The Nicotine Trick of Smoking
Most people know of the dangers of smoking but most people DON'T know this little-known fact of smoking: smoking actually increases your stress level!
Many people claim that smoking helps them to lower their stress levels, but the nicotine in cigarettes actually produces something called €The Nicotine Effect€ and it works like this: when a person smokes a cigarette, the nicotine brings up a delayed reaction where roughly 20 minutes after smoking that cigarette, the nicotine causes the person to feel the physical effects of stress: the skin tightens, blood pressure increases, and so on.
When a person feels the physical effects of stress in their body, they start to feel mentally stressed as well. We call our feelings €feelings€ because we FEEL them in our body. Our minds, by way of our thoughts, influence what we feel in our bodies and vice versa.
The interesting thing about this Nicotine Effect is that because it is so many minutes after smoking the cigarette, the person does not associate the feelings of stress with the cigarette. In other words, because there is such a delay, the person does not make the connection of what they are feeling to the cigarettes they smoke.
The result: the smoker smokes a cigarette€¦minutes later, feels stressed and then smokes in order to relieve their stress. It's a vicious circle!
So, why do so many people feel as though smoking relieves stress? It comes down to two things: distraction and breathing!
Our minds are easily distracted. Case in point: have you ever been sitting on your couch and stood up to get a drink of water and then found yourself distracted by a phone call or someone calling your name€¦and then an hour later realize you totally forgot about that drink? When someone is stressed and they walk away from the stressful situation to smoke a cigarette, it's just like that phone call. Your mind is occupied by another activity - in this case, smoking. Over time, after thousands of cigarettes smoked, you've conditioned yourself to €believe€ that smoking relieves stress.
The second aspect, breathing, goes back to our physical needs: when we are stressed, our bodies go into the €fight or flight€ mode of preservation - in essence, we become battle-ready and thus start taking in more oxygen for this battle-readiness.
How does this tie into smoking? When a person smokes, especially when they smoke when they are stressed, they take in a deep breath when they drag on that cigarette!
With all that in mind, it's easy to understand how smokers can misunderstand the effects of cigarettes in terms of relieving stress. And once smokers begin to understand the true relationship of cigarettes and stress, it's important first step toward becoming a healthy non-smoker€¦for good!
Many people claim that smoking helps them to lower their stress levels, but the nicotine in cigarettes actually produces something called €The Nicotine Effect€ and it works like this: when a person smokes a cigarette, the nicotine brings up a delayed reaction where roughly 20 minutes after smoking that cigarette, the nicotine causes the person to feel the physical effects of stress: the skin tightens, blood pressure increases, and so on.
When a person feels the physical effects of stress in their body, they start to feel mentally stressed as well. We call our feelings €feelings€ because we FEEL them in our body. Our minds, by way of our thoughts, influence what we feel in our bodies and vice versa.
The interesting thing about this Nicotine Effect is that because it is so many minutes after smoking the cigarette, the person does not associate the feelings of stress with the cigarette. In other words, because there is such a delay, the person does not make the connection of what they are feeling to the cigarettes they smoke.
The result: the smoker smokes a cigarette€¦minutes later, feels stressed and then smokes in order to relieve their stress. It's a vicious circle!
So, why do so many people feel as though smoking relieves stress? It comes down to two things: distraction and breathing!
Our minds are easily distracted. Case in point: have you ever been sitting on your couch and stood up to get a drink of water and then found yourself distracted by a phone call or someone calling your name€¦and then an hour later realize you totally forgot about that drink? When someone is stressed and they walk away from the stressful situation to smoke a cigarette, it's just like that phone call. Your mind is occupied by another activity - in this case, smoking. Over time, after thousands of cigarettes smoked, you've conditioned yourself to €believe€ that smoking relieves stress.
The second aspect, breathing, goes back to our physical needs: when we are stressed, our bodies go into the €fight or flight€ mode of preservation - in essence, we become battle-ready and thus start taking in more oxygen for this battle-readiness.
How does this tie into smoking? When a person smokes, especially when they smoke when they are stressed, they take in a deep breath when they drag on that cigarette!
With all that in mind, it's easy to understand how smokers can misunderstand the effects of cigarettes in terms of relieving stress. And once smokers begin to understand the true relationship of cigarettes and stress, it's important first step toward becoming a healthy non-smoker€¦for good!
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