Photo by Giulia Ballestri on Unsplash
I’ve smoked from the age of 16/17 years old where I used to think that it was cool and made me look hard to be puffing on a cigarette, especially while standing and holding the fag between my fingers a certain way. I can still remember my first time at senior school standing down at the bottom of the school field trying to keep one alight in the strong wind sucking on it hard and long keeping the embers burning. A lad ran over to us shouting, “no no no, not like that you need to puff on it quickly, like this,” as he took the cigarette from me and showed us how to do it properly.
So I started smoking at an early age and it feels like I have been trying to quit for most of my life. I have notes written in journals going back to the early ’80s where I’m telling myself that I need to stop. And I tried, in vain to quit on quite a few occasions and lost the battle to stay stopped. The longest being 6 months where I found it really easy but caved in due to my peers outside a pub one day. I had decided that if I had stopped then I would be able to do the normal thing and stand outside with my friends while they smoked and that it wouldn’t bother me, well it didn’t but to be honest I think I was looking for a reason to start again. I used to really enjoy the art of smoking, especially in rolling my own and it was my health that was giving me the need to quit only at that time my ego ruled me and I went against my own judgments.
The coughing had become akin to asphyxiating myself where I’d be moments away from blacking out with a feeling of a rush of blood to the head, blurred vision, and a sense of euphoria (yes, I actually liked that feeling), so much so that I knew that I had no choice but to quit. I’d attempted to stop smoking more times than I can even remember and I can now say with hand on heart that it is all down to ‘Mindset’.
I’m now in my 57th year and leading up to the New Year of 2021 I was heavily into setting resolutions for January 2022 which is where we are now and I have reentered that space where I am ‘smoke-free’ and have been now for 1w 5d and 3h.
The fact on its own that I can now take a deep breath is just as intoxicating and fills me with a sense of total accomplishment. I feel so relieved that I am now SMOKE-FREE! Everything is falling into place, I have my lungs back where it’s now really really easy (and enjoyable) to take that deep breath and one of the biggest pleasures for me is the fact that I can’t hear myself breathe anymore, especially at night when I’m in bed trying to fall asleep.
I have a lot more time in my days now and I’m much more organised. Hell, the productivity system that I adhere to now is one that I’ve been creating and failing at for well over three years now and at this moment in time it’s ticking along like a dream, it feels wonderful. I’m happier, more content, and more productive. My calendar is full and every week I’m performing the same tasks where I’m heading towards completing my goals, short and long-term plus all of my other daily routines, I’ve never been so well organised, and now that I am every day without having ash all over my desk where I’m constantly sweeping it off into my hand and then into the ashtray while making space because of the said ashtray and smoking parefenailia, tobacco pouch, rizzlas, filters and lighter is a day spent ‘Living The Dream’.
