natives encountered European industrialization, the average Indian man smoked about six cigarette's worth of tobacco a year.

In truth, the post-colonization tobacco trade was absolutely horrible for Amerinidans as well as Africans - tobacco is a dirty and blood-stained industry, and it always has been.
Gain and loss, status and disgrace,
censure and praise, pleasure and pain:
these conditions among human beings are inconstant,
impermanent, subject to change.

Knowing this, the wise person, mindful,
ponders these changing conditions.
Desirable things don’t charm the mind,
undesirable ones bring no resistance.

His welcoming and rebelling are scattered,
gone to their end,
do not exist.
- Lokavipatti Sutta

Stuff I write about things.
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Kim OHara
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Re: seven days with zero tobacco

Post by Kim OHara »

LonesomeYogurt wrote:... tobacco is a dirty and blood-stained industry, and it always has been.
Yep.
You might also like to check out Merchants of Doubt. The tobacco companies were the originators of the systematic pseudo-scientific denialist tactics which have since been used in defence of the plastics, pesticides, chemical and fossil fuel industries. Their basic plot was, "We know we're selling poison but we are going to pretend we don't know while we quietly pay lots of people to say it ain't poison."
Start here http://www.merchantsofdoubt.org/ or here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merchants_of_Doubt.

:namaste:
Kim

edit: fixed typo
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