Whenever I see a smoker my mind goes to quitting smoking, because helping people quit is my living. This particular day as I walked along the footpath I stepped aside for a lady riding a mobility scooter.
She stopped in front of me and lit up a cigarette and my mind immediately wandered as to what her story might be.
Everyone and every smoker has their own story, and hers blended having a health condition which required the use of a scooter and yet she still smoked.
It’s easy to judge and especially because of my work I try not to. But a part of me always wonders how a person arrives at a point where they think that smoking is more important than their health.
That in spite of suffering with a life limiting complaint, having that cigarette is more important than improving their health.
The bigger question is why do we sabotage ourselves. We have one body and one life, and yet so many of us find ways to damage that body which we need to move us around or not for 80 odd years on average.
On some level it is true that every smoker is willing to give up their health and many years of their lives for the pleasure of inhaling nicotine into their brains.
It is also true that many of those same smokers will spend many years, maybe even decades, wishing they could quit, and berating themselves for not having the willpower or strength to quit cigarettes.
The scooter shouldn’t really have surprised me, because I’ve seen smokers who have had, heart attacks, legs amputated or dying from lung cancer, but for some reason this particular lady seemed to sum up all that is so pointless about smoking.
I don’t offer to help any smoker I encounter, unless they ask, I don’t tout for business. Nor do I lecture them on the dangers, that would be inappropriate, boring and largely a waste of time.
However once someone does inquire and stopping smoking, I am brutally honest as to how important it is for them, and how in order to successfully quit they must commit themselves totally to the process.
So where are you in the cycle or smoking pleasure, versus the guilt, fear or frustration.
What is your state of health? Are you doing OK, ignoring issues, deluding yourself? Of are you in, or heading for your own mobility scooter?
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