Kilkenny Smoking Hypnotherapist shares important info to kick the habit!

World No Smoking Day falls on Friday. Adrian Blanchfield from Kilkenny is a former 20 cigarettes per day smoker of 21 years who turned to hypnotherapy after trying every other traditional method of giving up smoking and failing miserably each time.
Finally quitting smoking has, both physically and mentally, had a profound effect on his quality of life since.
He found it easy compared to traditional methods of quitting. He wants to share some of the mindset tools and techniques he used to help people overcome their smoking addictions once and for all.
Beliefs
“If you only take one thing from this article let it be a better understanding of the power of our beliefs.
“There is no more powerful directive force in human behaviour than our beliefs.
“If you want to change your behaviour then you must start with your beliefs.
Are you one of many that smokes as a means to relax?
Nicotine is a stimulant and therefore will create a stress response for your mind and body.
“Once it enters your blood stream your body must respond by releasing endorphins to mask the symptoms of being poisoned that you felt when you smoked your first couple of cigarettes.
“That same poison is still entering your bloodstream and an increased heart rate is one of your body’s responses to dealing with it.
“Meanwhile you have fooled your brain into thinking smoking helps you relax because this is the time that you have stopped doing whatever you were doing and took some time out for yourself. Needing to inhale poisonous gases into our bodies so that we can relax or enjoy ourselves defies all logic yet there are millions more around the world slowly killing themselves through similar nonsensical beliefs.
“Think about the cigarettes that you believe that you will miss when you stop smoking.
“When having a coffee for example.
Go through each and every one of them and KNOW that smoking does absolutely nothing for you let alone make your coffee any better.
“Logically you know that smoking has zero benefit whatsoever but over the years your subconscious mind has created positive links to smoking. Debunk every belief you have around enjoying smoking or about how tough it will be because until you do any attempt at quitting is going to leave you with feelings of deprivation that will make stopping smoking unnecessarily stressful for you.
“Start to visualise what you are going to do instead of smoking in those situations from now on.
Motivation
“Only when you have finished debunking your beliefs must you then start tapping into your motivation for quitting.
“Start to write down your reasons for stopping but always framed in the positive “I want to live a long healthy life” rather than “I don’t want to feel sick and tired all the time”.
“Your subconscious mind wants to give you what you want. It determines what you want by noticing what you focus on. If you focus on what you don’t want, your subconscious mind tries to give you that thing. That’s why focusing on the positive outcome is important.

Plan ahead

Failure to plan is to planning to fail. By now you have long since come to damning realisation that you cannot quit whenever you choose through willpower alone. No need to panic. With diligent planning and guidance we can always set ourselves up for the best possible chance of success. First thing to do will be to set a date and stick to it. Only you know what constitutes a good day for you to quit but the sooner the better and should certainly be less than a month away.

Once that date is set you should immediately start to plan ahead for the inevitable life events that could lead you to start smoking again. Maybe you had quit for some months previously and suddenly you had very stressful situation to deal with and you found yourself back smoking again. The list of potential saboteurs is different for everybody. Know yours and more importantly see yourself overcoming every one of them.

Avoid any form of substitution. Nicotine replacement therapies have repeatedly been proved to perform marginally better than placebo products. If your smoking was just a nicotine addiction then these products would work. Every time. But they don’t. Smoking is a habit and a behaviour. Even healthier forms of substitution should be avoided as they are all subconsciously creating a feeling of deprivation. Ask yourself what are you giving up? You're giving up.... guilt, feeling weak, wasting your money, bad health, social stigma, craving, rotten smell, lack of control. You're giving up all the things you don't want, including smoking. You're giving up the things you don't want in order to get the things you do want.

Visualisation

All meaningful and lasting change starts inside your imagination and works its way outside into your reality. Start to think about the positives outcomes of having reached your goal and then visualise yourself already in the future having already achieved it. Bring emotion into it and really allow yourself to bask in the pride and happiness you will feel having finally overcoming this personal obstacle. Visualize in first person, present tense and positive imagery. Start building that visualization of a happy non-smoking future for yourself. If your giving up smoking then put that  money aside every day and treat yourself to something really nice that you would not have normally had. Maybe a holiday to your dream location? Then picture yourself there in the first person, lying by the pool, cocktail in hand, sun shining on your face, in complete and utter relaxation. The more vivid your visualisation the better.

In truth there are many mindset tools and techniques I could share with you but real change can only ever happen when you take ownership and accountability of your whatever obstacle you are facing and COMMIT to change.

Mindset

We have all met people that seem to remain joyful and optimistic no matter how awful their lives appear to be and conversely who seem to be eternally moping and complaining no matter how much good fortune comes their way. Mindset is the reason one person’s mountain is another person’s molehill.

So as soon as you commit then immediately look forward to stopping. Rather than assume you are going to feel deprived and miserable, look forward to finally being free. How you feel is not the result of what is happening in your life, it is your interpretation of what is happening.

Beliefs - What you resist persists

Visualisation and Motivation - Henry Ford very famously once said “whether you think you can or think you cant you’re right”.
Change your words, change your mindset –Our English language has two words that people use all the time, and these two words are a recipe for failure. “I’m trying to quit smoking.” “I hope I can quit smoking.” Let’s start with the word TRY. This word “try” sets up the mental expectancy that you cannot do it. If I asked you to try and take a pencil out of my hand, and you reached over and took it, understand that you may have been successful in removing the pencil from my hand, but you didn’t quite follow the instructions. Instead of TRYING, you JUST DID IT!
The word HOPE is just as bad. Hope is taking all personal responsibility and handing it off to the world to fix it for you. Understand that there’s only one person in the world that can MAKE you quit smoking, and that’s YOU. Quitting smoking is like a light switch. It’s either on, or it’s off. You either do it or you don’t do it. Remember, you are not “giving up” or “quitting.”

Know your enemy - Understand nicotine  - Nicotine takes 2-3 days to leave your body. Nicotine replacement therapies have repeatedly been proved to perform marginally better than placebo products. If your smoking was just a nicotine addiction then these products would would work. Every time. But they don’t. It’s a habit, it’s a behaviour.

Know your motivation 
 Look forward to stopping. Rather than assume you are going to feel deprived and miserable, just look forward to finally being free. Any nonsense about really missing first fag in the morning. Avoid any form of substitution. If you replace cigarettes with chocolate — you'll gain weight and be miserable. Even the use of seemingly innocent substitutes such as carrots and apples creates a feeling of deprivation. Remember you are not giving up anything — you are getting rid of smoking.

Looking for a replacement would be like getting rid of a terrible cold and wanting to replace it with the flu! Self talk - its important that you realise that you realise that you must control your self talk or your self talk will control you. . one of the principles of changing your mind is that you must change the self talk that is going on. You may not be able to control the external world around you but you can, through your own discipline, control how you speak to yourself.
Commiment – “Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too”
In war, some generals would demolish the bridges they had just crossed in order to motivate the troops forward. How committed were you to giving up. Commit. Set your date for quitting.