In my former blog I explained why smoking cessation aides such as ‘nicotine replacement therapy” which includes substituting something in place of the cigarette or e-cigarette do not work over a span of time. If you have not read my blog, I invite you to do so. It will orient you to my reasoning and will prepare you for this blog which focuses on why the Choose a Smokefree/Vapefree Life Programs work like no others with a better than 80% success rate.
If attempting to block out the urges, by replacing the nicotine found in cigarettes and e-cigarettes with another form of nicotine or another substance isn’t the answer, then what is?
With all approaches that offer a way to escape withdrawal the addict is looking outside herself for something or someone to rescue her from this inevitable reaction that ensues when she stops using nicotine. Nicotine withdrawal is the natural process one undergoes when one chooses to allow nicotine to leave the body.
But we know that the need for nicotine is not only physical, it is psychological as well. It is how we regard nicotine that is the obstacle to our long- term success. The internal dialogue goes something like this: “I’m dying for a cigarette. If only I could take one hit. I can’t take this! I wish I could smoke. When will this ever end?!” With this internal malaise it is no wonder that we go back to smoking, thinking that the solution is the cigarette, not the problem! Nicotine dependency turns our thinking upside down. The solution looks like it’s the problem because all we know how to deal with withdrawal is to shut down or try to block it out, and when that doesn’t work, we lament, feel sorry for ourselves. or berate ourselves and others for our misery. We have no skills for walking through the process as a positive experience, not a negative one.
But aren’t we making the problem worse by the very stance we take? What If we learned a way to allow ourselves to experience the withdrawal on all levels without putting up a fight? Consider this principle: What you resist, persists! If that principle is true, then consider how you make your cravings for nicotine worse by your attempts not to feel them. That is why you become so miserable because you are fighting the very thing that is ushering in your freedom.
Let me clarify I am neither a saint nor a masochist. I acknowledge that nicotine withdrawal is an uncomfortable process. But withdrawal brings discomfort, not pain. I have in all the years of my work never had a client who needed to be medicated or hospitalized by undergoing withdrawal. And yes, there is a certain degree of physical disorientation during the first few days as the nicotine is leaving the body.
But here’s the thing: most people don’t go back in the first few days. They go back after weeks, if not months afterwards, and it isn’t the physical craving that takes them back. It’s the psychological need that takes them back. So, the real issue is this: what skills do you have to overcome the urges to go back? How prepared are you to deal with your urges as you live your life?
What if instead of fighting your urges and making them your enemy, you made them your friend learned to invite them into your awareness? Remember, what you resist, persists? Well, what you invite, flows, and goes away by itself.
You will learn how to stop smoking for good with the Choose a Smokefree/Vapefree Life Programs because you will learn to allow yourself to walk through the experience of withdrawal with your eyes wide open and your feet on the ground. We will train you to do what we did to get free from nicotine once and for all without a fight. You will get free from nicotine within five days, and you will be supported to stay off nicotine with personalized support for ninety days from your stop date.
Think you can’t do it? Yea, we know, we thought so too. Call 512-758-1910 or go online to Chooseasmokefreelife.com to book yourself in the next class.
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