Becoming a non-smoker does not have to be a lifelong struggle. Many people have accomplished with a few session of hypnotherapy what they had not been able to in years of using willpower alone. Hypnosis works by establishing a direct line of communication with the unconscious mind, allowing changes to occur at the source of behavior. For this reason, hypnosis can be effectively employed to uninstall attachments to many compulsive actions.
Preparing the Mind
Step 1
Document your smoking habit. Log into your journal all events surrounding episodes of smoking. Put in where and how often you smoke, how much you smoke at one time, and why, and all thoughts and emotions occurring before, during, and afterwards. Motivations for smoking, over time, become unconscious mechanisms. Simply reconnecting how actions are created through certain thoughts and feelings will prepare the mind to choose those that engender new, and healthier, behaviors.
Step 2
Create a list of physical results directly related to smoking after discovering "how" you smoke. Avoid intangibles. Things like "peace of mind" or "comfort" are merely emotional states that one may have chosen to associate with smoking, not products of the act itself. Definite consequences, instead, may include things like: yellow teeth, shortness of breath, stained fingers, wrinkled skin, etc. Doing this serves to de-idealize whatever illusions of smoking the mind has created to hold the habit.
Step 3
Induce trance. Find a place where you can sit or lay back comfortably, and close your eyes. Focus your attention entirely on your breathing; the lift, and fall, of your chest, the feeling of air moving in, and out. Continue doing this until you notice your breathing pattern beginning to change, becoming slower, and deeper, moving a sense of relaxation into your chest.
Step 4
Imagine that this relaxation has a certain color. Allow that color to spread outward, throughout your entire body, so that you feel all tension easing out. Allow your body to sink heavily into the surface of wherever you are, as you move into a place of internal peace and comfort.
Step 5
Tell yourself that shortly you will count backwards, internally, from 10 to one. Declare that with each number your body will become twice as relaxed as it was previously. Do the count and, upon reaching the number one, you should be in a deep state of trance.
The Smoking Reframe
Step 1
Create a picture of your hand reaching for a pack of cigarettes. Fill the image with sensory detail. Sharpen the colors, hear the crinkle of the surrounding cellophane, feel your hand reaching out, etc. If you self-roll cigarettes, then picture either rolling one or lifting it to your mouth.
Step 2
Allow the image to dissipate. Once it has gone, immediately imagine the worst-case resulting scenario of continued smoking. Conceive how realizing these circumstances will affect those closest to you. If you experience severe distress, then hold on to that feeling. Once again, fill the scene with as much detail as possible. Anchor the emotion by pressing the thumb and index finger of one hand together for several seconds.
Step 3
Pronounce a committed "No!" Do this out loud. However, if doing so is inappropriate at the time, you may say it to yourself. Do this repetitively, and allow each "No!" to push the negative image further and further into the distance, along with the feeling.
Step 4
Replace the image with a new scene, one that depicts a future produced from a smoke-free lifestyle. Conceive the health benefits, increased energy, monetary saving, and anything else you believe will improve as a result.
Step 5
Move, in your mind, to some neutral place for a few minutes, a familiar room or a pleasant scene. Reverse the original count, moving now from one to 10, with the knowledge that each number will move you toward your normal state of awareness. At one, open your eyes, and reorient yourself to your surroundings.
Tips and Warnings
- Practice this strategy each day, until the appropriate associations are established firmly within your subconscious. This method can be used to resolve any negative behavior that has become purely habitual. Intentions and expectations play a big part in the success of any therapy. Commitment to becoming smoke free, and anticipation of positive results, are important.
- If the compulsive behavior is attached to a bonafide chemical dependancy, additional treatment may be needed to compliment the therapy.
Things You'll Need
- A journal
References
- The Everything Hypnosis Book by Michael R. Hathaway
- Stephen Brooks Online Hypnosis Course
