"the smoke is a sort of literary device I'll be using in this story,
It's a long drag from start of finish. Whenever you lose yourself you remember to take a smoke.
The purpose of the cigarette is that the whole stick defines your painful history in a coat of nicotine. As you smoke it, you relive the past, all while you rely on the nicotine to suppress the pain.
You remember who you are then, and how you came to be. The nicotine serves to put a glass wall against that pain, letting you experience it behind a one-sided mirror, letting you see a clear picture of your past as a third party.
As the ashes gather, you relive more of the past, culminating to the last drag of breath where you reach that epiphany.
You remember the promise you made to yourself in that final drag of a smoke. It's a reminder of what you promised yourself before. It's sort of like a rope latched onto your waist as you float around in space. Everytime you get too far, you just follow the rope back. In this instance, the cigarette and the memories within it is the rope.
Every time you forget why you are what you are now, you smoke. And then you remember.
And when the smoke is done, you throw it to the ground and smoother it with the soles of your feet, as a sign of giving up that past, having recalled it; and moving forward to the future.
But lest we forget, smoking isn't just a temporal relief, but a permanent damage too.
You're gonna have to accept your past and what made you, or die by the torment of old memories.
Or just lose yourself right now. That's an option as well, isn't it?"