On Thu, 10 Mar 2011 11:24:45 -0800, Hawke
wrote:
On 3/9/2011 7:53 PM, rangerssuck wrote:
On Mar 8, 3:17 am, Don wrote:
On Mon, 07 Mar 2011 15:31:48 -0800, Hawke
wrote:
Sheen was saying that HE cured himself by willing it to happen.
That statement is as goofy as the things that come out of Gummer.
Hawke
That is exactly how I quit smoking after being addicted for 40 years.
I willed it to happen. No drugs, patches or other crutches. It'll
be 3 years in May, 4 years the following May, and so on.
TBD whether Charlie cured himself, we'll see if it sticks. It can be
done.
I smoked three packs a day for 15 years. Quit cold turkey in 1984. To
this day, I often find myself looking in my shirt pocket for a
cigarette. I;m glad it was so easy for you. Such is not the case for
everyone, though.
Those guys are just ignorant. If they were correct you could say the
same thing about heroin addiction or alcohol addiction. You just decide
not to do them anymore and it's over with? Yeah, sure, that's how
addiction works. Well, maybe there is no such thing as addiction either.
It's just "weakness". Yeah, that's it. It's just weakness that prevents
people from quitting addictive substances. Anyone who knows anything
understands that kind of thinking is wrong. Addiction is real. Whether
it's nicotine, heroin, or alcohol, or other drugs, they are physically
addictive. Any time someone tries to stop using those substances it's
very difficult and it takes more than simply making a decision. As Sheen
himself pointed out the cure rate for alcoholics is only 5%. So does
that make the other 95% of alcoholics just weak people?
People quit using addictive substances without help all the time. But
most people addicted to some kind of chemical can't do it on their own.
It's not a matter of will. That's 19th century thinking. My hat's off to
anyone that quits smoking on their own, or quits any addictive
substance. I know it's difficult. But not understanding the real
difficulty of getting off some of those substances, and that it takes
doctors and a lot of help for most people to do it, only demonstrates
the lack of knowledge of those who think that way. They're the kind of
people who still think you can beat the homosexuality out of a conservative.
Hawke
I think it's more a matter of motivation than of strength.
I had the help of a couple of doctors. They told me that my risk
wasn't merely an enhanced risk of cancer maybe someday. They told me
that if I didn't quit immediately and totally I would have another
heart attack within a year, one that I very probably would not survive
-- and did I realize how incredibly lucky I'd been this time?
Tawk about motivation!
I already had a number of other miseries to distract me and I'd
already been off smokes for 5 days while in a coma, so I already had a
head start.
I wish Mary hadn't tossed my windproof butane lighter, though. It was
really useful for singing nylon line to stop it from raveling.