I lived these illusions for fifteen years. I believed totally that my life would be intolerable without cigarettes.

 

	Even, to-day I will tear a cigarette into it's different parts, lay it on a table and then just stare at it objectively and without
emotion and try to answer the question that haunts all smokers

How could that thing just lying there
 on the table cause such fear and trouble in my life?

How could I believe that without it, my life would be intolerable ? 

Why did it take me so long to stop smoking and.... why did I believe it would be so difficult ?

A lifeless cigarette......

 
..............and there it lies on the table. Totally lifeless.

Powerless.

Dead. 

Totally oblivious to it's surroundings and to the pain and turbulence it causes to people's lives.

When I was giving up smoking, every now and then I would take out a packet - empty it out on a table and then one-by-one with full awareness and concentration, simply break it in two, crumble it up into a nothingness and then dump it into a bin.........

A SIMPLE QUESTION

May I ask you a question?

How did you feel ? - be honest here - what thoughts and feelings went through your mind when you read that ?

Did you think: "What a waste" .......followed maybe by a slight feeling of deprivation.....maybe even angry.

"How dare he tear them up. I could have smoked them. Pure waste"  

Did you feel, in some way that your pleasure was threatened ?

But hold on a minute. Let me stop you here. 

Let me draw your attention back to the torn-up cigarette lying on the table. 

Really look at it. 

It is dead, inanimate, lifeless substance. That's what a cigarette is in it's essence if you really look at it objectively and without judgment.  

Powerless, inanimate material.

It has no life or power of it's own. It can't sing or dance or solve your problems for you. Of itself, it can do nothing for you.

Suppose I got a plastic bag and tore it up and destroyed it - would you have any feelings at all about that ? 

Would you feel deprived, angry? Would you feel that your pleasure had been threatened ? Of course not.