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THE BENEFIT OF SMOKING

Love your disease: it’s keeping you healthy. John Harrison

When I quit my two pack a day cigarette habit back in the late 80s I attributed it to a couple of things: not giving up, no matter how many times I backslid (and I could slide sometimes a year at a time) - and discovering a simple four line mantra, or self-talk, if you prefer that term - the idea that there is a benefit to smoking.

If you ask any smoker why they smoke, most will say something along the lines of: I know its not good for me or I know I should quit or it’s a disgusting habit isn’t it which is really not an answer to the question, more like resigned justification of why they have no intention of stopping. Sometimes you hear: it makes it easier to socialize with others who are smoking. We share something in common. (In that case, why smoke alone?) Occasionally in a rare moment of clarity someone will reply I smoke because it helps me relax.

Everyone tells you why smoking is bad for you but the benefit of something is the real reason why we do it. The core satisfaction we cannot do without. Most will agree that nicotine addiction is not a benefit or why we smoke but folded up inside this insidious poison delivery system is a truly wondrous benefit.

If we could identify this benefit clearly and firmly perhaps we could find an alternative way of getting it free of the poison.

When I told my general practioner my idea, he interrupted me mid-sentence: there is NO benefit to smoking. I explained it in context of my own success in quitting – he considered that for a moment and then replied: I cant tell my patients there’s a benefit to smoking – I could lose my license to practice.

Hence the conundrum. You won’t hear this from Doctor Dan and you will definitely not hear it from the cigarette companies.

Look at what happens when you draw in cigarette smoke, inhale it into your lungs, hold it and exhale. It is a breath cycle but a slightly altered one. A slower one. Long draw. Hold it. Long smooth exhale. Ah!

I call this Cigarette-Assisted Slow Breathing.

Muscle relaxation and anxiety cannot exist together and anxiety is most noticeably experienced as a constraint in the breathing rhythm. Wilhem Reich observed that: 'Psychological resistances and defences use the mechanism of restricting the breathing.'
Soldiers in wartime, people in financial crisis, the pressures of raising children and surviving the litany of life’s traumas. Watch what happens to the breathing patterns of yourself and others during these times. Short sharp breaths. Shallow and rapid breaths. Like eating too fast and not chewing your food properly. Or eating while talking. Or compulsive chatter. There is no room for a long breath cycle in any of these states. So when we feel like we’re going to pop a vein we step out in the lane and reach for our slow-breathing devices. Cigarettes. Within minutes, we’ve transformed our quick staccato panting into slow and serene smoke rings. For a moment, we could be on the River Seine, wandering in a French film, overcoat pulled up, romance a distinct possibility – not about to rush back inside the building to our stressed job at Fuckwit Pty Ltd.

Naturally, or rather unnaturally, this calming fix is temporary. (That’s why they give you twenty in the pack) and although you are temporarily out of the emotional shite, you have introduced a kind of computer-virus – nicotine and long-term lung damage – into your body’s hard drive.

You say: if it was a simple as this, why don’t I just do the slow breathing without the cigarette in my mouth? Many do. It’s called yoga, meditation, the ‘listening breath’ in acting, controlling the emotions in martial arts and disarming the reactive mind in various kinds of therapy.

But I didn’t do any of these things. What has worked for me since the late 80s and what I still continue to do when faced with unexpected crisis is simply recite four lines to myself – over a long breathing cycle.

I learned this breathing exercise from the Vietnamese Buddhist, Thich Nhat Hanh. He calls it the walking meditation or Four Breaths. But it is really two complete breath cycles, repeated as long as required. I have adapted it to quitting smoking. Here it is:

First breath:
Inhale slowly, while saying to yourself:
'breathing in, I calm my body.'
Exhale slowly, while saying to yourself:
'breathing out, I smile.'

Second breath:
Inhale slowly, while saying to yourself:
'breathing in, I am in the present moment.'
Exhale slowly, while saying to yourself:
'breathing out, it is a beautiful moment.'

That’s it. That’s it? If that’s all it is, why doesn’t every who wants to give up smoking just do that? Good question. Maybe nobody has told anybody or showed them how to do it? Maybe nobody has bothered to identify the benefit they are getting from smoking and looked for something to replace it without the damage. Do you think cigarette companies are going to spend advertising dollars to persuade you to stop? I’ve already showed you why doctors are hesitant to consider this.

There are two basics aspects to quitting smoking: kicking the physical addiction of the nicotine which requires a somewhat cold-turkey approach. With its accompanying withdrawal symptoms, irritability, sleeplessness and a host of other aches and pains related to overcoming any minor drug dependence.

But without understand the benefit of smoking, the first part is almost impossible to defeat in an isolated way. Finding an alternate way to get the benefit of the slow breath relaxation makes the addictive component a lot easier to face. Because you can relax while you are working the nicotine toxins out of your body.

Let’s look more closely at what happens during this slow breathing cycle:

1. Breathing in, I calm my body. As you draw in a slow breath, you focus on the area in your body that isn’t relaxed and let it relax. Stiff neck. Relax your neck etc. As you continue this cycle you will notice each of the areas of tension and stress you choose to focus on gradually surrendering to relaxation.

2. Breathing out, I smile. Don’t do this intellectually. Crack a big grin. Feel it. No one is watcing. You might feel a little stupid at first but as they say: this too shall pass. A great beaming smile does wonders for the spirit and lightens it up – all the time breathing out the slow exhale.

3. Breathing in, it is the present moment. Let the long breath in dissipate memories and anxieties about today and tomorrow. Be in the simple moment of that long breath entering your body.

4. Breathing out, it is a beautiful moment. Well, what if it is an ugly moment, you ask? Are you supposed to lie? Even in unpleasant moments there are beautiful components. Find the beautiful kernel of the present moment and focus on that. What you focus on expands. Expand the beautiful moment with the long exhale out.

How long do you hold these breaths? Up to you. Start with mimicking the exact breathing pattern of the way you smoke. The more you do this, the less you have to say the entire phrases to yourself. By the sixth or seventh cycle you can use short-hand:

1. In – calm (six seconds)
2. Out – smile (six seconds)
3. In – present (six seconds)
4. Out – beautiful (six seconds)

After you start to mellow (and you certainly will or your free advice cheerfully refunded) you don’t even have to say anything. Just the slower breathing will do the trick.

Enjoy that invisible cigarette.

First Published in Meanjin online, May 2013