How To Give Up Smoking And Other Addictions

Addiction – An Unconscious Signal of Not Being in Control

If you are substance-addicted, this may be accompanied or caused by the inability to fulfill one or more of your deepest desires. Although unconscious of it, you may have this idea that there is a power beyond your control that stops you from achieving your dreams, big or small.You may even admit self-defeat by maintaining the belief that it is just too difficult for you to give up old habits like smoking, drinking alcohol or eating addictive foods.

Many smokers argue that they cannot quit smoking if they constantly see other people smoking. Others do not want to face the possibly unbearable withdrawal symptoms that often accompany a sudden abstinence from smoking. Quite a lot of people managed to quit smoking, but when they suddenly put on a lot of weight, they resumed the habit.

Most smokers who wish to end their addiction feel that they don’t have enough willpower to stop smoking. Why are we giving a small cigarette such great power that it is able to rule over our freedom to make conscious choices in our life? Smoking, like any other addictive habit, is vape attic hours merely a symptom of an underlying void or deficiency of some sort. What is really missing in our lives that we continue to desire substitutes? This question is impossible to answer in this context due to a vast number of possible answers, many of which may only be known by the addict himself. But the need to smoke can become very useful in as much as it can reveal and actually overcome this inner lack, whatever it may be.

Instead of criticizing or judging yourself for giving your power to a habit that has the potential to make you ill or kill you, you can learn a great deal from it and make yourself feel complete again. Because you may not be able to understand the underlying message that smoking entails, you tend to resign yourself to the expectation that quitting the habit is a difficult and frustrating task. Yet smoking can make you aware that you are no longer completely in control of your life, and even offer you a way to reclaim that control.

The excuse “I cannot give up smoking becauseā€¦” is an unconscious recognition that I am a victim of some kind, and that I am suffering from low self-worth. There is a part of me that I consider weak and inadequate. A part of me is not alive and well. The act of smoking makes me admit in a way that my desire for a cigarette is greater than my desire to stay healthy or, in other words, to love myself. It is very difficult to give up smoking or other addictions for as long as I preserve this underlying weakness, projected by such exclamations as “I can’t give it up” or “I go crazy if I don’t have my cigarettes”.

Learning to Recover Your Free Will

Similar to using a thorn to pull out another thorn, learning to give up the habit of smoking may be one of the most effective ways to uproot any underlying incompetence and dependency in your life. By suppressing or fighting the habitual desire to smoke, you merely feed it with more of your own energies. This all but increases the addiction. Desires want to be fulfilled, or at least we should be able to decide whether we want to fulfill them or not. The addiction to smoking, which reflects a lack in inner competence and completeness, can actually become a very effective method to fill you up again and regain conscious control over your life. What does that mean, you’ll ask. Smoking is not the problem you need to combat. Just seeing smoking as an addiction that may have horrible consequences is a depressing notion, and fighting it doesn’t raise your self-esteem. Even if you succeed in quitting this habit, you still haven’t regained your inner sense of freedom and are likely to develop an addiction to something else, like eating sweets, drinking alcohol or having sex. Instead of waging a war against your anxiety or poor self-confidence, all you need to do is increase that sense of inner freedom to make your own choices in life.

If understood and dealt with properly, smoking can be one of the most important things that has ever happened to you. It can lead you to adopt an entirely new way of thinking, thus reshaping your destiny. If you are a smoker and wish to give up the habit, you first need to understand that your addiction is not an accidental mistake you made during one of your lower moments in life. You have created this habit not to suffer because of it, but to learn from it. It is likely to stay with you or change into another addictive habit until that day when you will have acquired the ability to refer all power of fulfilling your desires back to yourself. Giving up smoking is not about quitting one addictive habit just to adopt another one; it is about recovering your sense of free will.

To use one’s willpower to fight an undesirable habit is defeating its purpose and likely to backfire because fighting something is based on the premise that you are being attacked or in some sort of danger. With what we know today about the powerful mind/body connection, the fear that underlies the fight against an addiction is enough to keep the cells of the body jittery, anxious and dysfunctional. They can never find the peace, balance, and energy they need in order to be ‘happy’ cells for as long as the fear of not being in control prevails in the awareness of their master. The enzyme-based messages that cells are sending to the brain and heart are simple cries for help. The host interprets these signals, though, as depression and nervousness. To ‘overcome’ the discomfort, at least for a few moments, the host feels compelled to grab the next cigarette or look for another drink. Each time the discomfort reemerges, he or she feels defeated and weakened, and so the addiction carries on.

True willpower, however, is about learning how to make conscious choices. Addictions stick like glue to everyone who wishes to overcome them. They are the ‘ghosts of memory’ who live in our subconscious and pop up every time the addictive substance is in sight or is imagined. The subsequent urge is not under conscious control, hence the feeling of ‘dying’ for a cigarette, a cup of coffee, or a bar of chocolate. It is important, though, to realize that you always have a choice. This is all you need to learn when it comes to overcoming an addiction.

You cannot successfully exorcise the ghost of memory by throwing away your cigarettes, avoiding your smoking friends, or living in a smoke-free environment. Society has condemned the act of smoking so much that many smokers already feel deprived of that sense of personal freedom they need to feel in order to make their own choices in life. If you are a sensitive person, be aware that a nagging spouse, a doctor, and the warning written on cigarette packs that smoking is harmful to your health may make you feel ridden with guilt. When all of this external pressure succeeds in making you give up smoking, you will continue to feel deprived of your free will and, therefore, look for other more socially acceptable forms of addiction.

Making Smoking a Conscious Choice

We all remember our childhood days when our parents told us not to eat chocolate before lunch or would not allow us to watch television when we wanted. The subconscious mind reacts negatively when it is deprived of its ability to make choices or when it feels forced to do something against its will. Disappointments resulting from not being able to fulfill one’s desires can add up and lead to an inner emptiness that wants to be filled. Smoking is simply a subconscious rebellion against the external manipulation of our freedom to choose what we want, and it appears to fill that uncomfortable space within, at least for a little while. However, this inner lack can only subside permanently when we have regained the freedom to make our own choices. You must know that you are free to smoke whenever you like and as often you like. If you have a cigarette and a match to light it, you will certainly find a way to smoke it, too.

The unconscious association of smoking, with all the other ‘don’ts’ in your past, will be negated by accepting your desire to smoke. I had my first cigarette when I entered high school at age ten. I felt like a criminal because the law said I was only allowed to smoke when I was sixteen years old. My parents were certainly strictly against smoking. Years of hiding my ‘secret’ from my parents and my teachers left me with no other choice but to continue smoking until I felt I had a choice. When I finally got the legal permission to smoke, I lost interest and chose to quit. I was able to give up the habit at once, without any withdrawal symptoms.

The first and most important step to quit smoking is to give yourself permission to smoke. Guilt from the act of smoking will only prevent you from gaining satisfaction and urge you to have another cigarette that may ‘at last’ give you what you have been looking for. But you are not really looking for the short sensation of satisfaction that smoking provides but for the lost freedom to make your own choices in life. By trying to avoid lighting up, you also deprive yourself of this potential satisfaction. The resistance to smoking creates powerful psychosomatic side effects. These are known as withdrawal symptoms. Symptoms may include depression, lack of interest in life, sleeplessness, anger, nausea, ravenous hunger, obesity, cardiovascular disease, lack of concentration, and shaking. However, these symptoms can only manifest if you believe that you have been deprived of your freedom to smoke.

The Ugly Effects of Smoking

Tobacco or cigarette smoking is an addictive habit which is quite popular among teenagers and young adults these days. Because cigarettes have large amount of nicotine (highly addictive drug) in order to get users hooked up. So there is no surprise that the millions people worldwide finding it really hard to quit smoking. Although the effects of smoking on our bodies are quite well known to both smokers and non-smokers people still getting hooked on smoking, and this addiction to nicotine and in many cases long term habit makes quitting really hard to most people.

Smoking is known to be a norm with in some social circles, especially among teenagers and young adults, and generally socially accepted this habit has no benefits to both smokers and non-smokers. Not only smoking is highly addictive and hooks you in spending lots of money on vape attic cigarettes, but also it can result in serious life threatening diseases and also it will result in less serious but still quite disgusting problems like bad breath, yellow teeth and fingers, bad skin etc. Also smoking effects not only the smoker but the people around the smoker as well because the smoke which getting emitted from your lungs contains huge amounts of poisonous chemicals which are quite bad for human health and the biggest problem of second-hand smoke is that in most cases it affects children around you.

The Ugly Effects of Smoking

Statistics shows that smoking is the most common reason for premature death among smokers. Statistics also shows that every year due to illnesses and diseases caused by smoking more than 400000 people die in the United States alone. And the really disturbing part of it is that fatalities also include children who are merely exposed to second-hand smoke from their parents or relatives. How would you feel if you knew that your smoking killed your child, think about it for a minute?

Did you know that when you smoke, every time you inhale, you actually inhaling more than 4800 different harmful chemicals, 69 of which are shown to trigger different cancer related diseases? Smoking is shown to be responsible for more than 90 percent of lung cancer fatalities in United States and also smoking is responsible for about 80-90 percent of fatalities from other respiratory diseases. If you manage to quit smoking the chances of lung cancer or other respiratory disease is dramatically reduced.

Also smoking does not only affect your respiratory system, smoking also attributed as a major cause of strokes, heart illnesses, and a number of other life threatening diseases. Statistics shows that every year a huge number of people are being diagnosed with life threatening diseases due to inhalation of smoke and what is quite alarming that the number includes both smokers and non-smokers so this is clearly shows that second-hand inhalation of cigarette smoke is nearly as bad as smoking itself.

Another alarming statistics shows that every year there are more and more young kids are treated for respiratory and coronary diseases as the result of second-hand smoke inhalation. Kids are more likely to have things like asthma, allergies, poor immune system and other nasty diseases in families where one or more parent or relative smokes then in a smoke free families. Also in smoking families it is much more likely that kids will start smoking as well when they get a bit older.

Also if you are a pregnant woman surrounded by smokers or a smoker yourself, your baby most probably will develop one or more of the following conditions, which will affect him for the rest of his/her life, weak heart and lungs with curtailed lung function and narrow air passages. In some cases smoking can also lead to premature birth or even death of a child. Do you want to kill your own baby or damage him/her for the rest of the life?

Other Negative Effects of Smoking

Aside from high risk of developing serious life threatening diseases as well as negative short term effects from smoking, you exposing yourself to other serious consequences when you smoking. These consequences include dental problems, hygiene problems etc.

You may think that smoking looks cool, but in reality smoking is very unhygienic. When you smoke your teeth tend to become yellow or even brown because of the tar deposits from cigarette smoke stay on your teeth. Also smoking results in higher risk of developing gum diseases and plague. And this can result in expensive procedures to get your mouth and teeth back into good condition.

Also smoking significantly increases the risk of losing your teeth. Medical statistics shows that the average tooth damage among smokers range 1.5 to 2.9 percent every 10 years. This means that if you were to start smoking when you 18 you are quite likely to lose about five teeth by the time you turn 35.

In addition to the above smoking shown to slow down healing process after injury or medical procedure. So not only you will have longer in a hospital or out of work but it will also cost you more.

And if everything mentioned above is not enough, smoking has a potential to ruin not only your health but also your physical appearance. Smoking tends to speed up the aging process which in turn makes your skin and hair look dull and aged. As a smoker you also tend to have more wrinkles but the worst part of smoking is that over time your hair and your body start to smell of smoke. And it takes a long time to get rid of that smell even if you quit smoking. Also as you can see all this will make you less attractive to the other gender and will highly reduce the chances of finding a partner.

Smoke Detector Installation Locations and Positioning Requirements

Where to install a smoke detector and its positioning are as important as having this life saving device installed at all. Placing a smoke detector in a wrong location might delay its response to smoke or even prevent it from sounding an alarm at all.

Although, you should install smoke alarms by following device manufacturers guidelines, and the NFPA standards (National Fire Protection Association), your local jurisdiction might have a different idea. This idea is usually LESS smoke detectors – Chicago is one of the examples.

Since it is your life we are talking about, following just a minimum requirement is not enough – for literally a few dollars more, you can get maximum protection.

Proper Placement of a smoke alarm based on IRC (International Residential Code), IBC (International Building Code) and NFPA:

New construction:

Smoke detectors must be hard wired (power supply from the electrical panel) and require battery backup. Your jurisdiction might require a dedicated circuit for this purpose – if such isn’t required, make sure that you smoke detector hasn’t been installed on a circuit / tapped to the wall switch controlled ceiling light fixture or outlet receptacle. Putting a smoke alarm on a GFCI protected electrical circuit also isn’t a good idea.

Do not use rechargeable type batteries for smoke detectors, good quality alkaline type battery is the right choice. Smoke alarms shall emit a signal when the batteries are low – replace the battery with a new one as soon as you hear that repeating sound.

Smoke detectors are required in each sleeping area and adjoining bedroom. Like I’ve mentioned before, some jurisdictions require less – Chicago is one of the vape attic olathe kansas examples where smoke detectors are not required inside the bedroom / sleeping area. Instead, you have to install a smoke alarm within 15′ from the bedroom entrance. In larger homes / apartments, where bedrooms are located more than 30′ apart, two or more smoke detectors might have to be installed.

At least one is required on each story of the house and in the basement. Crawlspaces and uninhabitable attics do not require a smoke detector installation. However, in case your attic or crawlspace contains a furnace, water heater, or any appliance that could become a source of fire (gas, oil, electric), have a smoke alarm installed as well (required by some jurisdictions and highly recommended if not required).
Smoke detectors must be interconnected – one triggered smoke detector activates all of them. Not all types of smoke alarms have the “interconnection” feature, which is extremely important – smoke developing in one section of the house would activate the closest device and automatically all of them at the same time.
Existing construction:

While remodeling, updating of electrical wiring to interconnect existing smoke alarms is not required unless the wall finishes are being removed exposing wall framing. However, even without any rewiring you can still achieve maximum protection by using an interconnected wireless smoke alarm detector system.

The smoke alarm shall be clearly audible in all bedrooms over the background noise levels with all intervening doors closed. That’s why regular testing of the smoke detector siren is so important – just like any mechanical / electronic device – sometimes they fail.

Enclosed interior staircases also require a smoke detector, and one shall be installed on the ceiling of the top floor. Staircases act like chimneys and smoke rising from the lower floor would activate the device giving you an early warning.
Smoke detector placement – rules apply to all of the locations described above.

This is extremely important and at the same time quite simple, unfortunately very often done completely wrong. It’s probably because we don’t like to read the manuals and often assume that we know what we’re doing.

When installing a smoke alarm on the ceiling (preferable location / might be required in some jurisdictions), place it as close to the center as possible, never closer than 4″ (10cm) to the sidewall or corner.

If for any reason, ceiling installation is not practical and wall installations are permitted, you can install smoke alarms on the wall with its top edge at a minimum of 4″ (10cm) and a maximum of 12″ (30.5cm) below the ceiling.
Before placing a smoke detector on the ceiling or wall, consider checking the house insulation. Older homes might be missing a ceiling (if open to the attic) or exterior wall insulation. This would allow extreme heat or cold transfer from exterior into the house, creating a thermal barrier, and prevent smoke from reaching / activating the alarm. If this is the case (you can simply touch the wall or ceiling during very hot or cold days), mount a smoke detector on an interior wall of the house.

How to Stop Smoking

Learning to smoke cigarettes was the hardest and most miserable task you undertook when you were young! Smoking cigarettes was something that you had to learn to do. Learning to smoke took some persistence and putting up with the misery of coughing and hacking after every pull on a cigarette. What were you mastering? You were learning to suppress your body’s natural protective responses to hot, polluted smoke going into your clean, pure lungs. Lungs created for clean air only! You were controlling your body’s reaction with your mind!

When people think about trying to quit cigarettes, they realize it’s in the best interest of their health to quit. They understand the health and fitness hazards of smoking. They know how expensive it is to smoke. They have every smart valid reason to quit cigarettes. Yet, many can’t do it! What is the reason for this dilemma? Because smoking the cigarette is the end to a means. That ends to a means is to satisfy a physical craving, calm your nerves, keep you from eating, whatever reason you use to justify the smoking. It is really the mechanism, the suppression of the body’s defensives, that the smoker has spent so much time creating that allows for them and now causes the smoker to experience the urge to smoke. If you are olathe vape shop able to quit cigarettes but don’t remove this body suppression trigger, the best you can hope for is to be an ex-smoker. What exactly is an ex-smoker? An ex-smoker is a person who has smoked in the past and has taken a break from smoking, but will probably resume smoking in the future.

The defense mechanism that you spent years building up remains functioning. It has become your ogre that you’ve forgotten how to be in charge of! You’ve erased from your memory why you created the ogre initially, because it was so long ago! You may overcome it and banish it for awhile, but it’s constantly pushing to break free. Eventually it will break free and you will resume smoking again. The cigarette is not the ogre. It is the mechanism you’ve created within your brain that compels you to smoke the cigarette that is the ogre.

Tips To Stop Smoking

There are physical addictions but, in addition there are also the psychological triggers that make giving smoking up difficult. Cigarette smokers become so used to smoking that they maintain regimens where they will smoke cigarettes at certain times of the day and when they do certain activities.

When I smoked I always looked forward to the after eating smoke and the first smoke in the morning. So when you try to break your addition and you are in the situation where you would usually smoke a cigarette, you find yourself craving one just out of habit. The activity has conditioned your brain to associate smoking with the activity. So as well as breaking the physical addiction you also need to break the psychological habits that have been set up.

Below are some tips to stop smoking:

  1. You must devote yourself to stop smoking. You must really want to stop smoking. An individual needs to develop a burning drive to give up smoking.
  2. Keep busy. When you find yourself in situations where you would normally have a smoke, substitute another activity for the activity of smoking. Brush your teeth, or chew gum until the craving passes. Don’t dwell about the craving and on how much you “just got to have a cigarette”.
  3. Chewing gum can help you since it keeps your mouth busy and gives you with something to do instead of smoking. Chewing the nicotine gum can be extremely helpful with warding off cravings
  4. Avoid dwelling on the giving up process. You must positive be about becoming a non smoker and not obsess over how hard it is and how much you need a cigarette.
  5. Tips to Help You Quit Smoking Naturally

Add exercise to your new life activities. It occupies you and gets you through those moments when you are experiencing cravings for a cigarette. When you really are craving a cigarette, put on your running shoes or get out your yoga mat and go to it.

Try to eat a low-fat, high-fiber diet to increase the speed of detoxification and to help you preserve energy. These food items circumvent weight gain.

Tell your non-smoking friends and co-workers that you have quit smoking using naturally using natural methods. The idea of your coworkers catching you smoking and the associated embarrassment may be enough to keep you from lighting up a cigarette.

Save your cigarette money in a jar, then reward yourself – a visit to the spa, a good book or a weekend trip away will give you the reward you’ve earned.

Look for an all-natural remedy for stopping smoking naturally to help reduce the cravings to smoke. There are some excellent stop-smoking formulations to help you quit smoking naturally. Natural products containing the herb echinacea are known to help your body resist cravings. Sarsaparilla helps prevent the weight gain and passion flower aids in reducing tension and anxiety. Burdock root, kelp and hyssop are good for eliminating nicotine deposits from the body. Aromatherapy oil can be used at times when the desire to smoke becomes almost unbearable. Rub the oil under your nose; the action and the aromatherapy vapor together will help you overcome the urge. Flower essence therapy, using Dr. Bach’s Emergency Extract can be used in times of intense stress that may cause you to smoke. These flower extracts may be found at health food stores or Whole Foods, and they really work!

Stop smoking hypnotherapy entails the process of giving suggestions to your subconscious mind by a trained hypo-therapist. Every cigarette smoker has their own personal psychological triggers that bring a positive experience from smoking, like the smoke, the smell of cigarettes, operating a car, being stressed out, after eating a meal, or while watching TV. Hypnosis allows you to get free of these types of cravings and create a stronger and improved cigarette free identity. These treatments additionally offer a convenient home system by means of CDs or through other audio recordings. The result of this therapy varies from person to person. It depends entirely upon the susceptibility of the person to hypnosis. Hypnotherapy treatment alleviates the cravings and the need to smoke. Sometimes several hypnosis sessions are required to obtain permanent results.

Teen Smoking Facts

There are more anti smoking measures being taken today than ever before, yet some teenagers disregard what they are told and begin to smoke anyway. This could be due to the fact that, despite all of our good efforts, these children are still not being fully educated about the very real dangers of smoking. Teenagers are at risk for very serious health problems once they begin smoking. Smoking can also lead to other bad habits suck as drinking and drug use. Parents are the biggest influence and do have the power to introduce their children to the dangers of smoking. There are other environmental factors vape attic hours though, that still make it easy and acceptable for teenagers to smoke. With combined efforts from adults, teenagers could be able to get the necessary education and make the decision to not smoke.

Even with all of the anti-smoking programs budgeted into our schools each year, approximately 3000 adolescents a day pick up the habit of smoking. Teens today are constantly being told that smoking is no good, yet it is estimated that about 4.5 million adolescents in the United States are smokers.

Smoking is becoming more taboo in our society than ever before with the elimination of cigarette ads, cigarettes on television, and smoking in public areas. Yet, some teens still can’t help but wonder what the big fuss about smoking is. Odds are, most of these teenagers were probably bombarded with statements such as, “Smoking will turn your teeth yellow”, or “Smoking will make your breath smell”, but were never given any actual facts about what serious effects smoking can actually have on their bodies.

By educating themselves with a few teen smoking facts, teenagers will have a better chance at staying away from cigarettes and leading a long and healthy life. Smoking can have serious effects on people’s bodies and because teens are still in a stage of development, they are even more susceptible to these harmful effects. There are more than 400 chemicals in cigarette smoke and more than 40 of them, are known carcinogens.

With every drag of a cigarette, you inhale a lung full of tar (yes, the stuff they use to pave the streets), hydrogen cyanide, benzene, acetone, formaldehyde, ammonia, and carbon monoxide. You wouldn’t inhale the fumes from the tail pipe of a car, why would you inhale these fumes from a cigarette?

Obviously, teens who smoke are destined to inherit some serious health problems. Teen smokers have smaller lungs and weaker hearts than those teens who don’t smoke. Teenage smokers are also more prone to getting sick than non smoking teens. Teenagers usually don’t realize that nicotine addiction becomes more powerful over time. What starts out as a habit of smoking 5-10 cigarettes a day, could increase to a 2 pack a day problem.

A study shows that those who smoke even a pack of day die on average 7 years earlier than those who have never smoked. Smoking kills over 1,200 Americans a day and is the single most preventable cause of premature death. Teenagers who partake in smoking are also much more likely to experiment with other drugs and alcohol which can cause serious problems of their own. Teens who smoke are traveling down a very dangerous road, and most don’t realize that once they begin their travels, they will most likely never stop.

Even with all of the measures taken to prevent teenage smoking, there are still some factors that exist that promote it. Parents are the biggest influence in a teenager’s life. Adolescents who have two parents who smoke are more than twice as likely to become smokers as those children with non smoking parents. Parents are sometimes uncomfortable talking to their teens about not smoking because they feel the information is going in one ear and out the other, but the truth is that most of these kids are listening.

Of the 3000 adolescents who being smoking each day, close to 1000 of them will die a smoking related death. This is why it so important for parents to talk to their children and explain the dangers of smoking. Even though in most states you have to be 18 or older to purchase cigarettes, a 2001 survey shows that 69.4 percent of teen smokers reported never being asked for proof of age when buying cigarettes in a store. This same survey found that 62.4 percent were allowed to buy cigarettes even thought the retailer was aware they were under the age of 18.

Teen smoking facts are very important for today’s young adult. The more knowledge these teenagers acquire, the more likely they will have the power to make a firm, conscious decision to never start smoking. Smoking related deaths claim more American lives than alcohol, car accidents, suicide, AIDS, homicide and illegal drugs combined. The sad part is that these deaths could all have been prevented. By educating teens to the fullest extent, they have a better chance of beating these odds and making their future bright.

There are more anti smoking measures being taken today than ever before, yet some teenagers disregard what they are told and begin to smoke anyway. This could be due to the fact that, despite all of our good efforts, these children are still not being fully educated about the very real dangers of smoking. Teenagers are at risk for very serious health problems once they begin smoking. Smoking can also lead to other bad habits suck as drinking and drug use. Parents are the biggest influence and do have the power to introduce their children to the dangers of smoking. There are other environmental factors though, that still make it easy and acceptable for teenagers to smoke. With combined efforts from adults, teenagers could be able to get the necessary education and make the decision to not smoke.

What Are the Health Risks of Smoking Cigarettes?

The damage that smoking can do to your body is truly immense. With the plethora of toxic chemicals present in every cigarette that you smoke, smoking regularly can very well be compared to living in a continual acid rain downpour (however mild it might be). How do you think that would affect your physical well being? The chemicals that you inhale in the form of cigarette smoke do play havoc inside your body, and smoking has been known to cause a variety of health problems.

It is not just you who is at risk because of smoking, but those around you as well. Inhaling second-hand smoke is known to be just as dangerous, and your smoking, therefore, also exposes your family and friends to the medical complications that arise due to smoking. For example, instances of children suffering from breathing related problems, in a house where both vape attic olathe ks parents smoke, are fairly common.

The medical complications that can arise because you smoke include:

Heart Diseases:
Your chances of getting a heart attack increase considerably if you continue to smoke, and there really isn’t any safe number of cigarettes that you can smoke every day. However, the more you smoke, the greater are your chances of having heart related problems.

Cigarette smoking is a very big factor when it comes to Coronary Heart Disease, and as a smoker, your chances of having a heart attack increase two or three times. If you also have high blood pressure or increased cholesterol levels, then the possibility increases even further. Around 80% of the heart attacks that occur in men under the age of 45 occur in men who smoke.

Once you inhale the smoke from a cigarette, the heart and the blood vessels surrounding it have several immediate reactions. After a minute of your starting to smoke there is a rise in the heart rate, and it can increase by up to 30% within the first ten minutes. Blood pressure also rises when you smoke, and the constriction of blood vessels forces your heart to exert more energy in transporting oxygen. At the same time, the carbon monoxide present in cigarette smoke reduces the ability of the blood to transport oxygen.

You, as a smoker, also have 5 times more chances of developing abdominal aortic aneurysms as compared to non-smokers.

Strokes:
Smoking has a considerable effect on the arteries that supply blood to the brain, and causes the arteries as well as other tissues to harden, thereby putting you at an increased risk of getting a stroke. Data shows that smokers are more likely to develop strokes (cerebral thrombosis) when compared to non-smokers; with women who are on contraceptive pills facing increased risks.

Erectile Dysfunction:
If you are a man, and if you are under the impression that smoking could make you more of a man, then do know that the reverse can actually be true. Clinical tests connecting smoking and erectile dysfunction have been conducted for some time now, and recent reports show that incidences of impotence are close to double in smokers.

Nicotine acts as a vasoconstrictor, which simply means that it constricts the blood vessels and arteries, thereby impeding the flow of blood in your body. Since the basis of an erection is blood filling up the penis’ blood vessels, the impediment in blood flow results in an unsatisfactory erection, or in the complete absence of one.

Nicotine use can also cause your testosterone levels to drop, and since testosterone is the primary male sex hormone, this drop in testosterone levels could adversely affect your sex drive.

Cancer:
Owing to the large number of chemicals present in cigarette smoke, smoking can lead to cancer in various parts of the body.

Amongst the most commonly discussed forms of cancer that occurs due to smoking is lung cancer. There is a considerable ‘dose response’ relationship when it comes to smoking and lung cancer, wherein the more you smoke, the more are the probabilities of your getting lung cancer. 90% of lung cancer deaths in men and 80% of lung cancer deaths in women are attributed to smoking.

Oral cancer (mouth cancer) also sees smoking as a primary factor (along with other forms of tobacco intake). If you have oral cancer, there is a possibility that it will spread further down the oral cavity to the larynx and the oesophagus, and continuing smoking would only hasten the process.

Bladder cancer also sees a considerable effect of smoking, wherein about half of all the bladder cancer related death in men, and around 30% in women, are attributed to smoking. This is because some of the carcinogens that enter your body in the form of cigarette smoke enter your blood. They are then filtered by your kidney, and get concentrated in the urine. Once in the urine, these chemicals work their way in damaging the inside lining of your bladder. This increases the probability of your getting bladder cancer.

What Way Will You Choose To Quit Smoking?

There are so many websites today offering numerous ways to quit smoking, many the same or similar, some quite different. Today the government’s 1-800-QUITNOW hotline is receiving a record number of calls. From 2004 to 2010 the total number of calls received was just under three million. So far in just this year, 2011, there have been over six hundred thousand additional calls! It is clear that more Americans than ever before are seeking some way to end their habit/addiction to smoking cigarettes, and once and for all, stop smoking.

To successfully quit smoking, to really stop smoking, one must find the right solution to their problem. Many seek to stop smoking using the nicotine patch. The theory is that if one uses the nicotine patch, and slowly withdraws from nicotine by using less and less nicotine in the patches, that in the end, the desire to smoke will be gone. The success rate for this system is woefully small (1). In fact, it is similar (or less) to just trying to quit “cold turkey”. This tells us that the desire to smoke cannot simply be found in vape attic the addiction to nicotine. Surely that is a part of the syndrome, but it cannot be all of it, or the system would be 100% successful for each and every smoker using it. But it is not. Not even close. Far less than 10%

The same is true for those who choose to use the nicotine gum. This is gum saturated with nicotine in various amounts, used to withdraw from the addiction to nicotine. But nicotine gum works no better than does the nicotine patch (2).

One of the oldest programs to quit smoking is using a hypnosis program. Hypnotists have for decades been taking money from those who believe that a hypnosis to quit smoking program will help them to once and for all stop smoking. However, having been a clinical hypnotherapist in perhaps the largest and oldest hypnosis clinic in the USA, I can tell you that although I do believe hypnosis should be a part of a successful campaign to quit smoking, the vast majority of hypnotists do not know how to correctly use hypnosis to get their clients to quit smoking. So the end result is that using a hypnosis program to quit smoking is rarely successful in the long term.

In fact, Kerry Packer, who was, until his death in 2005, the most wealthy man in Australia and one of the world’s multibillionaires, is reported to have paid Marshall Sylver, a world renowned hypnotist, $100,000 for a single session of hypnosis to help him quit smoking. It did not take. Kerry Packer did not stop smoking through hypnosis.

To quit smoking now, what a smoker must do is begin to deal with the core issue that drives the desire to continue to smoke cigarettes. To quit smoking through hypnosis, the hypnosis must be properly applied. It should not focus on the present, telling the subject that they will no longer desire to smoke, or that the cigarettes will begin to taste like rotten eggs, or any other such nonsense. What the hypnotist must do is focus on the past, back to the time when the subject first decided to become a smoker. That point, the exact moment that smokers, almost invariably children of no more than fourteen, often as young as ten, the children started to hypnotize themselves into becoming smokers.

It is my firm belief that every smoker, every single one, is in a state of hypnosis. They hypnotized themselves into becoming smokers, as after all, any hypnotist worth his or her salt will tell you that all hypnosis is self-hypnosis. It is not a capturing process as the old Dracula movies would suggest, but a leading process. In other words, the hypnotist leads the subject into a state of mind wherein the subject accepts and internalizes the suggestions of the hypnotist. But the hypnotist is not issuing commands, only offering suggestions that the subject may or may not choose to follow.

When someone tries to quit smoking after a decade or more after starting, they most often fail, and then believe it is because they lack the will power to overcome the addiction. Most see it as a weakness in their character. This is not true. What is true is that their inability to stop smoking by simply exerting their will is a testament to the commitment they made to themselves to become a smoker in the first place. They hypnotized themselves to start smoking, and they must reverse that hypnosis at the subconscious level to end it. To quit smoking, to stop smoking successfully and never desire to smoke again takes returning the person to the psychological state they were in before they committed to become a smoker.

I know there are those who smoke who will say, “I am not hypnotized!” But have they ever been hypnotized? Do they even know what being hypnotized feels like? Tell me this. Would anyone who is not in an altered state of consciousness (which takes them a step away from reality) knowingly take a chemically treated poison weed, wrapped in chemically treated poisonous paper, light it on fire and breath the toxic fumes from that fire as often as two hundred times per day (twenty cigarettes times ten drags from each) every day of their life for ten, twenty, thirty years or more, knowing that the end result may well be a painful, costly and prolonged death, and believe that they are experiencing some sort of “pleasure”, pay dearly to do that, and not be in a state of hypnosis?

No one starts smoking because they want to enjoy the taste of a burning cigarette. No one I have ever heard of enjoyed that first cigarette, especially after inhaling that first time. I know I didn’t. I became instantly nauseous and nearly threw up. I was dizzy and at ten years old, decided that smoking was not for me.

But four years later, after associating with three other boys my age in my new school, and dearly desiring to become a part of their “gang”, I believed I had to become a smoker as they were. I clearly remember asking myself what I call the “critical question”. I remember where I was and what I felt. The question was, “Do I really want to be a smoker?” Of course, after very little consideration, I said, “Yes!” Then I proceeded to inhale the cigarette I’d just lit, stolen from my parents stash, and got sick, waited until it passed, then did it again, until I could do it without feeling like puking. It only took a few days before I was smoking just like my new friends, blowing smoke rings and “looking cool”.

I, like almost every smoker I have interviewed over the years of my work as a smoking cessation coach, started smoking for three main reasons. They are

1) If only adults smoke and I smoke, I will appear to be more mature, more “adult-looking”. But that was true only to those younger than me. To true adults, I simply looked like a foolish little boy trying to look older.

2) My friends are doing it, and if I want to be more like my friends, I will start smoking like them. I will then be more accepted by them. I don’t truly think that they accepted me more, or would have accepted me any less had I opted not to become a smoker, but that was my thinking at the time.

3) Smoking is sexy. In the movies, I saw James Dean, Humphrey Bogart, Elizabeth Taylor and so many other sex symbols smoke and look “sexy and cool” smoking. I wanted to be like them; to be more sexually attractive. After all, John Wayne was advertising cigarettes on TV. If “The Duke” said it was the thing to do, who was I to believe otherwise. And add to that, every single adult in my family smoked. (And with the exception of my mother, who died as a result of an auto accident at 43, all died with smoking related cancers.) So smoking was simply a right of passage into adulthood in my life in the fifties.

Smoking Ban Ignites Arguments

You might smoke them or hate them – love them or berate them – but regardless of your position, the government has decided to ban smoke from more and more bars, restaurants and cafes across the US. The smoking ban seems to strike a nerve in everyone. The news is either met with extreme glee or extreme irritation – all depending on whether you smoke, don’t smoke, own a bar, feel a ban infringes on your rights or wish the government instituted the ban years ago.

Quite a few controversies surround the smoking vape attic olathe kansas bans and smoking in general – and everyone seems to have their own opinion on whether the move towards no smoking was right or wrong:

Non-smokers: almost all non-smokers are happy for the ban, and encourage the government apply it to more places, including cars and homes – so that the children of smokers will not have to suffer in a smoky environment.
Smokers: the majority of smokers feel as though the public is prejudiced against them. There are even a few who argue that the negative side-effects of smoking are not solidly proven by science. There are less and less people to support this stance as more and more information is published about the risks of smoking.
Business Owners: business owners who had to suddenly enforce the ban in their businesses, restaurants, clubs and bars have mixed feelings about the new laws. Some claim that there has been no change in the number of patrons – while others have been completely devastated.
Politically Minded: a surprising number of smokers and non-smokers who oppose the ban simply because they see it as an infringement on their rights. They argue that once the door is open to government regulating the behaviors of the public, who knows what other rights will be taken away.
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
In my opinion, all sides of the smoking ban argument raise legitimate points. Undoubtedly there are benefits to the smoking ban – the obvious being the improvement of public health. On the other side of the card, there are some negative points negatives like the number of business owners who can no longer pay their bills because their patrons have fled to the few, smoke-friendly clubs.

As I’ve researched this article, I have also found some completely unforeseen, border-line weird side-effects of the ban. For example, the statistics on how the ban has impacted drunk driving fatalities, spawned a generation of “healthy” cigarettes and linked barbecues to some of the same chemicals as smoke.

This article will give you a breakdown of my take on smoking bans including “the good, the bad and the ugly”.

The Good

Here are some good things that have been produced by the bans:

Drop in Heart Attack Occurrence. This is an absolutely amazing fact! Heart attacks have long been associated with cigarette smoke, since the chemicals in smoke cause narrowing of the veins and arteries in the body, putting strain on the heart. Clotting is also a cause of heart attack that is often directly related to smoking. Research done at the University of California found that after only 1 year of having the smoking ban in effect, heart attack rates were 17% lower than usual! Some of the individual towns studied by the University of California had more dramatic results – Helena, Montana had its heart attack rates cut in half only after 6 months of the smoking ban!
Healthier Work Place. Some estimate that working in a smoky environment for a long period of time can cut your life expectancy by 10 years! This is because the same risks that come with smoking also apply for second hand smoke. A smoke-filled workplace can be a non-stop source of secondhand smoke – working an 8 hour shift in a smoking environment is similar to chain smoking for all of those hours. So now your favorite bartender or waiter can look forward to living a longer life with a decreased risk of developing cancer, COPD, stroke or heart attacks. (But then again, if they choose to work in a smoky environment in the first place then avoiding smoke may not be at the top of their list. You would have to agree that no one made them work there – there are many other smoke-free callings and careers out there!)
Healthier Restaurants and Bars. No more coming home from a night out with clothing that reeks of smoke! Now your favorite restaurants and nightspots are a healthy place to spend a few hours. Many businesses claim that their number of patrons have increased since the smoking ban – indicating that all of the non-smokers who used to stay home now have a good reason to go out and live it up. Smoke-free restaurants are much better for their youngest customers – since children are at more risk from cigarette smoke because of their small, developing lungs.
VFW and Elks Clubs Boost in Members. The few private clubs that do allow smoking are now in high demand. Some organizations like VFW posts and Elk clubs that used to have sparse numbers now are booming with new members (as long as they are exempt from the ban. For many of the clubs that have banned smoking, funds are so tight that they have been forced to give up their charitable donations or have closed completely because of it).
More “Quitters”. In some locations, the ban has sparked renewed efforts to quit smoking for good. New York City reports that adult smoking is down 19% – which translates into 240,000 less smokers in NYC’s population. (Unfortunately, the flip side of these statistics is that other areas have actually reported an increase in smoking among working class men since the ban.) Removing the smoke from public places should technically help the fight to quit. This is partially because of the way that nicotine re-wires your brain. The more nicotine that enters your body, the more nicotine receptors develop in your brain to absorb the chemicals. A smokers brain would have billions more of the receptors than a non-smoker. Being in a place where you can smell smoke, or see someone else smoking in enough to switch on the receptors that cause nicotine cravings. The smoking ban cuts the number of times a “quitter” will be reminded of smoke cravings by the nicotine receptors during a night out, making it easier to quit.

Do Not Give Up – Smoking Cessation is Possible

Smoking is a very dangerous addiction, yet people can’t give it up easily. Find out why smoking is so addictive, what are the problems that result from smoking, what are the treatment methods for it, what the benefits of quitting are and much more about smoking here.

Why is Smoking So Addictive?

Smoking rushes nicotine to the brain and this is the fastest method of delivery; smoking also gives smokers precise control over their nicotine intake. Therefore, both ‘speed and control’ greatly enhance the addictive effect of nicotine on the brain. Smoking actually introduces nicotine to the pulmonary beds of the lungs from where nicotine is directly transported to the brain in seconds.

Nicotine mimics the neurotransmitter acetylcholine; it binds to and activates the nicotinic acetylcholine receptors. Once nicotine reaches the brain, it quickly spreads to the activated brain regions such as reward, memory and learning centers. These firing receptors cause the release of dopamine, a neurotransmitter that is associated with pleasure and addiction. So, in order to maintain these dopamine levels, a person needs to smoke frequently. Smoking may actually maintain dopamine levels by reducing enzymes that break it down or by increasing the level of molecules that inhibit dopamine clean up.

Simultaneously, nicotine also influences other areas of the brain that control mood, energy levels and memory as well as cause long-lasting neurological changes. As a result, the brain gets used to a constant dose of nicotine and therefore when you stop smoking, you experience withdrawal symptoms. This also makes it a difficult habit to kick.

What is Passive Smoking and What Are the Risks?

Passive smoking can be defined as involuntary inhalation of secondhand tobacco smoke. This secondhand tobacco smoke is a mixture of smoke exhaled by active smokers as well as smoke released from smoldering tobacco, diluted with ambient air. Passive smoking generally occurs in closed environments, but open environments are equally prone. Passive smokers are also exposed to carcinogens and toxic components present in secondhand tobacco smoke.

Passive smoking can have serious effects on an individual’s health. The health effects of passive smoking are as serious and debilitating as smoking itself. The risks outlined below have been linked with passive smoking.

Cancer – About 3,000 cancer-related non smoker deaths are directly attributed to passive smoking each year.

Heart Diseases – Approximately 50,000 non smoker deaths occur from heart related issues and can be linked to passive smoking.

Respiratory Diseases and Problems – Second hand smoke causes higher rates of lower respiratory infections, including bronchitis and pneumonia. It is also a contributory factor for upper respiratory irritation and infections as well as decreased lung function.

Ear Infections – Passive smoking is accountable for an increased number of ear infections.

Low Birth Weight – Second hand smoke is responsible olathe vape shop for 10,000 low birth weight births a year and is a major factor for many infant deaths.

Asthma – Second hand smoke is responsible for nearly 8,000 new cases of asthma annually.

Sudden Infant Death Syndrome – Passive smoking is related to nearly 2,000 cases of SIDS each year.

Still births – Passive smoking is also accountable for an increased risk of still births and spontaneous abortions.

What Problems Can Occur From Smoking?

Smoking is harmful and the dangers of smoking are serious. Tobacco smoke contains 43 cancer-causing (carcinogenic) compounds besides 400 other toxins that include nicotine and tar. Nicotine is the addictive substance in tobacco and tar congests the lungs, inhibiting normal breathing. Additionally, smoking causes lung and throat cancer, heart disease, emphysema, as well as bronchial and lung disorders.

Smoking, Learned Breath Problem to Change Stress – Core-Breathing to Replace Smoking and Stress

When its time for a person to stop smoking and start to live their whole life, some time should be spent to realize what smoking is doing for them on a emotional level by the way the habit affects stress and their emotional mood. Smoking is an emotional physical act that has been learned that was created into a habit that changes a persons emotional mood while they smoke. When a person just stops smoking their is a physical and emotional mental conflict that takes place in the body and mind. How a person address these affects has a major affect on their attitude about recovery from smoking and what vape attic olathe kansas do they want to create emotionally from not smoking. Since smoking is a set of created emotions that is used every time person pickup a cigarette and when a person stop picking up that cigarette it changes their whole emotional experience. Developing new emotions is never ease but always a challenge and finding people that have enhance their enjoyment of life is a suggestion. Asking good questions is part of learning after person stops smoking.

By realizing the single most powerful physical act you do as you smoke, is to affect stress and create a calm mood within the context of the learned emotional habit of smoking. This is done on your exhalation of the smoke within the habit to affect physical stress, that affects emotions. Smoking can be seen as a breathing habit to affect stress and a persons emotional mood.

This program views smoking as breathing or breath problem for the act of smoking affects how a person breathe. This is an energy point of view, base on breath and ones spirit for they are link together and realizing this link gives a smoker ideas and concepts that lets them affect their stress and emotions that can replace the smoking affect that changes their stress. Smoking is learned form of breathing that affects your physical and emotional reality by changing stress that is repeated in the form of habit. Simply, smoking is habit to change your stress which changes your physical and emotional state of being and has other influences on how person feels.

The power of core/breathing program deals directly with stress in shoulder and tension in body through its techniques directed by the mind that enhances physical force and feeling through the physical body. There is a saying in this program, “Change your stress, you can change your emotional reality” and the most affective proven way is affect stress is in your breath exchange between inhale and exhale, for smoking is about how you breathe with a cigarette. View point, your breath supports your physical, emotional reality for how you breathe within emotional situations affects your stress.

Once person decides to stop smoking the first thing that happen is they are changing their breathing pattern during parts of the day and that breathing pattern is smoking created to affect stress. The problem for smokers is not having that breathing pattern with cluing from a cigarette that lessen stress in shoulders which affects the feeling through out the body. Missing that habit that changes stress is a real emotional problem and finding ideas and techniques that affect stress makes the transition from smoking to be non-smoker lot more effective.

It has be shown that by changing your breathing pattern by extending breathing range affects physical stress which affects emotions for every major stress reduction program has breathing part of their program. If you take a view point that smoking is a breathing habit that affects stress by changing your breathing pattern through the use a cigarette to affecting stress, then first question to change from smoking is how to breathe to affect stress. By learning a different breathing patterns and one that makes a person physically stronger and holding less stress into habit to replace smoking breathing and its affect to reduce stress. By seeing and understanding the end goal that your smoking habit does for you, gives a view what you have to do to create the same affect, yet it will be different and new with out a cigarette.

With clear view of your smoking habit as way to breathe to affect stress and your emotional state, it opens a new way to address the affects of smoking habit in a very direct way where the person create their breath to affect stress in a mindful way. Keep in mind always, look for the best methods that create ways to lessen conflict physically and emotionally when your stopping smoking. Change is hard when it address emotional stress within one behavior for it affects the mind, body and spirit to change from a old way of action to new way being.

This is a way of thinking about change for there is three points of view, they are mental, physical and spirit for these are words to focus on when a person wants to consciously change. It is the interplay between them that within person behavior action that person works with to over come smoking habit. Look at smoking from energy point of view to start off with and see how it affects mental and physical. For smoking has three basic parts that integrate together to affect stress and finding ways to affect each and then have them blend together.

The real problem when person address stress head on is ” PEOPLE LOVE THEIR STRESS” for it makes up their emotional reality and when you touch on that part of being human, fear holds people back base on not understanding and how to replace the fear with some form of emotional sense of self while interaction with others around them. Self is some form of, on going emotional value projection, interacting with others that affects emotional connections to life. Some types of fear stops good emotional development and its very much physical to mental for its about enjoyment within your own emotions.

Keep in mind the affect of smoking has on persons emotions will very greatly and its base on how they learned how to smoke and at what age and the level of fear around them at that time. When a person learns to smoke which is learning to breath with smoke which impacted their energy level that had affect their physical feeling to the brain that affected their attitude to deal with their fear. To stop smoking will affect people in very different ways but underlining emotions that person has to deal with is fear going back to when they learned how to smoke. People that had low level of fear and it was very much part of being with the group, for them to stop will have little affect but people that was going through lot emotional fear conflicts (children its about about fear of not knowing and their surrounding with others and how they fit in) and smoking help them get through it, will have a real emotional physical conflicts that they have to go through and work out with their stress. Stress is learned and the mind and body deals with it in different ways given the individual.

The three cluing components that make up smoking that once understood can aid someone in their program not to smoke and recover from smoking by finding ways to address stress. First is the physical cluing of the cigarette itself, and even the pack of cigarettes, will get the mind to start to think about smoking within its learned emotions set that affect stress that has be learned through repeated emotional behavior. Cigarette is a physical item that a person can feel when they hold it, that sends a signal to the brain and bring about emotional state of mind. The physical input is very strong force and not having the item that triggers a mental connection to emotional state that affects stress is a real lose to deal with stress.

Second component that interacts with the other two, is a persons mental state of mind that was learned from the time they learned to smoke that forms the emotional context of the habit to smoke that affects stress. The mental state of a person does not do will when it loses a large emotional state of expression and a outlet of emotions and not having a way to change stress. The physical act of smoking is an emotional outlet of a person energy and just stopping it creates emotional confusion and the more person was using smoking to deal with stress the greater the conflict of not having the outlet. For some, eating becomes replacement of smoking to affect stress in shoulder, because they have to use their jaw which affects stress in shoulders and eating lowers person energy level like smoking.

The third component is breath, energy and spirit for they are all link together for understanding the affects that person creates when they smoke a cigarette. In this program the act of smoking lowers a person internal energy which affects a person ability to be emotional in what ever they are doing physically that is calming. Be clear the affects of smoking to lower a persons energy to be emotional affects their judgment and decisions within their behavior. When person smokes they lower their internal energy in two ways one with smoke that replaces oxygen and the other with nicotine that lowers the flow blood through out the body that effect strength and emotions. Smoking deals with stress by changing the level of internal energy that the mind has to work with to express emotions within physical behavior. This part is the most powerful force to be understood to change your smoking habit to new more powerful form of breathing, that can make a person stronger and changes stress. People change when they become stronger within what they are doing for its about enhancing physical feeling and the brain expressing them.

What is addicting part to smoking is its the most repeatable form of exhalation that is directed to physical stress and feeling connected to stress. The exhalation of smoke relaxes the shoulders and body and the inhalation through the cigarette affects feeling of stress and body to enhance the affects of exhalation of the smoke from a cigarette. How you inhale and exhale has major affect on the body and feeling of stress. The next is the smoke itself coming from the cigarette that replaces oxygen for it makes you physically weaker for its like choking from not having oxygen and that will make you weaker. The third is nicotine which enhances the affects of smoke by reducing blood flow to the heart and the rest of the body. When person learns to smoke they learn how to bring the smoke in and not choke on it and then releasing the smoke with long exhale which will affect stress in shoulders.

The myth that nicotine is addictive has hurt recovery from smoking and dealing with stress. The idea of nicotine is addictive comes from lawyers that wanted to prove point to make money but common sense tells a different story. Keep in mind nicotine has an affect on the body within smoking the question is how it works out side of smoking.

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