Hypnotherapy for Quitting Smoking - Why Willpower Alone Is Not Enough
One the most frequently requested issues that hypnotherapists see in practice is for support with stopping smoking.
(The smoking I’ll be referring to in this blog will be cigarette smoking rather than other smokable drugs such as weed.)
I want to explore in this post what some of the common misconceptions are around cigarette smoking and why it is so important to choose to quit now.
Often women will have tried to stop many, many times in the past and some of those times may be for months or even years if they have been pregnant or in relationships with non-smokers.
It can then be extremely difficult and frustrating to understand how the smoking habit has reared its ugly, stinking and unwanted head again.
Here are some surprising points to note about smoking cigarettes.
Smoking is not an addiction.
You do not become physically addicted to nicotine. Many of the short lasting effects that are experienced after quitting are primarily the result of expecting to feel bad after quitting.
Don’t forget that there is a worldwide multi-billion dollar tobacco industry that wants you and has taught you to believe that cigarettes are addictive, so that you keep on buying them.
If you were physically, biochemically addicted to smoking then you would find it extremely hard to sleep for 7-8 hours in the night without needing to smoke just before you go to sleep or immediately when you wake up.
Only around 70% of people who decide to quit actually even feel the urge to smoke after quitting. It is a matter of psychology rather than biochemistry.
This means that smoking is a learned habit. The good news is that if we can learn to smoke we can unlearn the habit. Habits can be changed.
Example:
Average number of cigarettes smoked per day: 20
Average number of puffs per cigarette: 10
Daily total: 200 puffs per day
Age: 40
Age started smoking: 15
Smoking years: 25
Smoking days: 25 years x 365 days = 9,125 days
Overall total = 9125 days x 200 puffs per day = 1,835,000 puffs
If smoking feels automatic or mindless then you can during therapy learn to bring in mindfulness. You are given an edge.
An advantage over those who try with willpower alone.
Smoking Does NOT Help You To Relax.
Most smokers use cigarettes to calm their nerves i.e. to self medicate as if they were mild sedatives.
Cigarettes are actually powerful stimulants and so you may as well be injecting adrenaline in your attempt to relax and cope with stress!
It would be like drinking a cup of coffee to help you sleep. It just doesn’t make sense.
Smoking doesn’t work to help you with stress, tension or anxiety. It just makes you more and more stressed, keeping your heart rate 10-15% higher than normal.
Research shows that smokers are generally more anxious and stressed than non-smokers.
When you stop smoking your mood improves and your anxiety is reduced.
Smoking increases the production of cortisol and other stress hormones that cause amongst other issues fat to be distributed around the waist.
Smoking increases EEG readings so that there is heightened activity in the brain rather than less activity. Hard evidence that it does not help to calm your mind.
Once you know that smoking isn’t the answer to stress, try choosing to engage in activity that IS relaxing, such as a walk outside or a mindful meditation.
Smoking Is Incredibly Dangerous.
There are over five thousand (5000) chemicals in cigarette smoke of which at least 600 are poisonous and 42 are known to be carcinogenic (causing cancer).
You might know the main players: Nicotine, Carbon Monoxide and Tobacco Tar.
Some of the chemicals in tobacco tar may surprise you: arsenic, cyanide, formaldehyde (the preserving agent), ammonia (used in cleaning products), cadmium (poisonous metal used in batteries), acetone (nail polish remover), benzene (industrial solvent used in pesticides) and DDT (a notoriously dangerous insecticide).
If I asked you to imagine yourself picking up a drink and asked you to read the label with 6000 chemicals in, would you drink it?
Would you offer the drink to a loved one?
Would you drink it 10, 20 times a day?
The More Times You Have Attempted To Quit Smoking, The More Likely You Are To Succeed.
If you have tried multiple times to kick the habit then it does not mean you are a failure!
In fact you have A HIGHER chance of succeeding this time!
Research shows that willpower alone without support makes quitting difficult, it’s much more likely with the help of a therapist.
Why Use Cognitive-Behavioural Hypnotherapy to Stop Smoking (HypnoCBT)?
The key elements of my approach stopping a habit like smoking are for you to:
Gain a greater understanding and awareness of your habit
Identify the thoughts and beliefs that underpin the habit and look to restructure or reframe them
Change the behavioural aspects such as environmental triggers and associated patterns that accompany the habit
Implement an alternative, competing behaviour to break the habit cycle
Learn simple, practical coping strategies to help with the stress, boredom and agitation.
Reinforce your motivation and build the self-belief needed to quit.
Hold you accountable for changing your behaviour.
Become more mindful of your overall mental wellbeing including your moods, stress levels and thought patterns.
There is no magic wand and all smoking cessation treatments including HypnoCBT require willpower and effort from an individual.
The best time to quit smoking is when you feel highly motivated, the reasons to quit are personal and not simply for someone else and you are not feeling so depressed or are experiencing a big life event that could place you under extra stress.
If you need support, tools and accountability to stop smoking then contact me today to discuss your situation.
You can book a free initial 15 consultation call here, I’d love to hear from you.
Rachel x
PS. If you want more information about me and my approach, follow me on Instagram or sign up to my mailing list here where you will receive free printable affirmations to help you feel calm and relaxed.