In this article, we will discuss how smoking becomes a part of an individual’s self-image and how this is a key foundation of the Psychological Smoking Mechanism. This mechanism is why it is hard to quit smoking.

The Smoker Starts at an Early Age

The average age that a person starts smoking cigarettes is around fifteen. It is sometimes even younger and other times a little older but the time window is usually between the ages of 12 and 16. This time frame corresponds to puberty which is a very difficult and intense period in a person’s life. The changes of puberty result in an Identity Crisis.

The impact of puberty is so unpleasant, people tend to start forgetting about it as soon as it is over. How often do you fondly reminisce about the age of 14? If you are like most people, memories of the time between the ages of 12 and 16 are vague because they were so chaotic and unpleasant. Yet, it is the chaos and intensity of this time that creates the Psychological Smoking Mechanism and empowers it. So, it is important to review just what happens during puberty and the Identity Crisis.

Puberty and the Identity Crisis

The one experience that every human being shares in childhood is the Identity Crisis. It is universal no matter what country or culture. Yet, the full impact of this time is ignored. Many of the problems that manifest later in adulthood can be traced back to this time. Smoking is one such problem that is forged in the crucible of puberty.

Why does puberty cause an Identity Crisis? It is the rapid change of the body in a short period of time after years of slow, steady growth. The body changes so rapidly, the mind doesn’t have time to adjust.

As everyone knows, we all start out very small. As adults, we look at infants and can’t relate to ever having been that small. How many times have you looked at an infant and said to yourself, “I was once that small”? It just doesn’t happen! We don’t like to remind ourselves of being in such a helpless situation. Just think about how you feel if you happen to be around your mom when she starts reminiscing to her friends about when you were a baby! I have seen many a young adult turn bright red with embarrassment.

When a baby is born, the development cycle is such that the infant starts out very small and grows rapidly, about an inch per month, the first year. The second year, the growth rate slows to about 1/2 inch per month and between age of three and puberty, the growth rate slows to about two inches per year. It is slow enough that we adjust to it without much difficulty. A fraction of an inch a month of growth is not very noticeable and although we are slowing getting larger, we adapt our self-image. Because we acclimate to the slow rate of change, we have an identity; we know who we are.

Who Is That in the Mirror?

Then, we enter puberty. It varies from person to person but usually starts between the ages of 12 – 14 although it can start earlier. The slow, predictable change that has gone on for 9 to 11 years is suddenly, and in some instances, shockingly speeded up. In a short period of time, many physical and emotional changes take place.

When the growth spurts start, it is usually double what it was between age three and puberty although for some people it is even greater. In a matter of months, the body is noticeably bigger. The rate of growth speeds up to the point that the person can experience “growing pains” and in some cases, stretch marks.

In addition to size change, the individual starts to develop sexually. Familiar body parts start to change. For boys in particular, the voice changes with embarrassing results. It seems as if each time the person looks in the mirror, they are different. After years of a known self-image, a stranger is staring back from the mirror! A stranger with a 5 o’clock shadow or, for the girls, a stranger with a rapidly increasing chest!

Emotional Chaos

In addition to this massive growth spurt, the person experiences emotions that are greatly amplified by the flood of hormones. Also at this time, new feelings of sexuality emerge.

This intense amplification of emotions and physical sensations is overwhelming. It is almost too intense and results in some embarrassing situations for both boys and girls. A consequence is that every event has a greater emotional impact than it would under normal circumstances. The increased emotion causes positive events to be more positive and negative events to be more negative. Amplified emotion is what leads to the creation of the Psychological Smoking Mechanism.

The Twilight Zone – Between Childhood and Adulthood

For the adolescent, puberty is a nightmare. They don’t look like themselves, they don’t feel like themselves, they have feelings they never had before, they have body features they didn’t have before, their voice is not the same, they are taller, favorite clothes and shoes are outgrown quickly, and many other changes. Adults are no help because they take the attitude that everyone goes through this experience. This response is due to the repression of their own puberty experiences. Believe me, the typical adult attitude towards the changes of puberty is no consolation to a young person whose world has been turned upside down!

In addition to amplified emotions and sensations, there is the added burden of shaving for both boys and girls, and of course for girls, bras and tampons. The carefree life of the child is shattered. To add to the stress, school has become much more complicated by requiring the student to change rooms many times per day with different teachers for each class and harder courses. Gone is the security of a single classroom with a familiar teacher and a small group of peers that you got to know by being around them all day.

Misery Loves Company

Since adults seem to dismiss the changes of puberty as trivial, an adolescent in the chaos of puberty looks to people who can relate to what is happening to them. They turn to their peers, who are also experiencing the same things, so they don’t feel alone in this massive assault on the childhood self-image.

The common realization each adolescent shares is that the old identity doesn’t work anymore. No longer a child but not considered an adult either. The only security the adolescent sees is being an adult but, they aren’t mentally or emotionally there yet. So, the peer solution is an attempt to force the title of adult. This is done by attempting to copy behaviors that are considered adult only. The two most common choices of adult behavior are the forbidden ones of drinking alcohol and smoking.

Smoking is Hard, Getting Drunk is Not

Of the two “adult” behaviors that the adolescent chooses to declare adulthood, the one with the most prestige and peer approval is smoking. This is because the hardest thing about drinking alcohol is getting it; anyone can drink and get drunk. However, smoking is different.

Smoking is very hard to do. A person has to go through a learning process to suppress the normal body protective mechanism. It is a miserable time but the motivation is driven by the amplified emotion of puberty and desperation to define an identity as an adult. Intense emotions give more power to the motivation and allows them to force themselves through the miserable, time consuming process of learning to smoke. Obviously, not everyone has the force of will to do so but a large percentage who choose smoking persist and learn to smoke. When the adolescent succeeds in being able to smoke, they are the envy of their peers, most of whom cannot smoke. They join the small, elite group of smokers and are considered accomplished. And why not, after all they have mastered a very difficult task; learned Mind over Matter to suppress the normal body protective reaction. They have created the Psychological Smoking Mechanism.

Smoking and Self-Confidence

Peer approval, the small club of smokers, the daring rebellion of breaking the rules by violating the law, and the perceived rebellious independence (who hasn’t looked on with admiration at the smokers plotting a cigarette break in the high school bathroom between 3rd and 4th period?), are very important to the adolescent. The ability to smoke cigarettes gives them prestige that they see the majority of their peers do not have. This is one of the building blocks of the Psychological Smoking Mechanism: smoking makes me special and admired.

Unfortunately, the young smoker gives power to the cigarette and feels that without it, they would not, and this is probably correct, have the attention that smoking gives them from both adults and peers. Smoking has become a part of their self-image because it gives them confidence. This confidence usually leads to other successes which in turn, are attributed to smoking when in reality, it is the confidence that led to success, not smoking; they just don’t realize it.

Conclusion

A person usually learns to smoke during the changes of puberty when they are trying to establish an adult identity. They are not a child but not yet an adult so they seek what they consider adult activities to declare themselves an adult. Among their peers, smoking has the highest status because it is hard to do and most young people won’t or cannot do it. This results in admiration and prestige from their peers and adult attention that they would likely not have otherwise.

Smoking gives the young person confidence which in turn allows their natural abilities to produce success in other areas. The cigarette is given the credit when in reality, it is their confidence in themselves that produce the additional success. Due to this misconception, the young person believes the ability to smoke cigarettes has given them things they wouldn’t have otherwise and without smoking, they would not have the other successes. This is a key foundation of the Psychological Smoking Mechanism. Removing the impact of these beliefs is an important step towards becoming a non-smoker.

? R. Michael Stone, All Rights Reserved

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In this article, I will explain how the smoker uses Associative Learning to reinforce the Psychological Smoking Mechanism which in turn, makes it hard to quit smoking.

The History of Associative Learning

The concept of Associative Learning was discovered by the Russian physiologist, Ivan Pavlov. He started out researching the gastric function of dogs but in examining salivary secretion, he discovered that saliva flowed before food was presented. Finding this more interesting, he gave up the gastric research and explored this phenomena.

He found that he could trigger a physical response, e.g. flow of saliva, by pairing a neutral stimulus with the active stimulus, in this case, food. The most noted neutral stimulus that he used was ringing a bell. (Remember the old fashion dinner bell?) After pairing the bell ring with the food, eventually, just ringing the bell caused the saliva to flow. Thus was born the psychological construct of Classical Conditioning.

Common Examples of Classical Conditioning

Before we get into the various ways Associative Learning strengthens the Psychological Smoking Mechanism, I want to give some everyday examples that apply to both smokers and nonsmokers.

When most people go to the theater or sit down to watch their favorite program on TV, what is one of the first snacks they think of? Popcorn!

Through advertising both in the theater and on TV (remember Jiffy Pop? How about Orville Redenbacher with his red bow tie?), popcorn has become associated with enjoying a movie or TV show. The aroma of hot, buttered popcorn greets the theater goer as soon as they enter the building. You have to walk right past the concessions to get to the movie theaters. If that doesn’t stop you to buy, the commercials before the show encourage the purchase and many people get up and go buy popcorn. Because of this programming and the subsequent Associative Learning, for many people, when they sit down to watch something enjoyable at home, making popcorn is part of the process. This is an example of Associative Learning. The positive qualities of taste and smell strengthen the urge to buy or make popcorn to enjoy the show!

The more you enjoy the movie or TV show, the stronger the association with popcorn. This is because it adds the power of emotion as well as good taste and smell.

A slightly different example of associative learning is provided by the following example.

Suppose when you were growing up, you parents owned a blue Toyota. This car was used to take you places that you enjoyed. Perhaps they kept this car for a number of years. When they got a new car, like most people, they bought the same brand. So over time, you begin to associate your parents with Toyota cars. As an adult, whenever you see a Toyota, you will have thoughts about your parents.

Of course, it doesn’t take a long time for this type of association to develop if there is a great deal of emotion behind it. Suppose you fall madly in love with someone and they drive a Mustang. In short order, whenever you see a Mustang, you will think of the person you love. This is Associative Learning!

All these examples show how Associative Learning works. You have a neutral stimulus, such as a brand of car, going to the theater for a movie or a favorite TV show such as a football game, paired with something that you love. In the case of popcorn, it tastes good and eating it is rewarding. In the case of the brands of cars, people that we love drive them. So, when we see the cars or go to the theater, it brings about the good feelings provided by what we love. It is this mechanism that makes the Psychological Smoking Mechanism strong.

When you First Learn to Smoke

No one simply picks up a cigarette and starts smoking. It is a learning process that is miserable. However, there is much motivation to smoke and the person sticks with it until they “learn” to smoke. This of course means that they use their mind to turn off the protective mechanisms that the body uses to alert you when something hazardous has entered your body. In this case, hot, polluted, chemical smoke into your delicate lung tissues that were only designed for clean air. They create the foundation of the Psychological Smoking Mechanism.

It is so hard to smoke, each cigarette requires the smoker to actively suppress their body defense mechanisms. Since smoking is really an unpleasant activity, the smoker looks for ways to justify the extreme effort to smoke each cigarette. This is where Associative Learning takes place. unconsciously, the smoker is looking for positive things to pair with the act of smoking. Using Associative Learning, the smoker begins to attribute the positive qualities of an event or act with smoking and over time, the smoker assigns these qualities to the cigarette. These associations provide rationalizations to the smoker. Let’s look at some common ones.

Smoking and Coffee

If the smoker is a coffee drinker, you can be certain that a cigarette will be part of the process. A perfect example of this is found in the movie, “Walk, Don’t Run” starring Carey Grant and Samantha Eggar. In a morning scene, a female friend who carpools to work with Eggar’s character arrives early and since there is extra time to chat, she offers her a cup of coffee. The friend says she’d love another cup of coffee and a cigarette! This movie was released in 1966, when about 44% of the American population smoked.

Coffee by itself is a pretty powerful drink. Many people use the caffeine as a pick me up and many people drink coffee after a meal (Just think about how many times you are offered a cup of coffee after a meal in a restaurant). Coffee has become associated with aiding digestion! Does it really work? Well, years ago, I was having some gastrointestinal tests run. Before the x-rays were taken, the doctor told me, if I liked coffee, to think about it as it would cause my digestive juices to flow. Yes, coffee is a powerful drink.

So what happens when you pair the powerful effects of coffee with a cigarette?. When you drink the coffee, it produces it’s powerful effects, whether by the caffeine buzz or stimulating digestion. Throw in the cigarette and over time, it is assigned the effects actually produced by the coffee. The cigarette actually doesn’t do any of the things that coffee does but in seeking justify the Psychological Smoking Mechanism, the smoker awards the qualities of coffee to the cigarette. Qualities the cigarette didn’t earn.

Smoking and Sex

Probably the most powerful drive in humans is the sex drive. There are many psychological and physiological reasons why this is so. Sexual fulfillment is a powerful force for both males and females. It is no wonder that the smoker works to associate this powerful positive fulfillment by smoking afterwards.

Contemporary movies are a good indicator of current trends. I mentioned “Walk, Don’t Run” earlier in this article as an example of smoking with coffee. A more recent movie that demonstrated the association of smoking after sex was the comedy “Zapped” with Scott Biao, released in 1982.

In this movie, set in a high school, a lab accident gives a nerdy, shy student telekinetic powers and of course chaos ensues. The exceptional abilities gives him confidence to do things he wouldn’t otherwise do such as approach the girl that he’s had a crush on but afraid to talk to. The new confidence leads to him having sex with his girlfriend in the lab and afterwards, he uses his telekinetic powers to retrieve and light two cigarettes which they both smoke.

There is a powerful message here. A person with powerful paranormal abilities has sex and then, both the boy and girl have to smoke afterwards. The message is clear, no matter how powerful you are, you must have a smoke after sex to make it “complete”.

Conclusion

There are many other examples of Associative Learning that the smoker uses to strengthen the Psychological Smoking Mechanism to keep smoking. If you think that smokers go out of their way to associate pleasant events and experiences with smoking, you are right! It is actually an inner drive to make these associations to justify engaging in an aversive and unpleasant behavior.

The Psychological Smoking Mechanism is initially built by desire but it is strengthened by positive association using Associative Learning. Remember this the next time you smoke a cigarette after something pleasant!

? 2009, R. Michael Stone

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The true amusing affair about psychological maturation engineering sciences like brainwave entrainment is that increasingly people are winning admittance to this form of applied science.

For one affair cortical potential entrainment is the function of nominal, organized measures that have been acquired in the laboratory for the exercise to ameliorate the posit of the thinker. Of course, this has been organised from the very fact that the head habits nerve cells in proper frequencies at unique times of the day.

What happens is that the nerve cells in the psyche in reality commune with some others to achieve the construction of electromagnetic pulses, which show up as relative frequency versions on responsive machineries. One of the things that you necessitate to do is to actually figure that the brain actually exists in certain grand states that you can actually make understand the function of the psyche wave engineering science. One of the things that is fascinating about the whole technology is that you are able to find and download the sound files from the internet.

Their simple availableness on the internet affects it one of the premier consumer personal ontogeny applied sciences that you can exercise. Insight entrainment is something that has really taken over; applying extended absolute frequency audios that have been embedded into specific comfortable auditory sensations that can be responded to by the cortical of the brain.

Brainstorm entrainment can make the different relative frequencies in the mind that are affiliated to high isometric and low isometric great states, which are identical structural for you gaining sprightliness. Of course what this means is that we actually use science to reverse engineer the processes of the mind and from there, induce the cortical of the mind to actually emulate the actual frequencies that are needed to actually be able to emit the kind of states that you need.

At the end of the day, brainwave entrainment is one of the most powerful and easily accessible technologies in the world today, and from there, you would be able to make some headway into whatever you are doing. There are plenty of things that you need to actually do to access this kind of brainwave technology. We will look at other technologies in other articles.

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Those of you who grew up in the 80?s might remember a series of ?Choose your own Adventure? books where at the end of every page you had to make a decision and that determined what happened to you next. This article will take you on a similar psychological journey that might just reveal some surprising answers about your personality. I would encourage you to try this out for yourself. I have also found this to be a lot of fun to do with a small group of friends or relatives.

Before reading any further, however, I would ask that you find a small sheet of paper and a pen to jot down your answers as you go along. Try to answer the questions using the first answer that comes to your mind. Please don?t go back and second-guess your answers or try to figure out what they might mean. Just relax and have fun with it!

The Journey:

One day you decide to go for a hike in the country. After walking for a while, you come to a fork in the road, which way do you decide to go?

Do you take the path to the left that leads you up towards the open plains?

Do you take the path to the right that takes you down towards the wooded valley??

Please write down your choice before continuing.

A little farther down the path, you suddenly come across a bear.

Describe what kind of bear it is and what it is doing as you approach.

As you look around, you discover that there is also a gun lying nearby.

What type of gun is it?

Do you decide to pick it up or leave it lying on the ground?

As you continue down the path, you arrive at a body of water.

Describe this body of water in detail (size, shape, color, activity, etc..)

Finally as you stand there looking across the water, describe what you see on the other side.

Once again, please take a moment and write down your answers to all of these questions before continuing on to the explanation.

Ready?

Your Personal Journey Explained:

This type of psychological test has been used by therapists and researchers for years. The objects used in the questions above have symbolic meanings that are easily recognized by your subconscious mind. Simply by completing this exercise, you will be able to learn more about yourself and those around you.

The initial path that you chose to take is said to represent your state of mind and your current willingness to take a chance on the unknown.

If you decided to turn left and travel across the open plains, your subconscious mind is telling you that you may now be ready to explore that new idea or opportunity that has recently presented itself in your life. Even though you realize that there is always a risk of failure, this might be the right time for you to try something new.

If you decided to turn right and travel into the wooded valley, your subconscious mind is telling you that right now you may prefer the comfort of a familiar situation rather than risk exposing yourself to taking any unnecessary risks. By psychologically retreating into the protective covering of the forest, you are indicating a strong desire for security and a need to guard your innermost feelings from others, at least for now.

The symbol of the ?Bear? represents how you would typically view strangers or other people you have just met. Think about this for a moment, when you generally meet someone for the first time, do you usually see them as an ally or a potential adversary?

Did you imagine the bear to be large and intimidating (like a grizzly), about the same size as you (psychologically as an equal), or perhaps something much smaller that is easily controlled or manipulated (such as a small bear cub or a stuffed teddy bear). Think about not only what kind of bear it is, but also what the bear is doing (eating, sleeping, attacking, running away, playing, etc..) What might this behavior tell you about your current relationship with others?

The ?Gun? that you find lying on the ground is said to indicate how you generally interact with other people whom you already know. What kind of gun is it? If it is a large powerful gun, such as a shotgun or an automatic assault rifle, then you are probably not known for your subtlety when dealing with others. When you walk into a room you want others to notice, and even if you don?t always express it, you want to be the one in charge in any given situation.

On the other hand if the gun you find is only a small pistol or just a toy, you are probably far more receptive to the thoughts and opinions of others. You are confident enough in your own abilities that you don?t always have to have your own way. Generally you are willing to listen to other people?s ideas before making up your mind.

Whether or not you pick up the gun, is said to represent how comfortable you are with this particular aspect of your personality. In other words, do you accept this part of who you are, or do you often find yourself doing one thing while thinking another? For example, those who envision a large shotgun but leave it lying on the ground may be indicating a secret desire for more power in their relationships but they are unwilling to assert themselves. This is known as the passive aggressive personality type.

The ?Body of water? that you encounter next is said to symbolically represent how you see the immediate path in front of you. In other words, how difficult is it going to be to get across this body of water and reach your goal on the other side? Did you imagine a gently rolling stream or raging white-water rapids? What might your subconscious mind be telling you about your level of confidence in your abilities to achieve your current goal?

Take another look. How big is this body of water? Is it a small creek that you could easily jump over or is this a vast ocean with no visible land on the other side? The size of the water is itself a symbol that represents how long you believe it will take to get to where you want to go.

Finally, the land that you see on the other side of this water is said to represent your current vision of your goals. Look closely, does the land appear to be an inviting place worthy of your effort to get there, or is it a barren desert with not much to offer?

If this land does not appear to be a desirable place, you may want to ask yourself if it is possible that you are pursuing the wrong path. On the other hand, if the land across the water appears to be full of flowers and lush green fields, it may be your subconscious mind?s way of telling you that it?s time to focus your energy and do whatever it takes to get there.

If you have enjoyed reading this article, I would encourage you to forward this article on to a friend and be sure to check out my latest book ?Mind Doodles? which is loaded with more entertaining and enlightening mind adventures.

I wish you well on your journey,

Anderson Fox

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They consist of Why I Started Smoking and Why I Continue to Smoke beliefs. Both of these categories of beliefs support each other and need to be explored extensively. In this article we will look at how advertising helps to shape and strengthen beliefs that smoking is a good thing, to induce young people to smoke.

Advertising to Program Attitudes

If you are like me, you grew up in the “television generation.” This was the time when the majority of the television programs were sponsored by the tobacco companies. The television era of cigarette advertising ended January 2, 1971 but it continued in print and other forms of advertising until the present time.

What impact did this advertising have? Let’s explore it.

Tobacco Company Sponsored Programs – One Big Commercial for Smoking

When a show was sponsored by a cigarette company, they usually used it to promote a specific brand. They also made certain that they had well known celebrities promote the product. Since the majority of programs were sponsored by tobacco companies, some of the best loved shows on TV were promoting cigarette smoking!

As a child, one of my favorite shows was the Jack Benny show. Probably one of the funniest comedians ever. He was a pioneer in television as he was in radio. For many years, his TV program was sponsored by Lucky Strike cigarettes made by the American Tobacco Company.

Remember, funny programs appealed to children and the advertising was planting seeds of programming. Let’s review a particular episode of The Jack Benny Program. This program aired October 25, 1953 and was typical of all the early shows. The guest star was Humphery Bogart, a mega-star of the time having starred in such classics as The Maltese Falcon and The African Queen. He won an Oscar for his role in The African Queen.

As mentioned, Jack Benny’s program was sponsored by Lucky Strike cigarettes, a brand very much around today. The opening of the show made it very clear it was there because of Lucky Strike. Then, there was a commercial with Dorothy Collins singing the praises of Lucky Strike. The theme at this time was the LSMFT, letters with which I’m sure you’re familiar. What do they mean? Lucky Strike Means Fine Tobacco. I heard that phrase so many times as a child, after all these years, it is still a reflex! Of course, that is what it was intended to be. The jingle that Dorothy Collins sang really appealed to children. At the end, the slogan, “Be Happy Go Lucky”, a takeoff of a popular phrase at the time. Yes, they gave the cigarette a cute nickname of Lucky. Smoke a “Lucky”!

Then, during the show, there was a commercial written into the script so it wouldn’t appear as a commercial. Now this is very deceptive to children. For this episode, Humphery Bogart played a criminal that was brought in for questioning by Jack Benny’s police character. In the course of the interrogation, with policeman Benny “sweating it out of him”, Bogart repeats all the Lucky Strike advertising slogans. What effect did this have on children? It made Lucky Strike very appealing!

At this time, Humphrey Bogart was a big star known internationally. He had done many highly successful movies. Even today, there are posters of “Bogie” with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth; this was his trademark. He was a tough guy; a powerful role model. This certainly appealed to young people. As mentioned previously, this episode aired in October of 1953. In January of 1957, a little over three years later, Humphrey Bogart died of throat cancer. At the time of his death, the 5’8″ actor weighed just 80 pounds.

What sort of deceptive programming did you get as a child from cigarette advertising? Let’s look at some of the themes attached to the various cigarette brands:

VICEROY: “Gives double-barreled health protection.”

PHILLIP MORRIS: “When smokers changed to Phillip Morris every case of nose or throat ? due to smoking ? either cleared completely or definitely improved!” and “Medical authorities recognize Phillip Morris proved less irritating to the smoker’s nose and throat .”

PARLIAMENT: “You’re so smart to smoke Parliaments.”

MARLBORO:”Gee, Mommy you sure enjoy your Marlboros.”

LUCKY STRIKE: “11,105 doctors say Lucky Strikes prevent throat irritation.” and “Ask your doctor about a light smoke.”

L&M:”Just what the doctor ordered.”

CHESTERFIELD: “Nose, throat, and accessory organs not adversely affected by smoking Chesterfields.” (This was Bogart’s brand. Two packs a day)

KENT: “No other cigarette approaches such a degree of health protection and taste satisfaction.”

OLD GOLD: “Not a Cough in a Carload”

An interesting note about the Old Gold slogan. Bing Crosby, well know singer/actor had a radio program sponsored by Old Gold. In those days before recordings became common, everything was done live. It so happens that Bing was suffering from a cold. Ironically, while doing the commercial and repeating, “Not a Cough in a Carload”, he started coughing. This was actually, although accidentally, truth in advertising but the tobacco company didn’t appreciate it.

Bing Crosby was one of the pioneers in helping to promote and develop tape recorders so that he wouldn’t have to do a live show again. It is said that this on air incident was what motivated him to do so.

These are but a small sample of advertising slogans used over many decades. The wording was programming to help the smoker overcome the bodies normal defense reactions with such statements as, “Medical authorities recognize Phillip Morris proved less irritating to the smoker’s nose and throat” and, “Not a Cough in a Carload.”

They also told people they were smart to smoke and that doctors recommended it!

For young people, this gave them plenty of reasons to start smoking. This advertising was very effective as was demonstrated by the incidence of new smokers decreasing after cigarette advertising on television was banned January 2, 1971. However, due to the many people who were exposed to such programming, it continues to affect new generations as smoking is still promoted.

Smokers have forgotten most of the reasons why they started smoking because it was so many years ago. Using the memory recall techniques of The Unlearn Smoking Success System(tm), people are able to find out just how much they were influenced by cigarette and tobacco advertising. This is an important step to undo the advertising programming that is fueling the WILL POWER to smoke. When the WILL POWER to smoke is gone, so is smoking!

In future articles I will discuss reasons people use to continue smoking that keep them smoking, making it hard to quit.

(c) Copyright 2009, R. Michael Stone

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In this article, we will discuss why smokers ignore the serious health consequences of smoking.

What Would You Do?

You’ve been smoking for over 25 years. Your mother has been a smoker for over 40 years. She calls you on the phone one day and says she’s been diagnosed with lung cancer. You watch your mother deteriorate and a few months later, she passes away. As a smoker, what would you do?

If you are like a client of mine, you’d keep right on smoking!

How Could This Be?

If you are part of the 76% of the population who are nonsmokers, you probably think this is outrageous. How could a person see what cigarettes did to their mother and continue to use them?

It’s the same reason that people have a hard time simply quitting cigarettes:

The Psychological Smoking Mechanism

This mechanism is created in most people before the age of 18. The average age is around 15 although some people start smoking even earlier. It is no accident that smoking starts during the time of puberty and the identity crisis. The identity crisis is an unpleasant period of childhood where there is confusion of self. The person is not a child, but not an adult either. They struggle to define themselves.

Due to body and hormonal changes, puberty is an incredibly intense period of a person’s life. Everything is amplified. Emotions are strong and the world view is still that of a child being exaggerated all out of proportion. The child wants to speed up the process to be declared an adult.

Smoking is an attempt to resolve the identity crisis. It is a way to declare, “Hey, I am an adult!” Adults smoke, therefore, I am an adult!

Overcoming this confusion and ambiguity is of critical importance; it is a strong motivator for the young person. It is what gets them to apply the incredible WILL POWER necessary to turn off the normal body, protective reactions to harsh, hot smoke entering their delicate lungs.

The fact that learning to smoke is a hard, unpleasant task makes the young person more strongly defend it. They have numerous reasons why they HAVE to smoke. Any positive feedback they get from their friends adds to the power of the psychological smoking mechanism.

By the time adolescence is over and adulthood is reached, the mechanism is on autopilot. It continues to collect reasons for itself to exist. It operates independently of the conscious self.

The Nature of the Psychological Smoking Mechanism

The psychological smoking mechanism is frozen back in childhood with all the inexperience and shortsightedness of the child. The emotions and world view of the child define the mechanism.

Children have a limited view of mortality. They have trouble conceiving of themselves being harmed or dying. This is why there are many teenage driving accidents.

The whole topic of smoking is controlled by the psychological smoking mechanism. When you try to discuss the topic of smoking with a smoker, you are dealing with the 15 year old child, not the adult. This is why trying to have a rational discussion about the dangers of smoking doesn’t get very far.

The 15 year old child doesn’t believe the health issues. The 15 year old child believes that smoking is an important part of their life. They NEED smoking. It is something to be protected. When the dangers of smoking are discussed, you have them symbolically with fingers in the ears and a chorus of La, La, La, La, I can’t hear you.

A Real Life Example

My client, Bonnie Ryan, has graciously consented to have her story presented as an example of how the psychological smoking mechanism overrides the adult thinking mind. It was Bonnie’s mother who died of lung cancer and yet, she refused to quit. It was too important to her.

About nine years after her mother’s death, Bonnie started having some problems with her lungs. It was only at this point she decided that she needed to stop smoking. However, she really didn’t want to quit. Bonnie writes:

“After smoking for 35 years, my health was deteriorating and I knew it was time to give up smoking. Emotionally, I grieved at the idea of losing what I gained from smoking, and I was convinced that I gained a lot. Since my mother smoked through my childhood, I could not even imagine being smoke-free for the first time in my life.”

You’ll notice that she grieved at the idea of giving up smoking. It was like something very basic and sacred was being taken from her. Something that she NEEDED!

She of course, had heard all the health dangers of smoking over the years but like most smokers, tuned them out. She had convinced herself how important smoking was to her well being. Watching her mother waste away and die of lung cancer was never associated with her own smoking. It wasn’t until she herself started having health problems, that she consciously made the decision to quit.

It was not her grieving at the decision to give up cigarettes, it was her psychological smoking mechanism she began to construct at the age of 15. A mechanism made by and of the emotions of a child, viewing the world of smoking as a 15 year old and never changing its perspective. A childish mechanism always ignoring the damaging effects of smoking and constantly looking for rationalizations to continue smoking.

The Mechanism Has to Go

The only way a person can remove cigarettes from their life is to disassemble the psychological smoking mechanism. This is accomplished by identifying and removing the reasons a person started smoking and the reasons they continue to smoke. When this is done, the person becomes, not an ex-smoker, but a nonsmoker.

Removing the psychological smoking mechanism puts the individual back in conscious control with all the perceptions and attributes they as adults, possess. They no longer have to fight against the illogic of the child mechanism they created. They no longer have conflict when their logical adult perceptions are overruled by the shortsighted, illogic of the child created psychological smoking mechanism.

When the mechanism is gone, so is smoking, permanently. There are special techniques that need to be used and the smoker has to invest some time and effort. With the right psychological tools, the incredible power of the mind can be redirected back to conscious control and the childish psychological smoking mechanism removed. When you Unlearn Smoking(tm) your system goes back to the time before you started smoking and the body’s normal defense mechanisms against harsh, hot smoke in your delicate lungs begins to work again. Smoking becomes aversive just like it was with the first cigarette. At this point, you won’t be motivated to put out the tremendous effort required to turn them back off! You have become a NONsmoker.

(c) Copyright 2009, R. Michael Stone

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The reason it is important to understand that cigarette smoking is a psychological addiction rather than a physical one, is to facilitate effective protocols to remove cigarettes from a smoker’s life. In this article, we are going to discuss examples that demonstrate that nicotine is not physically addictive but that cigarette smoking is psychologically addictive.

What is Nicotine

Talk about a substance that has gotten a bad reputation. Nicotine is presented as the ultimate evil and the culprit that makes quitting cigarettes difficult or for some, impossible. However, just what is nicotine?

According to medical researcher Dr. David G. Williams, nicotine is a chemical substance found in cigarette smoke that stimulates the production of the neurotransmitter acetylcholine, which is needed to facilitate the transmission of nerve impulses.

There’s one thing though, there is another chemical called nicotinic acid that is a close cousin of nicotine that also stimulates the production of the neurotransmitter acetylcholine. What is this almost identical substance? It is called Vitamin B3!

Could smokers be getting Vitamin B3 from their cigarettes? If so, it’s not a healthy way to do it but look at the symptoms of Vitamin B3 deficiency:

Impaired recent memory
Depression
Hyper irritability
Apprehension
Emotional instability

These are many of the reasons that people give for smoking! It improves their memory, lifts their spirits, calms them down, etc. Since many people don’t have good nutrition, perhaps one of the things that fuels the Psychological Smoking Mechanism is a B3 deficiency. After all, these are water soluble vitamins or chemicals, if you will. They are not stored in the body and must be replaced constantly.

The bottom line here is that people don’t get addicted to vitamins! This is just another indicator that the thing that keeps people smoking is not an addiction to nicotine. Let’s look at some of the other things associated with smoking that do not follow the physical addiction mechanism.

If Cigarettes were Addictive

In the previous article in this series, we discussed a case of accidental addiction to pain medicine. As you recall, when the patient discovered they weren’t getting the same results from the standard dose of medicine, they increased the dose which did, for a time give them relief. It wasn’t long before they had to increase the dose again, and again.

This is what happens with chemical addiction, the body views the chemical as throwing it out of balance (homeostasis) and it creates a counter force. It matches each increase with an increase in counter force.

If nicotine was a truly addictive chemical, the smoker would have to keep increasing intake to achieve the same effects that are claimed for cigarettes just as in our drug example. The consumption of cigarettes would increase over time. However, this doesn’t happen.

Let me give you a real life example. My grandfather was a cigarette smoker. He smoked his entire life starting in his early childhood years. He smoked less than a pack of cigarettes per day. The amount smoked never varied. He had a set amount that he unconsciously metered and for over 70 years maintained this level. The fact that he smoked less than a pack per day was to his benefit and delayed the health issues associated with cigarette smoke. But you can’t avoid it forever and he did eventually develop health problems that years of cigarette smoking produced.

A clear indicator that cigarettes are psychologically addictive and not physically addictive is that the smoker settles into a pattern and stays there for years. You have your half a pack a day person, your pack a day person, your 1.5 pack a day person, your 2 pack a day person and in extreme cases, the three pack a day person. This volume is established pretty early and stays that way. There may be daily fluctuations but they all average out. There is a mental meter that regulates the amount of cigarettes smoked! That’s the Psychological Smoking Mechanism.

If cigarettes were physically addictive, the smoker would be adding more and more cigarettes to achieve whatever claimed benefit they provided. This doesn’t happen. This is a clear indicator that that cigarette consumption is regulated by the Psychological Smoking Mechanism and not the chemicals in the cigarette.

If Nicotine was a Chemical Addiction

There is a whole category of smoking cessation treatment protocols that operate under the idea that providing nicotine will take the place of smoking. The thinking behind this category is that supplying nicotine through vehicles such as patches or gum will eliminate the desire to smoke because the hypothetical nicotine demand is being met. Then by reducing the nicotine over time, just like drug rehab, the compulsion to smoke will be eliminated. Sounds great doesn’t it? If nicotine were the culprit, nicotine patches, gum and lozenges would be 100% successful. After all, they are giving the body the chemical that it theoretically craves which is the supposed mechanism behind the compulsion to smoke.

Nicotine patches are powerful products that give the body a steady supply of nicotine. Let’s look at their effectiveness. Since the smoker is getting generous amounts of nicotine which they are supposedly craving, the patches should be incredibly effective. However, some research shows, (Davidson, M., Epstein, M., Burt, R., Schaefer, C., Whitworth, G. & McDonald, A. (1998)), that only 19% of people on patches had stopped smoking at six weeks and that it was reduced to 9.2% at six months. Looking at it another way, at 6 weeks, 81% of the people using nicotine patches were still smoking and at 6 months, about 91% were still smoking. Yes, 10% of those that had stopped were back at it again.

The results for the gum is about the same. Even though the gum was providing the smoker with plenty of nicotine, at 6 weeks, 84% of the people were still smoking and at 6 months, 92% were smoking.

These smokers were getting all the nicotine they supposedly needed. In reality, they were probably getting a great deal more nicotine than the cigarettes they smoked provided. Yet, most of them continued to smoke along WITH the patches or gum. If nicotine doesn’t compel the smoker to smoke, what does? It’s the Psychological Smoking Mechanism.

Another Indicator that It Isn’t Nicotine

With a chemical addiction, more is better for the addict. With nicotine patches, the smoker is getting a great deal of nicotine. They should be satisfied right? Well as mentioned in the last section, only 9% actually stop smoking with the patch. However, putting all that nicotine in a smokers system with patches does have an effect on the smoker. According to the American Lung Association, side effects with the nicotine patch are:

Headache
Dizziness
Upset stomach
Weakness
Blurred vision
Vivid dreams
Mild itching and burning on the skin
Diarrhea

Yes, nicotine does have an effect on the smokers body. However, with all the things that smoking does to the smoker, it doesn’t produce these effects. This is another clue that nicotine is not the motivator to smoke.

Smokers Resume Smoking after Extended Periods

Another clue that nicotine is not the motivator to smoke is the tendency for ex-smokers to resume smoking after a long period of time. Obviously, after an extended period of time, all the nicotine would be out of their system. As has been stated, nicotine is the cousin of Vitamin B3, a water soluble vitamin. These substances are either rapidly used or excess flushed from the body daily. No matter how heavy a smoker, it won’t take very long for all nicotine to be out of their system.

Also, from a strictly habit perspective, a few weeks or months without smoking should have put an end to the habit; the habit of reaching for a cigarette is broken. However, an ex-smoker can pick up a cigarette and resume smoking like they never stopped whether it is weeks, months or even years.

This is because the Psychological Smoking Mechanism is still operating. There is no nicotine in the system, the habit has been abandoned for weeks, months or some time years, yet, cigarette smoking can resume.

Conclusion

The effects of nicotine do not follow the chemical addiction mechanism. Nicotine is similar to Vitamin B3, a water soluble vitamin. It must be replenished daily. It is possible that the smoker has a deficiency of Vitamin B3. Each cigarette provides a small amount of nicotine which is similar to Vitamin B3.

A smoker falls into a pattern of cigarette consumption which doesn’t vary over decades. Whether it is the half pack a day, one pack a day, one and a half pack per day or the extreme of three packs per day, this amount doesn’t vary. Although there may be daily fluctuations, it averages out over time to whatever pattern the smoker follows.

Cigarette consumption is regulated by the Psychological Smoking Mechanism. The only way to remove cigarettes from your life is to remove this mechanism. If the Psychological Smoking Mechanism is not removed, the person quitting cigarettes will continue to be a smoker who doesn’t happen to be smoking right now. When the Psychological Smoking Mechanism is gone, so is smoking because the person has become a NONsmoker!

(c) Copyright 2009, R. Michael Stone

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The interviewers are surprised because addiction to cigarettes (nicotine) has been used as a rationalization as to why it is so hard to quit smoking. The truth is, nicotine does not present the characteristics of a physical addiction. The real cause of the difficulty to simply quit smoking cigarettes is the Psychological Smoking Mechanism. If you stop cigarettes and don’t remove this mechanism, you will continue to be a smoker who isn’t smoking right now. It is the real reason why the smoker, after being off cigarettes for weeks or months, is compelled to start again.

In this article, I will discuss the dynamics of true physical addiction. You will see that nicotine doesn’t fit in this category. In part 2 of this article, I will discuss more specifics that demonstrate how nicotine is not a true addictive substance and how the Psychological Smoking Mechanism is the real power behind smoking.

What is Addiction?

Any substance that alters the physiology of the body is capable of being addictive. Many people accidentally become addicted to pain medicine so we will use that as an example.

In our example, we have a person who has been severely injured and is in a great deal of pain. Pain is the body signal to our conscious selves that we have a problem that needs to be immediately corrected.

With modern medicine today, injuries are quickly and effectively treated. However, although the mechanical damage has been repaired, the healing process, which only the body can do, has not yet taken place. To make things easier on ourselves, we take pain medicine. After all, we know we are injured and it’s been treated, we don’t need to be reminded with unpleasant pain.

The chemicals in the medicine interfere with the pain signals reducing them so we are more comfortable. If we take the pain medication as directed, there is little chance of addiction. If the body heals in a timely manner, the pain medicine continues to help because the healing process is reducing the need for pain.

What the patient doesn’t realize is that each day on the pain medicine, it becomes less and less effective! Why? Because the body is trying to do it’s natural process of pain generation. When it is artificially suppressed, the body boosts the pain signal.

As long as healing is taking place and reducing the pain intensity, this signal boost isn’t noticed by the patient. It’s only when the healing process lags, e.g. takes an extended period of time, that the patient notices the pain medication isn’t working as well.

To achieve the same level of pain control requires more medicine. The patient’s doctor will not allow this because of the problem with addiction. You should listen to your doctor. However, some people won’t listen. They’re hurting, what they were taking had helped and they want the same level of relief. Perhaps they have a friend that had left over pain medicine and persuades them to give it to them because they need it. Not a good idea but people do it.

So on their own, they boost the dosage. They have the pain relief they were getting initially. But the body doesn’t like this at all. It again boosts the pain signal weakening the effects of the medicine. If the patient managed to get a large amount of extra pain medication, they continue to increase the dosage to get the same amount of relief. The body, seeking balance, continues to boost the pain signal.

At this point the person is in a hazardous situation. They cannot simply stop the pain medication because if they’ve taken it too long and increased the dosage too much, the physical backlash might be life threatening!

The Potentially Deadly Tug-of-war: Body vs. Pain Medication

Look at it like the game tug-of-war. The pain medicine is on one side and the body is on the other. The pain medicine side adds a member (increased dosage), the body side adds a member (puts out more pressure), not to win the tug-of-war, but to get the marker back in the middle. To the body, the pain medicine has gotten it out of balance and it uses it’s biochemical and physiological resources to bring itself back into balance. This is why the pain medicine loses effectiveness over time. This is technically called habituation -Physiological tolerance to a drug resulting from repeated use.

What happens if you stop taking the pain medicine cold-turkey? In our tug-of-war analogy, stopping cold-turkey is like one side, the pain medication, letting go of the rope. The side still applying force, the body, backlashes into a jumbled pile. In real tug-of-war, the people on the side still pulling slam into each other, possibly being injured if they were pulling hard enough. In our example, it is your body that’s going to be the jumbled pile with possible injuries!

Solution to the Problem

You can’t safely stop taking excessive pain medication cold-turkey. This requires a stay in rehab where the addicted person is medically monitored and the pain medication reduced slowly over time. As the pain medication is reduced, the body counter reaction to it is also reduced. The body is happy because it keeps itself in balance which is all it was trying to do anyway. You are happy because your body doesn’t end up in a jumbled pile!

Chemical Addiction Pattern

Remember, the body always works to keep balance. The technical term is homeostasis. Whenever the body is confronted with a chemical that pushes it out of balance, it applies a counter force to get back to balance. The stronger the chemical, e.g. high dosage of pain medication, the stronger the body pushes back.

You cannot safely stop after overusing pain medicine without giving the body time to adjust slowly.

Nicotine

As you can see, nicotine simply doesn’t fit this pattern. No one ever had a life threatening experience being deprived of cigarettes. Granted, there have been many smokers tell you, “I’m dying for a cigarette.” However, it’s a certain physiological fact that a smoker will not die if they don’t get a cigarette!

In part 2 of this article, we will discuss specifics that demonstrate why nicotine is not chemically addictive and why the Psychological Smoking Mechanism is the real factor that makes quitting smoking difficult.

(c) Copyright 2009, R. Michael Stone

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What you need to do is empower yourself with confidence and assurance, which is the defined as assurance ? assurance is the ability to take command of any state of affairs, and assure that you are in ascendance of most of the ingredients within it. You can recognize somebody who is positive and divide them from the citizenry who are not, and commonly, they wear this confidence on them extremely plainly. So you need to be able to regain some of that confidence on your own and how you do that is really through some sort of self psychology.

You need to overcome your fears and to do this, you need to confront them. Self-assurance is also the command of the emotions that appear to burble up uncontrollably when fronted with difficult situations. It is all about the severe emotions that you have to be mindful of, and how they strike your overall behaviour. Not to sound like a clich? or anything, but you do need to overcome that fear and do it soon. It is like trying to quit smoking, you have to face your fears daily, and little by little, you need to measure the kind of reactions you have, identify where they are coming from and suppress them. This way you are able to actually overcome the fear pretty easily.

Keep in mind, citizenry all over the universe, in unique situations, can spot a not reassured somebody from a mile away, and this is the truth all round. Psychological Science and the psychological barrier are the 2 things you necessitate to key out and figure when it comes to confidence, and you must know that the root of any problem of self assuredness always comes from the inner mind.

You have the prospective to overthrow this situation if you can strain into the unconscious psyche and put in a unique set of didactics. In the end of the day, it is all about you. You are the genesis and the initiative of your own remedial, and the sooner you picture this, the best it is for everyone round you as well. You need to come to your senses when it comes to this. Facing your fears is really one of the ways you are going to regain back that self confidence and take back the success in your life once again.

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Poise is the power to take control of any situation, and check that you are in control of most of the components within it. You can spot individual who is reassured and divide them from the multitude who are not, and normally, they get into this self-assurance on them extremely plain. So how do you wear this on your own? And how do you overcome the fear in your life? Well, all of these can be done with the simple acquisition of your self confidence and using all the positive emotions to wipe out the fear in your life.

The ability to get rid of your insecurity is also the of the emotions that seem to ripple up uncontrollably when faced up with hard posts. It is all about the hopeless emotions that you have to be alert of, and how they motivate your overall behaviour. Think, mortals all over the earth, in different spots, can spot a not reassured person from a mile away, and this is the truth all just about.

When talking about how to actually overcome some of the cerebral problems that you are going to face, we can look into two main areas – psychology and the intellectual roadblock are the 2 matters you need to identify and image when it comes to self-confidence, and you must know that the root of any problem of self assuredness always comes from the inner mind. You have the potentiality to converse this situation if you can strain into the subconscious judgment and put in a diverse set of didactics.

There is a period in your life that actually ensures that your emotions and the psychological makeup of your mind and behaviours, and we can focus on the developing stages of your early life, when affiliations and psychical didactics you either acquired or live as telescopic and the sort of sounds you hear, but these can go away quite without hassle if you know what you are managing and how the mind actually works. In the end of the day, it is all about you. You are the start of everything, even your own empowerment and the beginning of your own mending, and the earlier you recognize this, the more of life you can actually take over and enjoy. Confidence is an epiphany for most who have found it, and when you discover this, you will find it as well.

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