Just listen to anybody who smokes and quite regularly you’ll hear things like “I’m going to try and quit smoking, just as soon as I (fill in the blank)”. Perhaps you’ve heard them say these things a number of times and now you just don’t listen. Know what I mean?
So here’s what you need to do. You need to put down in writing the things you want to accomplish (quitting smoking) and come up with the reasons why. And while you are doing this, write down all the reasons why you can’t (your excuses).
Just putting excuses down on paper so that they are something solid you can see is enough to make some people look at how silly they really are. For others, they may have to analyze their list of excuses and figure out why they believe these reasons to be true. Usually it is due to repetition. You’ve been telling yourselves for years that these are the reasons why you smoke, and if you tell yourself something enough times, eventually it will become an ingrained belief, whether it is the truth or not.
I’ve listed some of the more common excuses here, but ultimately it is your responsiblity to list EVERY reason you think keeps you smoking.
“Smoking helps to keep me thin.”
The blunt answer to this one is ‘who cares!’ Studies have shown that you are better off to be 70+ pounds overweight than to smoke when it comes to your health, but that’s not a goal you are looking to attain either. The truth is that yes, some people do gain weight after quitting, but this is usually less than twenty pounds and if that frightens you, then this problem can be easily remedied by careful and detailed planning before you quit. Get it through your mind that you are not going to substitute food for cigarettes and if you do, it is healthy foods like celery, carrots and fruit, not candy bars, chips and other ‘comfort food’.
“Smoking makes me happy.”
If that were truly so, then chances are you wouldn’t be sitting there now gathering information on quitting, would you? Don’t worry. I’m not picking on you. I used to say the very same thing. Making statements such as this creates one major issue. And that is the fact that the more times you say it, the more you become to believe it. I’ve said it before. So time to come clean and be honest with yourself, is smoking really that enjoyable or is it just a fallacy you’ve convinced yourself to be true? What is it that you think smoking gives you? More money, better health and cleaner, fresher breath? Looking at it from that angle and writing down the answers will show you that you really don’t enjoy smoking that much at all.
The thing is that I am not trying to come across as mean or condescending, so please don’t take what I am saying the wrong way. No, what I am trying to do is be truly helpful by telling you that none of the excuses that you are currently using or have used in the past do anything for you other than keep you smoking and once you come to terms with this fact, the easier quitting will be.
Trust in yourself and you’ll find that you already have what it takes to beat these lies.
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