In Answer To Your Question…

A cigar just does it for me.

It really is as simple as that when it comes down to it, isn’t it?

Sometimes you can find yourself justifying your love for the leaf over and over again; to your friends, family, acquaintances, colleagues – even, to be honest, to yourself.

Because, as we are constantly reminded by warning stickers, advertisements, peer pressure and sniffy stares from passers-by, tobacco is as great a threat to our physical wellbeing as a fatigue-clad Isis action man wielding an AK47 and a heavily-adapted copy of the Koran. We must be mad to even contemplate puffing away on its noxious leaves – mustn’t we?

No. As it happens, we’re not barking mad, or have death wishes and an unceasing yearning for life-challenging pastimes. We just really dig cigars.

Just as some have a hankering for a Guinness, others for a bitter and more still for the fizz of a cold lager, we are all – relatively speaking, of course – gloriously different. We are different in so many ways, not the least of them chemically different. Our DNA pre-programmes us to favour specific things; to like certain aspects of lifestyle and existence and equally dislike others. It’s why family gatherings are so intrinsically interesting to observe. You can literally see that DNA working through the generations, from the 90-year-old Great Grandad to the little babe in arms crawling around at his feet.

So, while of course we retain an element of choice in all things, we may also, without realising it, be facing powerful pulls of a subtle, yet inevitable force within us. Why do some of us feel an attraction to blondes, or others always end up with a brunette on their arm? It’s all about that DNA weaving its magic deep inside the very essence of us.

And why can this not apply to the cigars we love and cherish? Our connection with cigars feels so right because satisfying your cigar urge accords with something inside you. If you’re a regular cigar devotee, you’ll have recognised those moments when a cigar has really hit the spot; found the very bullseye of time, place and taste that connect you strongly to that very moment.

There are times when we may smoke cigars at inopportune times, or get interrupted and our smoking experience isn’t the best. It may be enjoyable, but it won’t be this middle of the bat, straight down the fairway, back of the net feeling of perfect completion.

But when that feeling does come, you’ll know it and, like finally finding a succinct way to sum up something you’ve found frustratingly difficult to express, it’s a eureka moment. It achieves, without fuss or fanfare, a seemingly immediate ‘in the zone’ feeling of being the controller of one’s destiny.

It’s at these times, when the fog lifts and we see clearly our direction in life, that those questions about why we smoke cigars seem utterly ridiculous.

Why? Because we love doing it. It is an uplifting, rewarding experience. And it offers us daily, weekly or monthly moments of meditation which cut through the bullshit and take us directly to the place where we know what we want and what we think and find it easy to make decisions with certainty and purpose.

That’s why we smoke cigars.