Smoking Facts

How Smoking Addiction Works
The sooner you realize that you are addicted to smoking the better. But first, you must understand the actual meaning of the term addiction. Addiction is a dependence or relationship with people, substance, objects and events. People can become addicted not just to drugs like nicotine, alcohol, cocaine and heroine, they can also be addicted to sex, coffee, shopping, the list is endless.

Your daily actions may trigger a desire to smoke even while you're unaware of it. Smoking daily over the years will strenghten your association with smoking and it will become all the more difficult to give up this habit.

Are you addicted? Answer these simple questions:

Have you ever gotten up in the middle of the night to smoke?
Do you start to sweat during a four-hour lecture due to craving for a smoke?
Do you get seizures or headaches if you do not smoke for extended time periods?

If your answer is yes to any of the above questions then you can quit smoking by keeping your mind occupied. If you do not agree with your mental associations with smoking, you will not crave to smoke. Even the heaviest smokers can easily quit smoking when follow these rules. Your addiction to smoking is whatever you make it out to be. The ability to give up smoking is in the power of the mind.

In order to better understand your addiction to smoking, try to analyze your habit. When did you start to smoke and for what reason? Answers to both these questions will give you an insight regarding the reason you started to smoke. Where you young? Did you smoke to fit in your circle of friends or just to get a nicotine fix? What happened when the coolness wore off? Did you realize your parents were right when they told you not to smoke? You can get clues regarding your addiction to smoking by analyzing all of these questions.

All smokers are addicted to different stimulants. Learn to analyze what grips you and hooks you to smoking. Try to uncover the reason behind your addiction. If you really analyze yourself, deep down you will get surprising and sometimes weird results. People smoke because they like to see the flame every time they light a cigarette. Others smoke to stay slim and handle food cravings. Some people feel lonely without a pack of cigarettes in their pockets. Still others smoke to clear their minds.

If you discover the roots of the smoking addiction, it will be easier for you to quit smoking. In general, there are two parts of a smoking addiction:

Addiction to nicotine: Nicotine is a substance found in cigarettes that is highly addictive. Over time as you smoke cigarettes you teach your body that it will receive regular doses of nicotine. Eventually your body starts to require more and more nicotine causing you to increase the number of cigarettes you smoke per day. Nicotine itself is not that harmful, but the rest of the ingredients found in cigarettes (such as tar) are.
Mental addiction: Smoking is also linked with your life and your habits. In fact you have smoked a large number of cigarettes not because you needed more nicotine but because you have become used to the smoking ritual. For example some people believe that a cigarette goes well with coffee so they light up one with their coffee whether they need it or not. Stop smoking hypnosis has shown to be very effective in dealing with the mental addiction.

People can easily give up smoking by adopting a strong willpower and positive attitude. Learning to combat addiction by finding replacements for it in productive activities is the best way to give up smoking.

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