{"id":59968,"date":"2011-10-10T02:40:32","date_gmt":"2011-10-10T02:40:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/thesmokingpriest\/?p=59968"},"modified":"2011-10-10T02:41:25","modified_gmt":"2011-10-10T02:41:25","slug":"smoking-away-your-anxiety","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thesmokingpriest\/2011\/10\/smoking-away-your-anxiety.html","title":{"rendered":"Smoking Away Your Anxiety"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"color: #000000\">I enjoy a fine cigar after a long day of work.\u00a0 For me, cigar smoking is very relaxing.\u00a0 My most favorite brands are the Joya de Nicaragua Antano 1970, the Kristoff Corojo Limitada, the Padron Classics and the Partagas Black.\u00a0 For those of you who know anything about great cigars, you can tell that I enjoy a heavy cigar. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"color: #000000\">Smoking a fine cigar with a group of friends adds to the enjoyment.\u00a0 Cigar smokers are very sociable people and the conversation is always engaging. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"color: #000000\">However, cigar smoking is not a perfect remedy for the anxiety that we deal with on a daily basis.\u00a0 Yes, we certainly do live in a crazy, dysfunctional and challenging world.\u00a0 Besides, we would go broke if cigar smoking was the only remedy for our worries and apprehensions. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"color: #000000\">We need to be spiritual.\u00a0 Faith is the answer. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"color: #000000\">Without a serious spiritual life, anxiety will overwhelm us. If we are a people who live truly spiritual lives, we will be filled with peace and joy no matter what may be going on around us. And this is so, because we will always be able to trust God. <\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"color: #000000\">Jesus gives us the antidote to all of our anxieties when he says:\u00a0<em> \u201cThat is why I am telling you not to worry about your life and what you are to eat, nor about your body and what you are to wear.\u00a0 Surely life is more than food, and the body more than clothing!\u00a0 Look at the birds in the sky.\u00a0 They do not sow or reap or gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them.\u00a0 Are you not worth much more than they are?\u00a0 Can any of you, however much you worry, add one single cubit to your span of life?\u00a0 And why worry about clothing?\u00a0 Think of the flowers growing in the fields; they never have to work or spin; yet I assure you that not even Solomon in all his royal robes was clothed like one of these.\u00a0 Now if that is how God clothes the wild flowers growing in the field which are there today and thrown into the furnace tomorrow, will he not much more look after you, you who have so little faith?\u00a0 So do not worry; do not say, \u2018What are we to eat?\u00a0 What are we to drink?\u00a0 What are we to wear?\u2019\u00a0 It is the gentiles who set their hearts on all these things.\u00a0 Your heavenly Father knows you need them all.\u00a0 Set your hearts on his kingdom first, and on God\u2019s saving justice and all these other things will be given you as well.\u00a0 So do not worry about tomorrow: tomorrow will take care of itself.\u00a0 Each day has enough trouble of its own\u201d<\/em> (Matthew 6: 25-34).<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000\">Cigar smoking is extremely relaxing, but being relaxed and possessing interior peace are not the same. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000\">The inner peace that Jesus gives to us is a gift.\u00a0 \u201cPeace I bequeath to you, my own peace I give you, a peace the world cannot give, this is my gift to you\u201d (John 14: 27). \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"color: #000000\">Trust and abandonment; immersing ourselves into God; burning bridges; giving up control; leaving behind our own personal agenda: these things will remedy the anxiety so prevalent in our modern culture. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I enjoy a fine cigar after a long day of work.\u00a0 For me, cigar smoking is very relaxing.\u00a0 My most favorite brands are the Joya de Nicaragua Antano 1970, the Kristoff Corojo Limitada, the Padron Classics and the Partagas Black.\u00a0 For those of you who know anything about great cigars, you can tell that I&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":382,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,40,85,83],"tags":[57,78,62,61,16,55,60],"class_list":["post-59968","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-catholic-spirituality","category-contemplation","category-inspiration","category-jesus","tag-anxiety","tag-catholic-spirituality","tag-cigar-smoking","tag-faith","tag-jesus","tag-prayer","tag-serenity"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - 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