How to Quit a Habit
Introduction
This week’s blog is about how to quit a habit via a story. It worked for me, and I envision it can work for you, too.
You may know the father of holistic medicine, Edgar Cayce, recommended moderation in all things for people as a general guideline for general health and well-being. He also said moderation was not an easy task for most. If my own life and those I’ve known are examples, I agree with Edgar.
A bicycling, fully employed ninety-six-year-old once told me that being consistent with his diet and health was the most challenging but critical task he had ever had. The hardest thing I ever had to stop was a cigarette addiction. I know. Gross. But don’t judge. I felt ashamed enough of my unhealthy behavior for a hundred people. I was in denial of my slow suicide, and I went out of my way to hide my addiction or thought I did.
Mark Twain Said It Best.
Like most smokers, including master writer Mark Twain, “It is easy to quit smoking. Why I’ve done it a thousand times.”
My father smoked like a chimney was one, but he was never successful. He smoked– unfiltered Lucky Strikes back in the day. As a child, I was attracted to the name. When you think about it, who doesn’t want to have endless lucky strikes at a whim? Those sly tobacco companies knew how to name a brand.
His choices didn’t stop me from seeking ways to help myself quit. For years, ceasing the habit didn’t “take” with me either. Hypnosis or chewing Nicorette gum didn’t work for me. Neither did the tape that programmed me to stop smoking for life nor the training that tried to instill fear of smoking with all sorts of scary threats if I didn’t quit.
Finally, it wasn’t the dozens of well-meaning but judgmental lectures from healthcare practitioners and friends that helped either. Countless times, I tried quitting by myself and with buddies, and once even in a group.
Examining the Mindset and Other Hurdles
I didn’t give up. One-by-one, I sorted through the hurdles. One was that all of my family members and many of my inner circle of friends smoked cigarettes. It was an impromptu social event to do it together.
Another was the suppressed and repressed anger that started appearing when I quit. I was always so calm and peaceful when I smoked.
Never wearing clothing more than once, brushing my teeth each time I had a cigarette, driving with the car window down, refusing to smoke in my house, but only outside, and thinking I was keeping the odor, my shame, and habit/addiction a secret. I seriously needed a wake-up call to the out-of-balance situation.
Later, after quitting, I occasionally mentioned to a friend or co-worker that I had been a smoker and had stopped. And invariably, they would always say, “I knew you were a smoker.” We don’t hide anything even when we think we do.
Life mightily assists us on our wisdom path when we are open to it. I feel like a different person than the one in my old story because I am. I could not dare to share these things once upon a time. It feels like freedom to do so, to tell the truth as best as I can, shadows and all.
It is also doubly worth sharing my obsessiveness, addiction, and process of disentangling from life-taking influences and patterns I’ve worked through with you, dear reader. Human life can be tricky at times for any of us, and I would love this sharing to assist your process of letting go of old patterns and behaviors, even in the smallest of ways.
The Wake-Up Call I Picked Up
What finally tripped the switch was one thing. My father had an aneurysm and ended up in the hospital. They put him on oxygen; afterward was caught smoking five times! He could have blown himself and his room up, maybe hurt others, but he could not stop smoking. Finally, they kicked him out of the hospital for it. And that was a big deal for our family.
That was what did it for me. I could not imagine being at the end of life with all it entails and having to quit a lifelong habit such as smoking cigarettes. I decided right then and there that I would “quit until I quit, and quit I would. There had to be a way, and I would find it.
You can’t solve a problem on the same level which created it.
Albert Einstein
Another approach was necessary. For decades, I’ve been a fan with some success at asking Love Consciousness a question and letting the answer find its way back to me. It’s a unique variation of “ask, and you will receive.” I was starting at square one, so I asked. “What do I need first?”
A few nights later, I was sitting in my backyard (smoking a cigarette and enjoying the fireflies) and heard the answer in my head. “Mind is the Builder.” To begin with, “Ask yourself how you can want to quit smoking cigarettes more than you want to continue smoking.” Once the answer to this first question shows up, you will find your way to success.
I needed to build my desire to quit more than continue smoking. What a sound answer it turned out to be. This helped me learn “Everything is an inside job.” Once we get clear and focused inside, the outside takes care of itself.
A Quit Date
Ninety days in the future became my target date to become a nonsmoker. My most successful attempts to quit smoking for the most extended lengths were planned rather than “cold turkey,” which was always short-lived. We each have what works for us best.
Preparations
In the meantime, I pondered, “How can I want to become a nonsmoker rather than continue smoking — without health issues?” Soon, I began to feel ready and to look forward to being a nonsmoker. I asked other questions, too.
“What didn’t help when I quit before.” “What helped when I quit before?” “What hurdles will there be?” “How shall I handle the anger and other negative emotions that I stuffed along the way with the addiction?” What can I do to make this effort successful? I trusted the answers would show up, and they did.
Visualizing in advance was recommended. I envisioned people asking me if I wanted a smoke in stressful situations. I would answer in each, “No, thank you. I’m a nonsmoker.” I decided to use Nicotine patches, reducing them in potency over three months, to help with the physical withdrawal, a rubber band to snap against my wrist to pattern-interrupt cravings (ouch!), and long walks on the beach when the anger would boil up.
Realizing that certainly, after about a million cravings – the end of craving is the end of craving – just like the end of suffering is no more suffering. I visualized getting through the temporary onslaught of difficulty I saw coming and fulfilling my quest. If I had any resistance, I would remind myself to “just quit until you love being a nonsmoker. Then decide if you want to start again.”
Becoming a Nonsmoker
The day came. It was in the summer sometime in 1996 when, after thirty years of being addicted to cigarettes, I finally had my last one. The first three days and into three weeks were rough, physically, mentally, and emotionally. I took long walks on the beach. I dreamed my father offered me a cigarette, and I accepted. I was so happy to wake up and realize it was a dream and I had not put the stuff in my body.
Around six months out, I realized I genuinely loved being a nonsmoker, and all cravings for nicotine and cigarettes finally dissolved. Where once my whole life revolved around replenishing nicotine in my body, it is no longer of any consequence whatsoever. I am free of it.
I am also not bothered by other people smoking; I have no judgment about it or people who smoke. Many people have a much easier time quitting than I did, but I was able, with the help of questioning the One-Who-Knows-the-Answers-to-All-Questions, listening to the answers, and applying them.
Conclusion
In this little blog named, How to Quit a Habit, you have now read a strategy that worked to change one habit, in this case, smoking cigarettes, to becoming a nonsmoker. It inspires you to find your best path to successfully transforming dreary old life-taking habits into renewal and freedom from them.
Here’s a question for you. Is there something you would like to drop, change or add to your life? If so, maybe consider asking some questions to get your mindset moving in the right direction and other questions whose answers support your success. So simple, yet very powerful.
Thank you for your comments.
Love and Gratitude,
Kaye
