smoking costs

Most people are under the impression that quitting smoking is difficult. It seems to be an absolute undeniable truth that is perpetuated by the media, by the medical-industrial complex and by our friends and relatives. However, there are tens of thousands of people who have become non-smokers after years of smoking, and for them, once they made the decision, it was easy for them. It’s a bit like learning to ride a bike. Before you do it, riding a bike seems to be impossibility. However, once you have that first feeling of balancing, you never turn back. You will never go back to being unable to ride a bike. Let’s look at the question of quitting smoking and how difficult it is.

Allen Carr, one of the gurus of smoking cessation, would ask a smoker if they could go back to before they started with the knowledge they now have, would they have started, and the answer would always be, “no”. He would also ask, if they had children, if they encouraged their children to smoke, and again the answer would be,” an absolute no”. So, it is clear that every smoker has awareness that smoking is not something to desire. However, there is a part of them that is compelling them to smoke. Every smoker is a schizophrenic on some level. One aspect of their mind, the conscious mind, wants to stop while the other aspect, the unconscious mind, wants to smoke. The key is to reach that unconscious aspect that wants to smoke and shift its belief that smoking is good and desirable to the truth that smoking is a deadly poison that is killing them. Please know that it is not about the nicotine.

Nicotine’s effect is easy to overcome once one has decided to quit. In fact, the physical effects of nicotine withdrawal are fairly minor and short lived. Many smokers have had the experience of quitting for weeks and months, long after any nicotine has left the system and then allowed themselves to have “just one cigarette” only to find themselves smoking again. This is about a frame of mind and not the nicotine. The nicotine did not make them smoke that first cigarette. To be clear nicotine does have an affect, but it is not what makes the difference between becoming a non-smoker and not. Just like gravity has an affect on bike riding, but it does not determine whether or not we are able to ride a bike. The focus on the nicotine is what makes quitting so difficult. Do not give in to the misguided belief that nicotine is what prevents smokers from quitting.

If we believe quitting is hard, and that it will be a sacrifice or that there is something to give up, then of course it will be difficult. A smoker who quits and pines for the cigarette is an ex smoker who is bare knuckling it and will eventually, in a moment of weakness, break down and smoke. This is the hard way and many smokers take this path.

However, if one takes a clear look at smoking, what it has to offer and what it takes from us, we can come to the clear conclusion that it must go. Fear may block our ability to take an objective look and our unconscious mind will spin the excuses and justifications. Please be aware of how the mind can confuse this process. Once we can see the insanity of it, the next step is to make a clear decision to never smoke again. There is nothing to give up. There is nothing that the cigarette actually gives a smoker that is pleasurable. It is just an illusion. The pleasure came from the associations that were made with the act of smoking, but not the cigarette itself. We linked smoking with being with our friends, with relaxing, with escaping, with taking a break, with food, with sex, with something to dispel boredom.  We can have all of these pleasures without the cigarette. It is not the cigarette. It is the connections we made that linked smoking with these pleasures way back when we started as teenagers. Once the decision has been made to quit, rather than focus on the illusion of what we might be missing, focus on the absolute freedom and joy that being a non-smoker brings. How wonderful to be free.

Make the decision now and set a date, you won’t regret it.

The definition of the word addiction from dictionary.com is:

“The state of being enslaved to a habit or practice or to something that is psychologically or physically habit-forming, as narcotics, to such an extent that its cessation causes severe trauma.”

I would like to separate out psychological from physical because the causes and hence the cures, or solutions, will be very different. For instance, if I have a habit of putting more weight on my left leg when standing, we wouldn’t call that an addiction, even though I do it over and over again and seem to have no control over it. If I consciously started to shift my weight to the right leg, I wouldn’t go through withdrawal because I suddenly started a new habit. There is no substance involved that my body has become dependent on.

In the case of smoking, we have a behavior that is connected with a substance that is consumed, tobacco. The common perception is that a particular substance in tobacco, nicotine, is responsible for the “addiction”. Because of the habitual nature of smoking it is assumed that the cause is nicotine. I would like to suggest nicotine does not play as significant a role in whether a smoker can quit as we have been led to believe.

If nicotine were the main factor then simply replacing nicotine with the patch or gum would do the trick. Yet, it is only a successful strategy in 12-15% of the time. Therefore there must be other factors involved in why people smoke; roughly 85% of the factors given the 15%, at best, success rate for nicotine replacement.

Another thought to consider. Most addictive substances create tolerance or resistance to that substance so that over time, more and more of the substance is needed to achieve the same result. Smokers tend to find one level, such as a pack per day, and stay with that same level forever. Whatever that level is, it remains constant. In other words, no resistance, or tolerance is developed.

Cigarette smoking is really a strong psychological habit. It involves long held beliefs, imbedded into the unconscious mind, that cigarette smoking is good for us. It is not the conscious rational mind that knows smoking is bad for us that is in charge. The unconscious mind is in charge. Because hypnosis deals directly with the unconscious mind this is why hypnosis works so well with helping people quit smoking easily, naturally and forever.

Andrew Rader, LAc, MS

The last two excuses are really dangerous because there is a part of the mind that knows it is not true and it further erodes one’s self- image. So, what to do?

Until someone actually quits, preferably without medication,  and/or nicotine substitutes, the situation will only get worse. If they rely on a substance to help them, then they are still left with the belief that they need some substance to function in life. They are still dependent on substances.  Once someone is able to become a non smoker, under their own steam,  they then realize something incredibly powerful. “If I can do this, what else can I do”. They have tapped into the enormous potential of their mind. Immediately the previous downward spiral of negative thinking becomes an expanding  awareness of opportunity and hope. There is so much power that  comes from overcoming something that had previously been so daunting that they are bursting with energy. And with the discovery of how much easier it was than had been imagined, the mind begins to seek out new challenges that had previously been buried under the rubble of doubt and fear.

New nonsmokers re-enter the world with nascent  energy, determination and positivity that begins to spill over into their relationships, jobs and spiritual lives. They suddenly realize how much the smoking was inhibiting  them from engaging fully in their lives. There is one caveat here. The nonsmoker has to have fully  become a nonsmoker and not just a grit it out, force of will power nonsmoker. Let me explain.

When the smoker decides, with their heart and soul, that they want more than anything else to quit smoking, no matter what; this is when the transformation begins to happen. If they are doing it for some outside reason, such as they are doing it for someone else, or that they know they should, or that they need to quit, then it will be very difficult for them. They have not yet come around to wanting to do it for themselves. They are reluctant, and will become resentful because deep down they are not wanting to change. This is an incredibly important distinction.

It is only when the full force of the unconscious and conscious minds merge with the same agenda, that this transformation to fully realized nonsmoker can be achieved. Hypnosis is one very effective way to assist in this effort because the unconscious mind can be spoken to, by another person, and reminded  that it is not doing its primary job of protecting it’s body. Once it hears this truth, it converts without hesitation. The only trick is being able to get to the unconscious mind which is usually protected by a security shield. Only with permission from the conscious mind can this happen. So call a hypnotist right now if you want to quit smoking and give them permission to help you step into a new fantastic life as a nonsmoker.

Because it is a habit, it can be stopped, quite easily and painlessly. No withdrawal. No weight gain. No internal struggle.

Stay tuned. Or call 415-488-0201 and I’ll tell you more. Or go to www.freedomfromsmokes.com