How Smoking Becomes a Habit

If you want to quit smoking, stop the first puff.

This is an anonymous quote but see how true it is. The first puff leads to the second one. Slowly, you end up smoking your first full cigarette. This leads to the second and then the third. Before you know what is happening, you view smoking as a habit, a habit that you cannot let go of.

Let us look at the various stages of smoking and understand how cigarette smoking becomes a habit.

Stages of Smoking:

The Non-Smoking Stage:

Has two sub-stages. The first and initial stage is when you do not smoke and do not like anyone who smokes in your presence. You are quite firm in your actions and deeds. The second sub-stage is when you begin to tolerate people smoke cigarettes around you. Knowingly or unknowingly, you begin to inhale cigarette smoke. This is passive smoking. This is the preliminary stage of cigarette smoking.

The “Give it a try” Stage:

Usually, youngsters fall into this category. They see smoking as a challenge and consider it cool to give it a try. Many college going boys give smoking a try just to impress their girlfriends. According, smoking is an act of manhood and view people who do not smoke as someone who is not game enough. It starts with a cigarette or two before graduating to becoming a regular smoker not realizing the nicotine in any form can be addictive.

The Regular Smoker:

This is the third stage of smoking. It is also known as a prelude to smoking addiction. You start by smoking a definite number of cigarettes every week / month only to increase the number as the days goes by. You look for excuses to have a smoke. Hence, we can safely call this stage as one that makes you view smoking as a habit.

The Daily Smoker:

It does not take long to move from the third stage to the fourth one. Nicotine is an addiction. The more you smoke, the more you feel like smoking. By now, you are deep into cigarette addiction. It is not that you do not know smoking is injurious to health. However, you are not in a position to do anything because of your willingness to take up smoking as a habit.

The Chain Smoker:

This is the final stage of smoking. You graduate to a stage of smoking addiction where you can become restless when you do not have a cigarette in your hand. This is the stage of compulsive smoking.

Final Thought:

Thus you have seen that a casual fling ends as a case of severe cigarette addiction. Dependence on nicotine increases to epidemic levels. However, it is still not late to retract. Smoking facts show evidence that people have come back from this severe stage as well. Therefore, “if you want to quit smoking, stop the first puff.”