“How I Stopped Smoking & You Can Too”

For years I had been smoking and decided to stop a little over 4 years ago now. I thought I’m not getting any younger and my overall fitness levels were suffering because of it. So I decided to kill off this nasty habit dead in its tracks once and for all.

But What Was The Best Way To Achieve This?

Well, I thought planning is of the essence here, therefore I began to get a plan of action into place. First I looked at all the various aides to help me over the rough times I may have, and decided I’d use the nicotine patches. Then I read various articles on the subject matter of stopping smoking.

Now the one thing that stuck in my mind and has to this day is this: If you are smoking cigarettes you are a drug addict. I know that this may sound harsh to some of you but…THIS IS THE CASE. It’s just that nicotine is the main component in a cigarette, along with some other real nasties such as benzene, cyanide and a whole host of other undesirable toxins and chemicals that our body becomes accustomed to.

Ok what next…Just wear the patches get on with my life and hope for the best?

Well no way I thought I’ve still to formulate a plan to “Talk my way out of it”. Basically I’ve got the patches for the tough times but it will not be enough, so I had a meeting with a hypnotherapist friend of mine who helps people stop smoking with his various techniques.

He said to me that smoking is a habit nothing more, and yes there are toxins and chemicals in cigarettes that we become accustomed to…BUT he said it’s 90% + MENTAL.

I could relate to what he was saying because one time when I was smoking there was a late night film I desperately wanted to watch. I had a glass of wine at the ready and my trusty cigarettes. The film started, and 10 minutes into the film I thought I’d have a puff. I opened the packet and to my total horror I had one cigarette left. I thought I had about 15. Needless to say my frame of mind changed and I got pretty agitated. What was meant to be a great evening in front of the TV with an excellent film turned into…Well…not so great.

Okay the next part of my plan of action, was to get my head in the right place for this to succeed (Talk my way out of it). NOW THIS IS THE MOST IMPORTANT PART TO STOPPING SMOKING. Avoid this step at your peril! What I mean by that is that you’ve got to see cigarettes for what they are nothing more…So I had to reach into my psychology. What I did was get 2 pieces of A4 paper and a pen and put the heading “Cigarettes Who Benefits” on one, and “Cigarettes My Benefits” on the other.

I started with the piece of paper “Cigarettes Who Benefits” and started writing the following:

·        The government benefits as it gets massive amounts of revenue in duty tax from the sale of cigarettes.

·        People benefit in being employed by tobacco companies

·        The shops benefit in revenues from the sale of cigarettes and other tobacco products

·        The companies that supply the cardboard and inks for their packaging benefit

·        In fact various other people who either work indirectly for tobacco companies or sell cigarettes or tobacco products benefit

Fine I thought, now let’s get on with the second piece of A4 titled “Cigarettes My Benefits” I started thinking…and thinking…and thinking…and thinking. Nothing was coming to mind; how unusual. I’ll put on the kettle have a cuppa and get back to it. Okay…still nothing, I thought and thought for about an hour and 20 minutes, and I was still staring at a blank piece of paper with a title.

This told me volumes. Basically the end user GETS ABSOLUTELY NOTHING BENEFICIAL AT ALL.In fact the end user can get extremely ill and die because of smoking. This was the turning point. Simply put…People are making a killing off your habit, a habit that is potentially lethal to yourself.

These facts and only these facts tipped the balance for me…Finally my mind was in the right gear for me to exterminate this pitiful habit once and for all.

3 weeks rolled by and I still dug in. The “Cigarette voice” in my head was tapping my shoulder on a constant hourly basis…Remember me it would say. I listened to it and laughed, so you need me more than I need you…Still it persisted. 3 months later funnily enough the “Cigarette voice” had become fainter, I’m getting on top of this I thought, but this is certainly no time to be complacent. I was right, it tried again for me to bite and take up smoking again…And again I dug in.

6 months now had passed and the voice had become so faint I could barely hear it…I was now smoke free. I had stopped smoking, in fact these days I never hear it. I had beaten it and was triumphant.

Case Study…My Dad

When I was about 4 months into my “stop smoking campaign” my dad started questioning me about what I was doing, and how I was coping. I told him, and I was brutally honest. Sometimes I have easy days and other days you could ride a monocycle over my nerves! I’d say. Now my dad was smoking at the time, in fact my dad had been smoking for about 50 years. So he said “I think I’ll give it a try” to which my reply was “Don’t bother you’re not ready to stop smoking”.

He looked at me quizzically, I said your head is not in the right place and you must formulate a plan either similar to mine or your own to get you grey matter in the right gear. He went away to think about it…

Before he would puff away constantly and smoke around 40 cigarettes a day…Today 4 years this month however he has stopped smoking, seen the light as to say…So much so he even looks at smokers as second class citizens!

Now if a dedicated smoker of 50 years can turn smoking on its head and become an anti-smoker…It should be easy for the rest of you.

Just Remember THE ONLY Person Standing in Your Way is YOURSELF.

And as a wise Jedi once said: “DO, OR DO NOT DO…THERE IS NO TRY”

Just do it…Stop Smoking, do what you need to do to stop, because once you’re through that tunnel and it doesn’t take that long, you’ll see what a little liar that cigarette was all along. It was never your friend it was your enemy all the way.