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Three of the Secrets
Three of the Secrets ... for a long term quit.
Posted by zoomzoom on 12-02-2008 5:50 PM
Here are my thoughts on just 3 of the "secrets" for achieving and maintaining a long-term quit. No doubt there are many more. But these seem to be critical skills to learn and practice... and you can begin right away.
1. Be completely honest with yourself, especially about your addiction.
Make no mistake... you ARE a junkie. Not only is it part of you, it defines you. It permeates you... your health, your relationships, your attitude, your finances, your actions, your past, present and future.
If you do not acknowledge and accept the fact that you are addicted to nicotine, you will always consider smoking to be optional. You will always think that you have some choice in the matter, some control over it. But it is crystal clear that when you smoke, you have absolutely NO control over your addiction. It is running your life in more ways than you can imagine.
When you quit smoking, you will have to do serious work on the other parts of YOU to rid yourself of all the addictive thinking and behaviors that you feed your addictive self. Most of these you are probably not aware of. But it is fun and worthwhile work, the most personal growth that you have probably ever had as an adult.
2. Focus on TODAY. Don't smoke TODAY, no matter what.
Today is real. We never know when today will be our last day, so why worry about what MAY OR MAY NOT happen in the future? Now is the time to be happy, now is the time to do the things that are important to you, now is the time to live and laugh and love.
Today is the only day that counts. It's the only one that you can do anything with. So make the most of it and enjoy it, even if it isn't very good. Some days are like that. Appreciate it anyway.
Be happy TODAY. Be good to yourself TODAY. Live TODAY to its fullest and you will have no regrets about it.
3. Deal with WHAT IS, not WHAT IF. Stress kills many a good quit.
Another thing we junkies tend to do is overdramatize. The reason we do that is to increase the stress on ourselves, which in turn gives us the perfect excuse to... smoke, of course. When you begin to recognize that all of that self-inflicted drama and negative thinking is creating AT LEAST 80% of the stress in your life, you can begin to stop that sort of self-destructive behavior. You will begin to take responsibility for your own actions, your emotions, your relationships, your stress level.
If you are completely honest with yourself (see #1 above), you will come to the realization that YOU are the main cause of stress in your life.
Yes, there are things out there that make your life less than "perfect", but you are the one who chooses to crank up the stress level worrying about things, situations or people that you have no control over. What you do have control over is YOURSELF. You can control how you react to life's issues. If you have no control over it, then worrying about it is totally pointless.
Turn off the news channel and all its negative programming and turn on the Food Network. You'll be happier AND you'll be a better cook.
That's it. Three simple ideas that you can use each day.
Be honest with yourself.
Focus on today.
Deal only with what is real.
And don't smoke, no matter what.