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Why is it so darn hard to quit smoking? It's hard to quit smoking because tobacco companies spend so much time and energy making sure it would be. It's good old American business practices hard at work. Quitting smoking is fairly easy. As Mark Twain said, "I've done it hundreds of times." Quitting is hard but compared to staying stopped, it's easy. Not starting again is the real issue in most cases. Quitting smoking is the same as quitting any habit disorder. There are a number of elements to deal with and issues to address. Stopping: every day is easier than the day before. (Again, this is the easy part.) First, understand that stopping will mean establishing in your mind a resolve not to smoke any more and an understanding that there will be hard, hard work after that staying stopped. It will include a resolve to stay away from the people and places that you associate with smoking and from any other people that might be smoking and places where you will see or smell smoking and smokers. Also you need to accept the rule: Stopping means stopping. I have little faith in claims about fake cigarettes and cutting back gradually. Stopping when your last pack is gone is just stopping later. The best stopping is when you have cigarettes left. You don't give them away to another smoker to contribute to his or her cancer, respiratory disease and ill health. You destroy them. You destroy them and you swear to God and whatever else you swear to that you will destroy all other cigarettes you find yourself buying, borrowing or finding. If you start stopping by excusing further smoking with the silly argument that you don't want to waste them, you will never stop. If you destroy them and hate the waste that your getting them forces you into, you will be less likely to fall for such nonsense later. Saying you're going to cut down gradually is saying you are not going to stop but you are going to pretend to start stopping some day. Five basic issues: 1) physical dependency, 2) psychological dependency, 3) busy hands, 4) busy mouth and 5) psychological triggers Physical dependency - nicotine patches and gum. Physical dependency is basically an issue of being "hooked" on nicotine. You can deal with this by just letting your body deal with the loss -- usually called "going cold turkey" -- or you can get yourself a nicotine patch or nicotine gum. Psychological dependency - SSRI's and good old will power and resolve. The hardest part of any habit disorder is the psychological dependency. This results in a state of minor panic about losing your loved smoke and a lot of nagging reminders and arguments inside your head. It has been found that sometimes this problem can be lessened by visiting your medical doctor and asking for some chemical assistance. There are many fairly new drugs now that can help people rid themselves of nagging thoughts. The most common I have heard of is Welbutrin. This is a medicine in the Prozac family of Serum Seratonin Re-uptake Inhibitors -- used for reducing obsessive-compulsive thoughts. (This family of drugs is also used in cases of obsessive-compulsive disorder, anxiety and depression -- all of which have a nagging thoughts component.) With or without medicine, you will still need to steel yourself against the intense pressures that you will find yourself putting yourself through. If you aren't very busy with other things you will find yourself angry, frustrated and constantly tempted to say to heck with quitting. It can help to think of the rich tobacco company executives delight in your addiction. It can help to think of how stupid it is that you want to burn leaves and paper and suck in the fumes. It can help to think of how often everyone has told you you smell awful and you couldn't even smell that you did. It can help to think of how blackened your lungs probably are from sucking smoke for so long. Busy hands, busy fingers. Stopping will be easiest if you have ways to replace the fingers-occupying aspects of smoking with something else to do with your hands. This might mean getting a little squeeze ball like they have stressed executives and hand rehabilitators using. Or worry beads. Or a coin or stone you can hold and move around in your hands. Busy mouth. Stopping will be easiest if you have ways to replace the mouth-busying aspects of smoking with something else to do with your mouth. This could be chewing gum, sucking candies, toothpicks or -- my personal favorite -- certain types of pens that are marginally chewable. (Pens can substitute for something very close to cigarettes. You can play with them with your hands, place them in your mouth and give a good chew and then play with them some more with your hands. You need to stay away from pens with metal clips or ends as you will need your teeth later. You usually need to get used to finding yourself covered with ink if you chew too many hours on the same pen.) Psychological triggers. Psychological triggers are elements in the environment that remind you of smoking. Like Pavlov's dogs, our brains get used to the connections between things. (Pavlov realized that his dogs started salivating in anticipation of being fed when he opened the laboratory door in the morning -- and he was pretty sure they weren't thinking of eating either him or the door.) If you smoked in the kitchen in the morning, the kitchen in the morning will trigger memories of smoking and make you want to smoke more. If you smoked with coffee as a rule, your hunger to smoke -- whatever level it is at -- will increase every time you have a cup of coffee. If you always smoked with your best friend, his or her presence -- even if not smoking -- will increase your drive to start smoking again. And, of course the most obvious, if you see someone smoking or smell smoking, your urge to smoke will increase.
Given the realities of the above paragraph, it will obviously make quitting easier if you stay away from any activity or place or person that usually involved smoking. If you can't stay away, you'll do best if you keep yourself very busy with something else. If you can't do either, it will help if you just realize that your urge is going to increase when you do whatever it is you can't avoid that will trigger your thoughts of smoking. The easiest way to change habits is to change as many as possible at the same time. Thus, one doesn't trigger the other's relapse. If you can go on a cruise, if you have to be in the hospital for an extended stay, if you visit someone else (not a smoker), it will be easier to quit. Staying stopped: every day you are likely to relapse Resolve: If you relapse, you're going to stop again right away! Quitting is the easy part but it is very hard. Remember that. Every day you go, it gets easier. Every day you stay quit, it will cost you more grief if you relapse because you have to start back from the beginning. Every day you stay smoking after you relapse, quitting will be tougher. Resolve: If you relapse, you're going to figure out how! If you do relapse -- and you might -- you have to figure out how and make sure you burn that information into your brain. If you were telling yourself you could smoke just one, if you thought it would be okay to hang out with a smoker friend, if you thought going bowling (where the place is full of smokers) was going to be okay -- you have better information and you need to quit again. Resolve: If you buy more smokes, you will destroy them! Also: REWARD YOURSELF FOR YOUR FIRST WEEK's SUCCESS and the second and the third. Also: REWARD YOURSELF FOR EACH MONTH's SUCCESS. Also: NEVER LET YOURSELF LIE TO YOURSELF THAT YOU CAN HAVE JUST ONE. 
hypnosis CDs & hypnosis tapes I've known about ten times as many people who found going to a hypnotist did NOT help than found it did. However, hypnosis can help. Hypnosis tapes and CDs may help some people best because you can use them daily and frequently as needed (costly to visit a hypnotist daily and frequently as needed). For other people, hypnosis via a face-to-face hypnotist may be best, but this is a much more spendy alternative than purchasing taped presentations. Head-Cleaners Hypnosis Tapes and CDs can be very helpful in the quest to stop smoking by facilitating motivation, reducing nagging thoughts, dealing with anxiety, frustration, anger and depression, reducing the likelihood of eating problems and weight gain and a variety of other ways. They all are 30-day money-back guaranteed and multiple tape or CD purchases are available at a discounted price. now to quit smoking, too focuses on quitting smoking and avoiding relapse. Imageries and suggestions focused on reducing nagging thoughts, jitters, grumpiness, distracted thoughts, yearnings and anxiety and by fostering motivation and self-control. self to self partnering fosters a positive, practical attitude toward one's self -- very helpful when dealing with frustrating, frazzling challenges like the quitting of smoking. procrastinate tomorrow fosters a "just do it" feeling toward issues you may be procrastinating about. allowing one's self to get past it focuses on letting go of guilt feelings or feelings of anxiety or remorse that are not helpful and that may be causing some counterproductive tendencies -- e.g. smoking. healing tree 2 focuses on reducing grumpiness and accepting changes in life-style and behaviors with motivation and contentment. performance 2 focuses on ridding the mind of nagging thoughts, not noticing uncomfortable sensations and forgetting about stressors. are we asleep yet, too? aids in smoking cessation efforts by reducing the experience of haunting thoughts, anxiousness and feelings of stress late at night and of physical discomfort that are associated with quitting smoking. two voices to imagine focuses on the issue of control of physical or mental processes and can be very helpful in the quest to stop smoking and sustain healthy habits once they are established. to diet right down focuses on the issue of control of eating behaviors as taste buds recover and oral do-something-with-the-mouth needs arise. some thoughts to think to soften fears focuses on being careful but also accepting and at times forgetting about terrorism and other vulnerabilities and fears that you can't do anything about and establishing a feeling that everything will be all right. practical, optimal eating, too focuses on motivation for and awareness of optimal eating behaviors and attitudes while quitting smoking. NOTE of CAUTION: Effective hypnosis will involve fostering one's ability to forget negative or uncomfortable thoughts, forget and/or ignore uncomfortable sensations, enjoy new feelings of healthiness, accept and even enjoy positive life style changes and enjoy an increasing sense of self control and self esteem. None of the Head-Cleaners Hypnosis Tapes & CDs will implant suggestions that make a person feel nauseous or experience panic or cause any other extreme negative response if they think of smoking, pick up a cigarette or smell cigarette smoke. Aversive treatments (treatments that make one feel extremely, physically ill when engaged in or thinking about a target negative behavior) can have negative side effects and I strongly recommend staying away from hypnosis recordings or hypnotists that say they can and will do such things. Head-Cleaners tapes and CDs and any other tapes/CDs that might help will help best as a component of an all out effort to quit that includes a well thought out change in other habits and routines and a conscientious resolve to quit smoking. |
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