Smoking is More than Just A Physical Addiction

During this day in age, it is no surprise: smoking kills. One in two lifelong smokers will die from this detrimental habit, but yet they continue to smoke. Why? Is death not great enough of a deterrence? Most smokers assume that they cannot quit only because of the physical addiction [to nicotine], but in all actuality, this type of addiction is just the tip of the iceberg. Smokers need to understand that it is actually the psychological addiction that is preventing them from quitting, and it is deeply integrated into their daily routine. Once this is understood, they can learn the necessary steps and obtain the necessary tools to quit for good.

How Strong is Psychological Addiction?

Believe it or not, nicotine addiction is only 25 percent physical and 75 percent psychological. Nicotine withdrawal symptoms only last for about three minutes. The other irritable feelings (anxiety, grief, depression, etc.) a smoker will endure while trying to quit are directly related to psychological addiction.

Why is Psychological Addiction so Strong?

The psychological addiction is so strong because smoking becomes a major aspect of a smoker’s life. It constitutes a major part of their daily routine, becoming almost ritualistic in nature. They fire up a cigarette when they wake up, while driving or waiting at a traffic light, after eating a meal, while sipping a cup of coffee, while talking on the phone, or during a night out socializing and drinking. These daily activities are called “triggers” and they are directly linked to psychological addiction.

How to Overcome Psychological Addiction

Eliminating these triggers listed above is based mainly upon behavior therapy, or behavior modification. This type of psychotherapy primarily focuses on changing learned, maladaptive behaviors into adaptive ones.

Because most smokers light up a cigarette without thinking, information will not act as a deterrent. In order to sever the learned, but yet subconscious link between smoking and specific daily triggers, they need to follow the steps listed below.

Step 1: Identification

The first step in changing your smoking routine is to identify the triggers that are unique to you. Write down all of the following triggers below that apply to you specifically and add any additional ones you can think of:

• After Waking Up
• After Eating a Meal
• After a Snack
• While Drinking Coffee
• While Talking on the Phone
• While Driving
• While Drinking Beer or Wine
• When You are with Other Smokers
• While Waiting in Line
• After an Argument
• While Watching TV
• While Playing Cards
• While on the Computer
• While Reading a Book
• During Break Time at Work
• While Anxious, Depressed, or Stressed
• While doing Homework or Deskwork
• Before Going to Bed

Step 2: Unlearning the Behavior: Avoidance & Replacement

During the first few days of quitting, the hardest ones, try and avoid as many triggers as you can altogether. If you only smoke while talking on the phone, for example, try emailing your friends or communicating with them through Facebook or twitter.

However, as you will discover, some triggers you cannot avoid. For these triggers, you will need to learn how to replace the maladaptive behavior (smoking) with something else– much healthier. For example, if you smoke while driving, leave your cigarettes at home and bring along a snack. Trail mix and sunflower work especially well because you consume them bit by bit over a period of time–just like you smoke.

Some healthy, replacement behaviors will work for multiple triggers, but for others you will need something entirely different. Just be creative. If you have an urge and do not think you can endure it, just take a deep breath, relax and give it some time. Remember, over time they will gradually become less intense and they will eventually no longer bother you.

Lastly, and most importantly, increase your chances of quitting by employing the steps above in combination with a treatment plan. The time to quit is now! Click the link below to discover the most effective treatment plans as well as the unimaginable dangers of smoking!

Trying to quit cigarette smoking could be among the hardest things an individual can do in their lifetime. The reasons why many people find that it’s so difficult to cease cigarette smoking may vary. The one reason that is frequently cited is the behavior of cigarette smoking itself is quite difficult to break. The task then turns into trying to break the habit, and instead offer yourself a much healthier habit to hang onto. After all, it took you a while to get into the habit of smoking cigarettes so reason stands that it will require a while to break the habit.

If you’re driven to give up smoking, you have made an impressive start. However, if you have made a decision to stop all on your own, you are doing better yet. Sounds weird does it? You’d probably be surprised at just exactly how many people choose to give up smoking by being advised by their physician, spouse, parent, sibling or friend that they will be quitting. In order to successfully stop smoking for good you should make a decision for yourself to stop. If you’ve actually made this decision on your own, you are doing an excellent job. If you are allowing somebody to force you into giving up you might be just setting yourself up for headaches, hassles and complications that are very easily avoided.

As a cigarette smoker you’ve probably produced a pattern to your smoking. For instance, if you are a typical 1 pack a day cigarette smoker one of your habits is to smoke a pack a day. You should take tiny steps to interrupt these habits. Perhaps you will find good luck in simply changing your habits little by little. For instance, if you typically smoke a cigarette following each meal, you could find it helpful to brush your teeth. This can have the effect of providing a fresh mouth that you don’t want to dirty with the cigarette taste. You could possibly discover that right after every meal you need to try chewing a bit of gum, sucking on hard candy or even trying nicotine gum.

Keep away from things that has a tendency to cause a craving for cigarettes. If it’s something that you absolutely cannot avoid, like dinner times, you should create an alternative habit that you just replace smoking with. As an example, if you often smoke a cigarette once you arrive at your vehicle following work, you should consider carpooling together with an individual who doesn’t smoke cigarettes, taking a different route home, stopping for groceries, playing to some music or maybe taking a bus. Anything that you can do to shake up your normal smoking routine is good.

When trying to break your habit prepare yourself for some bumps on the road. If you end up in a position in which you can’t stay away from a typical smoking situation, you need to create a strategy to cope with it. Some individuals use nicotine gum when they are faced with a smoking situation. Others find that the stop smoking sticks are effective. These kinds of sticks enables you to hold a make-believe cigarette that just provides your hands with something to do. If you find these rather helpful you no doubt know that your trouble is your hands are idle, finding something for your hands to try and do can certainly help a lot.

Trying to quit is a very challenging process. Some people require weeks if not months to quit. If you are having difficulties far too much with the thought of completely quitting immediately you might find it’s much better for your own situation to slowly but surely reduce your cigarette usage. No matter what the precise technique that you decide, it can take a minimum of 2 – 3 weeks to start adapting new habits. This means that any new behavior you adopt in your quest to give up smoking cigarettes needs to be repeated consistently for around two – three weeks before you will begin to see a real difference in your way of life. The effectiveness of trying to break your routine might rely on providing yourself enough time.

Lung detoxification is a growing trend as people become more aware of the dangers of smoking and the terrible effects it can have on your lungs. Problems such as emphysema, chronic bronchitis, throat infections, strokes, heart attacks and of course the biggest danger… Lung cancer. If you have been smoking for just a year or more you have massively increased your chances of succumbing to these problems in fact as the tar and chemicals you breathe in are very difficult for the body to remove without added help. Once you remove the toxins and tar however the reduce these risks dramatically and you will be able to feel the difference as you breath.

As such here are 3 lung detoxification tips that can help you clean up your lungs to avoid becoming another health statistic.

Quit Smoking – Just in case you are still smoking and reading this you can not begin to clean out your lungs of tar and carcinogens if you continue to smoke. You must completely kick the cigarette addiction before you can do any real lasting actions to detox your lungs. However detoxifying your lungs can help you quit smoking if you do both at the same time. There are many methods for this but if you understand your mental addiction to smoking then cold turkey is the best way to go.
Breathing Exercises – Your lungs have hardened over time due to the tar that seeps into the lung tissue. Further inactivity by many smokers further weaken this essential organ because exercise is more difficult with tar filled lungs. Taking time every day to do simply breathing exercises can expand the lungs which allows more oxygen into your system. Try breathing in and holding that breath then breathing out for a few minutes. Then try breathing out as far as you can go before breathing in again to focus on the other extreme. IF you get dizzy and light headed do stop though. Start slowly then build on your results.
Boost Your Immune System – Your immune system is desperately trying to clean your lungs but is blocked by the layer of tar most of the time leaving the problem particles and chemicals sitting in your lungs for years. The better your body is at cleaning itself the faster those dangerous toxins can be ejected from your system. A big part of lung detoxification is improving your lifestyle to increase your body’s natural defences. This involves exercise, nutrition and rest as well as a deep understanding of your mental state that can boost your physical resistances. There are also detoxification herbs and detoxification diets that can speed this process along.