Questioner 1 Namaskaram Sadhguru,
There has been an increase in calls on smoker hotline from tobacco smokers trying to quit their habit.
Despite their best intention,
It is physically very difficult to quit because of their addiction to nicotine.
Sadhguru,
What are your recommendations for those people in this struggle?
Well,
This is not me.
The medical experts are saying that the virus,
If you get it,
Smokers die first.
That should be a cure.
I'm not trying to be cruel to you.
I'm not somebody who is moralistic and say you should not smoke.
I'm not even looking at it as a moral issue as some people look at it.
It's just that doing something that's against your system is senseless.
Another thing is,
Suppose you found some pleasure in that,
And you're doing it,
It's okay,
I'll leave it to you.
But the biggest problem for me is that you become compulsive about simple things in life.
That is a big problem for me.
You smoking,
That's not a big issue for me.
You're doing something compulsively,
This is a big issue.
Because you're throwing away the evolutionary benefits that this human being has,
That he can do everything consciously,
But you are choosing to compulsively do something.
What you might have picked up as a fad,
Or as a pleasure,
As a simple pleasure in your life,
You like tobacco,
You like to smoke,
I'm not coming in the way.
All I'm saying is,
Don't throw away the evolutionary benefit,
Because this mother earth and nature has worked for a million years to get you to this level of awareness,
Consciousness and intelligence,
This size of brain.
When people are using their brains today to see how to make a car that doesn't smoke,
You,
You're still smoking,
What is that?
Ah,
Once in a way you wanted to smoke because you enjoy that.
I will leave that,
I will not enter your personal life to that extent.
Well,
It doesn't make sense,
But everything need not make sense,
It's okay.
But you're compulsive.
That,
No,
No,
Because these millions of years of evolution is just going waste in you,
Going up in smoke,
Tch,
Literally.
Now should I give it up,
Should I give it up?
What is there to give up?
See,
If smoke was coming out of your ears,
You should go for treatment,
Something burning inside.
But you're taking it in and you're blowing it out.
There is no treatment,
You just have to make up your mind.
You can only make up your mind because you've seen those Marlboro ads.
Ah,
Tch,
Because you thought you're a real man only when you smoke.
No,
No,
No,
I'm not being gender prejudiced,
Women also can smoke,
Of course.
Oh,
What makes you think only men can smoke?
No,
No,
You can also be stupid.
Being stupid is not only a man's privilege,
Everybody has a right.
Only thing is,
Stupidity takes on many forms of hurting various lives.
But the most basic form of stupidity is that you choose to hurt this life,
Though there is physical pain and many other things involved,
Still you choose to hurt this one.
This is not happening by choice,
You might have started by choice,
But after some time it's just one big compulsion.
You,
I want to give it up,
I want to give it up,
Don't do all this.
If you forcefully give it up,
You will start doing some other crazy thing.
This once happened,
Shankaran Pillai one day was just leaving the office and his office colleague,
A young woman asked him,
Can you please drop me home today?
He said,
Yes,
Like a gentleman,
He took her,
He opened the door,
Everything,
They were driving.
When a lonely stretch of road came,
He stopped and suddenly he became like an octopus.
That means he had eight limbs.
He was all over her.
She pushed him away and said,
You fool,
I got into your car thinking you're a decent fellow.
What are you doing?
He said,
I'm sorry,
I'm sorry,
I quit smoking.
So you don't do these things forcefully.
If you understand,
If you are beginning to understand that we are understanding that a bus which smokes heavily is not good,
A car that smokes is not good,
But in the evolution of an automobile,
They are still in that place where they still have to smoke.
Not all of them have become electric.
In the evolution of an automobile,
Still smoke is all right.
We are working towards a smokeless one,
But still smoke is all right because the evolution of an automobile has still not reached that place where it's totally smokeless.
But the evolution of this became very smokeless long time ago.
It throws out carbon dioxide.
This is its nature.
But now you want to inhale carbon monoxide or whatever it is.
Well,
You just have to see it's stupid.
Once you see something is stupid,
You don't have to give it up,
It'll go.
Right now,
You're feeling little.
.
.
You think it's very smart to do this,
Especially when you are fourteen,
Fifteen years of age,
When you smoked,
You thought you're really doing some great thing.
So whatever your age now,
If you understand this is a stupid thing that you're doing,
You don't have to give it up,
It'll just fall off because you don't like to be stupid,
I know that.
