There are endless good reasons to quit smoking, including reducing your risk of cancer, heart disease and early death. Despite these well-known risk factors, however, many smokers find themselves needing a more personal reason to want to kick the habit; possibly because the threat of “maybe” contracting a deadly disease just doesn’t seem likely (the old, “it will never happen to me” syndrome).
This article is going to share some easy steps to help you come up with your own powerful, compelling reason(s) to quit smoking once and for all.
1) First, take a few moments to jot down on a sheet of paper the negative aspects of how smoking makes you feel. You can include actual physical problems like shortness of breath and fatigue; as well as feelings like embarrassment that your clothing and hair may stink; feeling like an outcast stepping outside to smoke while everyone else stays inside socializing and having a good time; or even your fears, like dying young and leaving your children before your time.
Write down as many reasons as you can, and try to make them reasons that really matter to YOU – not just what other people have said to you or you’ve heard others say before.
2) When you’re done with your list, look it over carefully. Read each item on the list, and really think about how it feels to experience that situation in your daily life. Now choose the top three reasons that are most repulsive to you and circle them.
Take another sheet of paper and write a longer description of each of those three items. For example, if one of your top reasons was “to not die young and abandon my children”, write a paragraph or two about why that is important to you. How would it affect your children if you died before your time? How will your smoking impact them, now and in the future? Will your smoking addiction encourage them to smoke later in life? Continue writing until you feel you have identified your core reason for wanting to quit smoking. This may seem like a morbid exercise, but it can be incredibly powerful. Being a smoker for a long time desensitizes you to the true long-term effects of smoking. This exercise jars you out of the haze of denial.
Now go through this same process for the other two important reasons on your list.
3) When you’ve got your three descriptions written, read them over again. Now take a final sheet of paper and write a description of the opposite outcome. When you do quit smoking, what will happen instead of those other experiences? For example, you might write that you will be around to love your children and grandchildren for many years to come, your kids will be really proud of you for quitting, they’ll be blessed with a healthy, strong parent that has the energy and stamina to play with them, and so on.
Do this for all three reasons you described earlier.
Carry these lists with you and read them slowly each day, really paying attention to how they make you feel. With enough repetition, you will actually begin training your brain to view smoking as an unpleasant, dangerous activity – which will make quitting easier when you decide it’s time.
While this may not remove the discomfort that comes along with nicotine withdrawal, it will certainly help you to stop seeing smoking as a harmless activity and instead see it for what it is: a true threat to your health, happiness and longevity.
If that isn’t enough reason to quit, what is?
Filed under Quit Smoking by on Feb 15th, 2010. Comment. 
Nicotine withdrawal is one of the most difficult challenges smokers face when they quit. Symptoms may include feelings of irritability, dizziness, mild chest pains, fatigue and difficulty concentrating; as well as nausea and abdominal upset, headaches, insomnia, anxiety, and more.
Some of these symptoms are due to the emotional and psychological separation from smoking, but more often than not the body’s dependence on nicotine sets the newly reformed smoker up for serious discomfort that can last for weeks.
The good news is that there are several ways to minimize withdrawal symptoms so they become more bearable.
This two-part article is going to share many helpful tips for making your quit easier.
- Deep breathing
Smokers tend to breathe very shallowly, so expanding your lungs each day can help you feel better and reduce stress and anxiety – not to mention the benefits of fully oxygenating your body.
How to do it: Whenever you feel a craving coming on (or you’re ready to scream because of the emotional tension), simply close your eyes for a few moments and begin inhaling slowly through your nose. Allow your abdomen to expand first, then as your lungs fill, your chest will expand also. When your lungs are full, pause for a second or two, then exhale slowly through your mouth. Repeat a few times slowly so you don’t hyperventilate.
- Meditation
Meditation is most often considered to be a spiritual pursuit, but it has amazing benefits for anyone – especially people who are dealing with the stress of quitting smoking!
How to do it: Meditating can be as simple as closing your eyes and quieting your thoughts for a few minutes a day. Sit or lie in a comfortable position, close your eyes, and consciously release all stressful thoughts from your mind. Focus on the darkness behind your eyelids, or call up a mental scene of something calming, like the last time you were at the beach or a fun camping trip with your family.
Try to hold your attention steady for as long as possible. When random thoughts try to intrude into your mind, gently push them aside and take control of your focus again. Meditation does take practice to master, but you’ll probably find that the benefits far outweigh the effort you have to put into it.
- Purging angry or tense feelings
If you used to use smoking as a way to avoid dealing with uncomfortable feelings like anger or stress, you may suddenly find yourself feeling overwhelmed when you try to quit smoking. Suddenly you’ve got all these feelings coming up – and no idea how to handle them! One simple method is to begin working through your feelings as they arise. This may not always be easy to do (especially if you are used to avoiding them), but over time it will prove to be a much more effective coping technique than smoking.
How to do it: There are many ways to purge your feelings, including writing them down in a journal, blogging about them online (you may want to make it a private blog or be sure your name isn’t on it!), or even shouting them aloud into a pillow. There really is no magic system with this method; you simply get into the habit of expressing your emotions in a safe and productive way. You’ll probably be surprised to find that expressing your emotions immediately makes you feel better – no need to cover them up with smoking anymore!
There are also more active things you can do to help minimize your nicotine withdrawal symptoms; read Part II of this article for more helpful tips.
Filed under Quit Smoking by on Feb 9th, 2010. Comment.
Hi, my name is Karen and I am a non-smoker. Having kicked my addiction to nicotine and cigarettes I am living a healthier no smoking lifestyle. If you would like to be a non-smoker, too, join me on your quest to find the best solution to help you stop smoking.
