“I like it” - “I love it”

I used to say this too and believed this rationalization with every fiber of my being. Think hard, what is it that you love about smoking or using oral tobacco? If a smoker, what is so wonderful that we are willing to damage and even destroy our lungs and gradually clog every artery in our body, while accepting a 50/50 chance of departing earth more than 5,000 days early? If an oral user, how much love does it take to permanently expose your mouth to unadulterated tobacco’s 2,550 chemicals? Joel teaches that as dependent users we live a constant struggle to maintain a narrow range of nicotine in our bloodstream, referred to as our “serum nicotine level.”

Each time our serum nicotine level falls below our minimum limit we begin sensing the onset of symptoms of early withdrawal. We start growing tense, anxious, irritable, and depressed and the only thing that will bring us immediate relief from escalating symptoms is more nicotine. Once replenished, we are left totally convinced that we "enjoy smoking,” "like chewing” or “love our dip.” On the other end, we also have to be cautious not to use too much nicotine and exceed our upper limit of tolerance or we risk suffering varying degrees of nicotine poisoning.

Early symptoms can include a sick feeling, nausea and dizziness. As Joel notes, being a successful user is like being an accomplished tightrope walker, constantly maintaining a balance between these two painful extremes of too much or too little nicotine.103 According to Philip Michels, PhD, a USC School of Medicine professor and cessation facilitator, it is normal for us to look to our own behavior in order to obtain clues about our attitudes and beliefs. We tend to draw conclusions about what we must like by watching what we see ourselves doing. Such self-analysis goes like this:

Logical Yet False Reasoning
· I don’t do things I don’t like to do
· I smoke lots and lots of cigarettes
· Thus, I must really love smoking