Quit Quitting Quitting

Some years ago I helped an organisation in California to counsel youngsters who had been brainwashed into joining a cult, and indulging in some fairly dangerous activities.  After being ‘rescued’ and starting to join the real world again most of those people couldn’t believe how easily they’d been sucked into the strange world of this cult.  They told us how their behaviour, although dangerous, antisocial and clearly very bad for their mental and physical health, had seemed to them to be totally normal and acceptable.  Later, after realising how they had been drawn into living a lie for the financial profit of a few unscrupulous individuals, they realised they had been wrong, and life would now be better for them as they had been released from that brainwashed mindset.

 

I smoked cigarettes for many years, as I had grown up watching advertisements telling me I would look cool and rebellious if I smoked, that I’d get more girls if I smoked and that I’d be amongst the rich and successful people.  I swallowed the lie, hook, line and sinker.  I believed it was acceptable to smoke in the company of children and of non-smokers, and that those who didn’t have the courage to smoke were just not going to be anywhere near as successful as me in their quest to be a rebel.  I haven’t had a cigarette for about fifteen years, and I now spend much of my time helping people to escape from the smoking cult.  Maybe you’re one of that group of people who believe that they enjoy smoking, that they could quit whenever they want to (just as soon as they’re in the right frame of mind and they have no stress in their life), and that they are totally in control of their own life.  They are convinced that smoking is just a habit, and they’ll get out of the habit just as soon as the moment is right.  Of course, they’ve swallowed the lie, perpetuated by the cigarette manufacturers who have had lawyers and courts in the USA tied up for years trying to agree whether or not nicotine is addictive. They’ve spent the first ten years fighting to agree a definition of the concept of addiction, and the cigarette manufacturers pay the lawyers with your money.

 

I’ve watched bemused by correspondence in the press where smokers write very articulately in defence of their right to stay in the cult.  Smokers are without doubt the most clever group of addicts in our society.  They invent a thousand different reasons why they will quit tomorrow, and not today, and how it is their absolute right to not be lectured to by the anti-smoking do-gooders.  It’s always fascinating to read pub landlords telling us how the fabric of society will crumble because they’ll go out of business if smoking is banned in pubs.  Of course, we wouldn’t dream of entrusting the judgement of a heroin addict as to whether it’s acceptable to inject heroin, and it would never occur to us to allow somebody who is drunk to decide whether they need another drink before driving home.  They’ve been sucked into different cults whilst under the influence of drugs – alcohol or heroin. Nicotine, plus the hundreds of EU approved additives put into each cigarette by the manufacturers, is a drug.  It changes your perception and it impairs your judgement, just like heroin or alcohol, but it’s OK to use it because a nice chap in a corner shop sells it to you with a message from the government.  In the UK for one tax year recently the total tax revenue from smoking products was around £9,000 million.  The estimated cost to society for healthcare, education, etc. was around £3,000 million.   That left £6,000 million for the government to spend on whatever else it wanted.

 

I smoked for many years, but now I would rather chew wasps.  So, what changed?  Actually, the real difference in me now is that I went past my tipping point.  I went from believing that I enjoyed sucking acrid smoke into my lungs to being desperate to quit. I would have tried anything to seize control of my life back from the cigarette companies and the narcotics they sell.

 

Let me tell you how to find your tipping point – if you’ve got the courage, and if you’ve given enough of your life to faceless people in grey suits in cigarette companies.  Just stop – do it now.  Don’t ever buy another cigarette, don’t ever light another cigarette, don’t ever inhale smoke from another cigarette.  Just choose to quit now and be so much happier and healthier.  Don’t give another penny to the cigarette companies who have cashed in on your misery by sucking you into their cult.

 

If that doesn’t work out for you call the health services. They have a great pile of Nicotine Replacement Therapy (NRT), but remember a recent analysis by Harvard School of Public Health of a large number of trials of NRT, concludes it is useless.  I have to say, I’ve always wondered why you would give Nicotine to somebody if you are trying to help them over their Nicotine addiction, unless you make patches or gum for a living, of course! Most healthcare providers have a team of people who can help you with the latest chemistry and support to help you quit, and many have quit successfully and permanently that way.

 

Whichever method you choose needs to achieve two things.  You need to overcome your Nicotine addiction, and you also must separate smoking from pleasure, as they are nothing to do with each other, unless you are in the cult.

 

However, it can be a lot easier than you think, but nobody has any kind of magic wand just to make it go away. In your quest to quit, if you come across anybody offering a guarantee that they can cure your smoking, just walk away.  There is no guarantee of anything, particularly to do with health and the workings of the human mind.  Just like all cult members you will need a period of adjustment to your new healthier, happier lifestyle where you are once again in control of your own life, and you can stop donating your hard-earned money to the owners and beneficiaries of the cult.  Yup, it’s a great thought, isn’t it?  So, just do it.  Choose to overcome that fear of failure, that fear of what kind of person you’ll be as a non-smoker.  Ignore the subliminal and expensive campaigns by the cigarette companies, paid for with your money, that keep you believing it’s going to be so tough.  I’ve helped thousands of people to quit, many of whom found it much easier than they thought it would be. 

 

Millions of people successfully quit smoking every year, and they are richer, healthier and happier for it.  You might want to join them now.  Whatever you do, quit quitting quitting.