According to Osho, forget fighting tobacco itself—the root problem is the mind’s addiction to habit. If you drop tobacco without understanding the inner restlessness it masks, another substitute will appear. Rather than moralizing, watch the urge, see its function, and address the inner emptiness; only insight into the habit-mechanism dissolves it naturally, without replacement or guilt.
Don’t just quit chewing; understand why you feel the need to chew, or you’ll grab another habit.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Osho, I am ignorant. All around me there is nothing but darkness. What is the path for me?
Music! Darkness is only proof that light can be. Darkness is only evidence that light is possible. So do not look at darkness with a negative outlook. Do not look with the eyes of an atheist; look with the eyes of a theist. Then even in darkness you will sense light hidden within it. Darkness is the womb of light. Do not be alarmed by darkness, nor afraid, nor anxious—be blissful, for the morning must be coming! And the denser the darkness, the nearer the dawn. Deep is this darkness; by the veils of selfishness we have been plundered. A wall of dead matter stands encircling, people speak as if turning their faces away; in this sky there is no sun, no moon, no star. An infinite ocean of imagination this, roaring as it girds the body, fierce— nothing is understood; where is the dusky shore? Beloved, give me that…
Osho, my husband has the habit of chewing tobacco. How can he give it up? Asked by Geeta. First of all, trying to make someone else drop their habits is not a mark of decency. Let the other person understand for themselves. Acknowledge at least that your husband has intelligence. If there is to be a question, let your husband be the one to ask.
The weak always finds a tactic that appears right. Being weak, they must play a kind of politics that looks proper and cannot be easily refused. What will you say? The wife isn’t saying something bad. She says, “Your lungs will be ruined; if you smoke you’ll get TB.” She says it for your own good. The weak will always devise ways to torment you “for your own good.” And she isn’t factually wrong, so you cannot even argue. Husbands begin to enter their homes in fear. The home starts to feel like school for little children—that is how husbands feel about home: a classroom. Lessons are given there—where to take off the shoes, where to put the clothes, don’t smoke, don’t play the radio so loud—thousands of lessons. Slowly the wife becomes a schoolmistress and with her own hands breaks the delicate threads of love. The threads of love…
Osho, I keep turning back to look at the past. It’s futile, yet the habit doesn’t drop. What could be the reason?
Even to a dry tree the vine clings. Support! No other support seems visible. Ahead, only darkness; within, only darkness. The one bright thing seems to be the line of the past along which you have come—this path that is over, that will never be again, that has already happened. You sit arranging these preserved blossoms, these dried flowers. You cling to them. The creeper has twined round a lifeless tree— how much the past coddles the unborn It’s all dead, a corpse. Sometimes it happens: a she-monkey goes on carrying her baby pressed to her chest. Even when the baby dies, she keeps carrying it. It takes days—only when it rots and starts to stink does she drop it in a fright. Otherwise she goes on clutching the corpse—old habit. The past is a corpse—gone, done. Dust. Ash; the ember is out. Don’t keep lying on this ash, don’t…
Osho, I cannot drop the habit of chain-smoking. I have tried hard but I have failed always. Is it a sin to smoke?
Gurucharan, DON'T MAKE A MOUNTAIN OUT OF A MOLEHILL! Religious people are very skillful in doing that. Now, what are you really doing when you are smoking? Just taking some smoke inside your lungs and letting it out. It is a kind of PRANAYAMA -- filthy, dirty, but still a PRANAYAMA! You are doing yoga, in a stupid way. It is not sin. It may be foolish but it is not a sin, certainly. There is only one sin and that is unawareness, and only one virtue and that is awareness. Do whatsoever you are doing, but remain a witness to it, and immediately the quality of your doing is transformed. I will not tell you not to smoke; that you have tried. You must have been told by many so-called saints not to smoke: "Because if you smoke you will fall into hell." God is not so stupid as…
Question: BELOVED MASTER, I WANT TO GIVE UP SMOKING. WHAT DO YOU SAY ABOUT IT? For example, it may be that your mother's breast was taken away from you earlier than you wanted and it is just a substitute. To many people I have suggested -- and it has been of help to smokers -- I say, "If you really want to stop smoking, then start sucking your thumb." They say, "But that will look very stupid!" That is true... smoking looks as if you are doing something great! You are doing the same thing, in fact a little more harmful. Just sucking on your thumb is not harmful at all, but smoking IS harmful. But because everybody is smoking and it is an accepted thing and it seems to be a very grown-up thing....