Tabagism

Published on Addictions, Breathing system.

All forms of dependence represent an escape. It is an escape that started as a quest. What actually happens is that the person literally projects the objective of his search on something he found along the way, and decides his quest was over. He is pleased with what he has found. He remains trapped in fear and convenience. Anything can cause addiction: alcohol, drugs, sex, tobacco, gambling, food (bulimia, anorexia), but also, and even to a larger extent, money, power, rules, fame, influence, knowledge, entertainment, isolation, asceticism, cult, tradition, ancestral beliefs, religion…

The addicted person is the one who stops halfway through his quest. For this reason, he feels empty. And because he feels empty, he needs to fill the void with external substances that confer him the illusion of being balanced.

Basically, we could say that in all humanity, we are all dependents. The difference between the sick dependent and the healthy dependent rests in the quality of self-observation, that is, in the awareness of oneself, of one’s feelings and path. Dependence is a type of attachment. The non-addict, non-sick consumer is the one who is aware of his attachments.

Tobacco stimulates the lungs and the bronchi, which are organs of contact and communication with others. The smoker who holds the smoke in is stimulating his bronchi. It is a masculine attitude and a form of marking the territory. Bronchi are, in fact, linked to territorial conflicts, which are male conflicts. This need for territorial marking is typical of the person who cannot express himself as he should, at home or at school or work. Ninety five per cent of people start to smoke during adolescence, which is when youngsters are dizzy over their hormonal and human development and fail to communicate well with parents and teachers. Then he hides behind tobacco. He is trying to stimulate communication and mark his territory through tobacco. It is a movement whose causes he is unaware of. Besides, exhaling smoke keeps people away. This is another way young people use to mark territory that they believe to be threatened. A woman who smokes is marking her own territory. Women smokers are more aggressive, more yang, more masculine.

Tobacco also stimulates communication, through the lungs. And alcohol, coffee and tea, that are diuretic, stimulate kidneys, organs that are also linked to communication. For this reason, at gatherings with friends, people drink and smoke, as a means to create contact and to stimulate the organs of contact, the lungs and kidneys. In these meetings, smokers communicate very well amongst themselves.

However, smoking and drinking do not resolve the causes. They merely resolve symptoms and effects, not causes.

© Copyright by Luís Martins Simões, developed by RUPEAL