Smoking

Smoking has not been a problem in my life for about 5 years now and I don't ever plan to start up again and after what I've read, seen and heard yestaurday I can guarantee I won't ever go back.

Someone asked me to help in getting them motivated enough to quit smoking and so I figured out a bunch of questions to get the person really focused on the reality of smoking and how it could affect many diffrent areas of their life as a starter. These were questions like "If you had to carry an oxygen tank around with you wherever you went, how would that affect your ability to do the things you enjoy?" or "Would smoking potentially increase the love and respect you have for yourself or would it potentially decrease it? and "What would you have to give up if you were confined to bed because of a serious health disease like cancer? How many fun activities would you not be able to do because you'd be bed ridden?" I also asked how if it potentially would increase the level of certain positive emotions or decrease it. If you are bed ridden, have terminal cancer or had a limb removed because the smoking, I highly doubt that would give rise to deeper positive emotions.

So I used the questions then I saw some really sad movies about a guy with lung cancer, a woman with mouth cancer, a child losing a parent and some guy who had his lower teeth, lower jaw and tongue removed because of cancer and that scared the crap out of me.

I then looked for some pictures and saw a guy with no lower jaw and that was pretty gross too.

Then came the stats and I briefly read a story about some guy dying and leaving his son without a father.

 All that was pretty disturbing for me and I hope for that other person as well. I didn't however just use disturbing as a way to motivate, I also asked questions that had the potential for creating pleasure. Ie "Would not smoking help increase your mental and physical health or decrease it and why?" "Would you potentially be more productive if you weren't a smoker and weren't controlled by your cravings or would you be less productive?" "What would your life be like if you didn't have to worry about running out of smokes or making it to the next smoke break?"

This friend has not responded yet so I'm not sure what the results are but I'll post when I find out.



Mike