The Real Reason Smokers Don't Quit

It’s a fact that we will all pass from this world. We don’t know how or when. We take so many precautions. We don’t run into a busy road run across the train track when a train is coming. Yet in so many areas of life we take risks that are just as terminal.

Take smoking for instance. It has been shown that smokers die 10 years sooner on average than on-smokers. While the impending collision of a large steel object hitting you might seem incredibly frightening, smoking is as deadly if not more.

Smoking of course is a just like a slow acting poison that masquerades as a feel good pastime for its users. The very act of smoking is not painful to a smoker. It’s pleasurable! Yet the compounding effect of the toxins takes its toll on the human body. Let’s face it, the human body is amazing. When you consider our history and how recent smoking is you have to admire how well the body copes with the clouds of toxin dense smoke brought into the lungs throughout the day. The body copes as well as it can but of course over time it breaks down.

So while smokers know the risks involved, why is it that they still continue to smoke?

First and foremost smoking is pleasure. Everyone knows that sugar makes you fat. It’s not secret. But people will try to every else but stop eating sugar to try to lose weight. Sugar causes dopamine release and so does smoking. Human beings are creatures of pleasure and dopamine is a pleasure chemical.

So while a smoker is presented with the long term prospect of illness from their habit, the pleasure keeps them hooked. That is also combined with a smoker’s ability to disassociate them from high risk of illness. To many smokers cancer from smoking is what happens to other smoker. And as stated before smoking the cigarettes feels good not bad.

For many smokers the idea of giving up represents discomfort and feeling like they will be missing out on something that is pleasurable. Sure it is short term pleasure and it comes with a heavy loss of lifespan, but nevertheless it is pleasure. To humans pleasure can be something that is very immediate and can blind us eternally to the real consequences of our actions.

While governments seek to scare or shame smokers, they should ultimately consider handling the real reason why smokers smoke. It feels good.