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Content Revised July, 1998

 

Choosing Cigarettes for Ritual Smoking

In this section, I discuss choosing cigarettes for Ritual Smoking. If you haven’t read my instructions for Creating and Participating in a Smoking Ritual, you might want to look them over and become familiar with some of the considerations involved. Also, as a matter of personal taste, I participate in Ritual Smoking using cigarettes. I don’t see why cigars and pipes could not be used as well; I’ve just never been too fond of them and as a result have no experience from which to speak of their use. There are many pipe and cigar sites on the Web which may help you if this is you interest. That said, let’s go shopping!

So many wonderful choices to consider! Length, flavor, paper color, smoking characteristics, package design… Truly an outing for the creative side of the brain. Shopping for cigarettes will give you an opportunity to venture into establishments which cater exclusively to the trade of tobacco: Tobacconist, or more commonly Smoke shops. The aroma in these stores alone is enough to conjure up the beginnings of wonderful things. If you are fortunate enough to find a good one, they will also give you an introduction to the ritual aspects of smoking.

I find that smoke shops fall into two general categories: the first is in business for the sole purpose of selling cigarettes as cheaply as possible. I avoid these places like the plague and recommend you do to. They rarely carry a good selection of cigarettes appropriate for Ritual Smoking, and in general, they make a poor beginning for creating the mood of a ritual. The second type of smoke shop ranges from simply functional to wonderfully engaging. These shops will be filled with the aroma of tobacco, be staffed by knowledgeable and intelligent sales people, and will offer a good selection of cigarettes from several parts of the world. In choosing the cigarettes you will use for Ritual Smoking, by all means shop until you see something which calls out to you and appeals to your sense of style and taste. It is important to remember that rituals are created from items which are otherworldly and unique. Make your ritual cigarettes something which can draw you outside of your day to day routines.

To begin with, you might purchase a variety and try several brands until you find something special. A few recommendations: If you’re new to smoking, certainly select something in the Lite or Mild category to minimize your initial adjustment to smoking. If you’ve smoked before, choose something different than your "usual brand." You’ll want to do a few things to set Ritual Smoking apart from what you did before. And a different, possibly more exotic brand, can serve this purpose well. Whatever your background, by all means read the wonderful reviews of different brands, and the highly entertaining and informative discussion of smoking in general that you’ll find at MagdaZine’s Start Smoking Page.

One other thing to consider in the choice of brands is what I call the "mood" of the cigarette. The mood of a cigarette is set by its maker and can encompass many aspects of the product. Certainly the design of the packaging, the appearance of the cigarette, its aroma and quality, its smoking characteristics, all contribute to this elusive quality. But there are other factors as well. The way a cigarette is marketed can have a bearing upon its mood. If something is so common as to appear on every other billboard in town, it hardly can be thought of as special and unique. Also, it has come to light recently that many of the more popular American cigarette manufacturers add chemicals to the tobacco to accelerate the ingestion of nicotine. To my mind, these cigarettes are manufactured to engender habitual smoking and if you notice how they’re typically used, this seems to be the case. Certainly not the mood we’re looking for in Ritual Smoking! For this reason, I would encourage you to refrain from these brands. There are chemicals which can be added to tobacco to promote smooth combustion and enhance its taste (menthol for example) which are very much in the mood of Ritual Smoking. So don’t avoid such things entirely. Just choose wisely. Since most cigarettes which have appropriate and appealing moods for Ritual Smoking are only sold in tobacco stores, this will give you an excuse to visit these wonderfully aromatic establishments.


Ó MrTedd 1998