Zimpapers Logo

As we enter into the New Year, 2014, many of us will make resolutions about one aspect of our lives that we feel to be a major weakness in our character. It may be an unhealthy habit such as smoking or excessive drinking. It may even be something to do with our moral behaviour, changing girlfriends or mistresses more frequently than one would change one’s socks in the middle of a tropical summer.

Some resolutions may concern one’s personal relationship with God, irregularly attending church services or paying tithes, for instance. Some people take a resolution to save more money than they had hitherto been doing.

In this opinion piece, I will deal with resolutions to stop smoking and drinking. These two are both unhealthy and clearly financially wasteful.

We know that smoking is a cause of a number of heart diseases and that very many people have died of one or other of those diseases.
We also know that excessive consumption of alcoholic beverages damages some parts of the body, especially the liver, a very serious condition known in medicine as cirrhosis of the liver.

In many cases it may lead to the disruption, if not destruction, of one’s social and economic life.
We have innumerable examples of formerly stable and healthy families that were broken up by excessive drinking by one or the other of the marital couple, usually the male one; usually is not synonymous with always.

As for smoking, informed people say that it has an adverse effect on the cardiac blood vessels resulting in a reduction of blood supply to some parts of the body, a condition known as ischaemia in medicine. It also causes a number of throat ailments one of which may be laryngitis (inflammation of the larynx or voice-box.)

Cigarette smoking is the major cause of two diseases, emphysema and bronchitis, both of which account for thousands of deaths in Southern Africa. The two are collectively referred to as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD).

If the disease is diagnosed during its early stage, doctors say it may be possible to stop it from developing further provided the patient discontinues smoking promptly.

That is when resolutions come in to avoid possible death. To keep a resolution one needs only two personal qualities: willpower and a mind that clearly identifies one’s life priorities as far as the body and soul are concerned.

To stop smoking one should understand that doing so is in the best interests of one’s life. One may carry a packet of cigarettes in one’s trouser-pocket. Each time one craves for a cigarette, one should take out the packet and say, “I have decided never to smoke again; and I will keep that decision,” and put the packet back in one’s pocket.

After spending, say 12 hours without smoking one should say: “I have spent 12 hours without smoking; I can spend another 12 hours.”  At the end of 24 hours, one should aim at doubling that without smoking.  After 48 hours, aim at 96 hours, by which time, the craving for a cigarette would have been relatively reduced. Normal life can be resumed.

At the end of one week, which is 168 hours, throw or give away the cigarette packet in your pocket because the possibility of a relapse is by then rather remote. The level of nicotine in one’s body is so low that it causes no craving any longer, and continues to fall until it reaches a level when the smell of tobacco is offensive.

To stop the consumption of alcohol is more difficult if the consumer is actually addicted. But with determination it can be done by just not taking any alcoholic beverage as from the time one makes the resolution.

Withdrawal symptoms may be somewhat painful but they are not fatal, at least not in most cases.
It may be advisable for one who has resolved to quit drinking altogether to withdraw from one’s former drinking associates for quite a while till one is sure that the problem is overcome. That may be necessary because the temptation to hit the bottle once more is stronger as a result of peer influence and pressure.

For those Christians whose churches are opposed to the very consumption of both tobacco and alcohol, it should be easier than, say, the Roman Catholics because they believe that the “body is the temple of the Lord.”  They are expected to be bodily and spiritually clean. It is ungodly to fill up God’s temple with nicotine (isikhananandani) or with intoxicants of any type whatsoever, so indicates the relevant verse.

Resolving to do or not to do something injurious or harmful to one’s body or interests is the beginning of wisdom and mental maturity; to implement the resolution is the fruition of that wisdom.

The author wishes every reader of this column a healthy, happy and prosperous New Year.

Saul Gwakuba Ndlovu is a Bulawayo based retired journalist. He can be contacted on cell 0734328136 or through email [email protected]