I am getting used to writing in this newly oxygenated state which still feels a bit like driving a car when under the influence of alcohol. Its been nearly two weeks since I stopped smoking, and it is taking my body a long time to adjust. I have been abusing the soft tissues of my lungs for more than forty years, and then just stopped. It was a Friday morning, and along came by the opportunity for me to stop smoking, which I grabbed.
I dared to ask myself, Adam, re: smoking WTF? Like what is actually going on here? The ‘opportunity’ was that I was willing to stop for a moment, turn around and face this fear which I have connected to the idea of no longer smoking, to face the experience of this fear.
In the process of walking this life, constantly attracting towards me points which I am needing to face, points of dishonesty with myself, points of separation in the experience of me as Mind as Energy. Frequently for me this Energy is Fear, and my experience in allowing and accepting myself as less than it. In consequence I go into hiding from realizations of what it is that I am doing. The essence of hiding is in denial of being Here. I stop doing that. Certainly these little affairs, these relationships with cigarettes have been instances over and over of hiding from self. And instances of reasserting over and again my belief in the possibility of hiding. I stop hiding
‘Giving up’ smoking, yes it is that simple, in the sense that the physical correction of myself lies in the simple stopping of doing it. But for me it has been a shocking discovery to find out how much I had structured smoking into my life. This ‘stopping’ has been a major event in my life, almost, I realized after a few days, like a miniature ‘nervous breakdown’, not smoking anymore ever left me without self definition. I had lost touch with my familiarity with myself as being who I am in smoking.
I had a dream that I was lying on a road verge watching the traffic going by, I had left my father’s car parked up on the other side. When I woke up I noticed that ‘my father’s car’ had been an early positive experience of smoking, as the sweet smell of cigarettes and phosphorus and leather drifted over from the front seats. Also I wondered if this had been an image of my father’s consciousness which I had been driving around in and then suddenly one day stepped out of.
One of the cool things about these urges which come up is that because I have been using cigarettes as a way of avoiding points which I am needing to look at, when now I suddenly want or desire a cigarette I can use this as a flag to show me and remind me about what just came up/went down just then just before I had that urge.
When I mentioned about the ‘structure’ of the day and smoking, I meant about how I have used smoking as a preparation, as a reward, as a punctuation, as a point of satisfaction, as a point of pleasure, as a good feeling, as a comfort, as company, as a stabilizer, as a suppressant, as a sedative, as a place to think, to contemplate, to concentrate, to day dream, as a point of defiance, as a point of resignation, as a point of protection. When I look at how all these points come up immediately in my day just because I am no longer smoking I can see how important it is for me now to stop. I can see also how much I have been kidding myself in picturing this habit as if it was a little add-on to the personality that could be dropped (further) along the way.
I forgive myself for allowing and accepting myself to believe that I have become addicted to a substance when really I am using that substance as a point of blame for abandoning my responsibility for who I am and whether or not I live in self direction.
I forgive myself for allowing and accepting myself to fear the feelings which might possibly come up in me if I do not have a cigarette.
I forgive myself for allowing and accepting myself to participate in thoughts about a future in which I am having bad experiences.
I forgive myself for allowing and accepting myself to fear the feelings that might possibly come up in me if I were to fail or fall within my resolution to stop.
I forgive myself for allowing and accepting myself to create and justify a system of abuse of my body and for not allowing myself to realize my starting point of self hatred.
I forgive myself for allowing and accepting myself to judge myself as good for hating myself in my attempts to define myself by the judgements of others.
I forgive myself for allowing and accepting myself to believe that I can win by being the first to hate myself before all others.
Smoking as a preparation:
I forgive myself for allowing and accepting myself to believe that I need to prepare myself before an event such as ‘the day’ by having a cigarette.
I forgive myself for allowing and accepting myself to fear walking straight into an event without preparation.
I forgive myself for allowing and accepting myself to fear making an action without first taking a period of inaction in which I smoke a cigarette.
I forgive myself for allowing and accepting myself to believe that I will be able to make myself ready for action by organizing myself in and as my mind.
Smoking as a reward:
I forgive myself for allowing and accepting myself to manipulate myself through my motivations as energy, such as making myself do something which I have judged to be a chore by promising myself a cigarette when it’s all done.
I forgive myself for allowing and accepting myself to be conditioning myself and programming myself to create rewards to work towards in the future rather than being here in each moment with what I am doing.
I forgive myself for allowing and accepting myself to evaluate my present actions in terms of something which might happen in the future.
I forgive myself for not allowing myself to realize that by motivating myself with future rewards as ‘good feelings’ I am programming myself to remain in and as the mind.
I forgive myself for allowing and accepting myself to remain in and as the ego of my mind by creating and attempting to live this preference in which I am outside the event in being either before it or after it, I forgive myself for allowing and accepting myself to fear being in the ‘hot seat’ of life as responsibility for myself as life participating in this moment Here.
I forgive myself for allowing and accepting myself as the mind to define myself within having preferences of substances in my breath, rather than allowing myself instead to be within and as my breath in each moment.
thanks Adam !