What Is Smoking Addiction?
A smoking addiction means a person has formed an uncontrollable dependence on cigarettes to the point where stopping smoking would cause severe emotional, mental, or physical reactions.
Everyone knows that smoking is harmful and addictive, but few people realize just how risky and addictive it is.
Chances are that about one in three smokers who do not stop will eventually die because of their smoking.
How does yoga help?
As we have seen the major problem is lack of will power to adhere to the decision and go through the period of pain and discomfort of the withdrawal symptoms although it is short lived. Yoga helps in strengthening the will power. It gives the tolerance (Titiksha) to put up with the side effects. Without aggressive psychological reaction. Regular practices of one hour of yoga including dynamic suryanamaskara and other asanas done in quick succession interspersed with short QRT and chanting of AA, UU, MM are very valuable. Left nostril Kapalabhati followed by seetli, seetkari and sadanta practiced for 10 minutes, several times in a day. Wherever you feel the urge to smoke can help get mastery over the urge. "Smoking urge dropped off effortlessly after yoga and I did not have to try and struggle to stop it" is a common report by yoga therapy practitioners.
Why Is Smoking Addictive?
Nicotine is the drug in tobacco that causes addiction. Nicotine is a psychoactive drug with stimulant effects on the electrical activity of the brain. It also has calming effects, especially at times of stress, as well as effects on hormonal and other systems throughout the body. Smoking doses of nicotine causes activation of "pleasure centers" in the brain (for example, the mesolimbic dopamine system), which may explain the pleasure, and addictiveness of smoking.
Only stop when you have made a firm decision. When you do make up your mind, however, you can succeed, regardless of how addicted you may be. Many of the unpleasant effects of cigarette withdrawal are due to lack of nicotine and are reversed or alleviated by nicotine replacement (for example, nicotine chewing gum or the nicotine patch).
As with other addictions, it is difficult to give up smoking, and without help most smokers fail despite trying many times. Even after stopping successfully for a while, most relapse within 2 to 3 months.
Smoking As A Drug-Taking Activity
Most smokers absorb sufficient nicotine to obtain pharmacological effects. The modern cigarette is a highly effective device for getting nicotine to the brain.
Smoking also accelerates the rate of osteoporosis, a disease which causes bones to weaken and fracture more easily. Women who smoke during pregnancy damage their unborn child, causing effects that last throughout the child's life. Lung problems. Smoking is responsible for 82 percent of deaths due to emphysema and chronic bronchitis.
NAKRASANA
Nakara means a crocodile. This posture consists of several dynamic movements resembling those of a crocodile stalking its prey, hence the name.
Technique:
1. Lie flat on the floor, face downwards.
2. Bend the elbow and place the palms by the side of the waist.
3. Bend the feet about one foot apart. Exhale; raise the whole body a few inches above the floor, balancing it on the palms and the toes. Keep the body stiff as a poker and the knees taut. The body should remain parallel to the floor.
4. Take a few breaths and with an exhalation lunge the whole body a foot forward, lifting the hands and feet simultaneously off the floor. After going a foot forward, take a few breaths. Then exhale and lunge forward again.
5. Repeat the forward lunges four or five times. At the end of the each lunge, the position of the body should be as described in position 3 above. These movements resemble the lunges made by a crocodile stalking its prey. After each lunge, rest a few seconds taking deep breaths.
6. Now reverse the movements and with exhalations jump back about a foot at a time until the return to the position from where you started.
7. Rest the trunk on the floor and relax. |
