The Big Smoking Delusion!

Affiliate Programme that saves Lives

2009-08-18T11:31:00.000-07:00

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
Contact: John Wesdorp
Telephone: UK (0)84500 99 500 or
email: jwesdorp@nosmokingagain.com

AFFILIATE SCHEME THAT SAVES LIVES!
Today, in Cheshire England, the World’s First Online Stop Smoking Clinic launches its Affiliate Partner Programme as part of its expansion scheme to help more smokers to quit.

This morning, NoSmokingAgain, the World’s First Online Smoking Cessation Clinic opens its virtual doors to website owners and webmasters who are interested in making money by promoting a healthier lifestyle and assisting more people to quit smoking.

NoSmokingAgain uses low-cost risk-free online hypnosis to successfully persuade smokers give up the habit.

Over one hundred million people per year ask Google for help to stop smoking as more and more smokers have had enough of being lied to, cheated, robbed and poisoned. NoSmokingAgain offers help on a no-cure-no-pay basis. The company is looking for webmasters to come and share in the success and help to save some of the lives of those who are assisted to never smoke again.

NoSmokingAgain aims its service at those who need it most, the heavy, long term smoker who tried everything else to give up and has failed. Smokers behind their PCs are subjected to a combination of Hypnosis, Cognitive Behavioural Therapy and Reversed Conditioning. This unique no-cure-no-pay online therapy and website are the brainchild of John Wesdorp, Professional Hypnotherapist and Smoking Cessation Counsellor.

John Wesdorp (60) of Wilmslow in Cheshire, NoSmokingAgain’s CEO says: “twenty percent of all internet users are smokers and most (78%) want to quit, not tomorrow, but today, preferably in their own home. There is an explosion of health related products and services on the Internet and webmasters and website owners have a chance to ride crest of the wave, with our partner programme.”

“This Affiliate Scheme is definitely worth being part of,” says Abdul Ghafoor, - Affiliate Marketing Expert

End

N.B. If you want to read the whole blog, please start at the very bottom. Reading the blog in any other way does not make sense.
Apologies for the inconvenience of having to scroll all the way down to the bottom of the blog page. It is worth it though if you are either a smoker or interested in the smoking phenomenon. I promise.

The Blog Sequence

2009-01-01T11:09:00.000-08:00

This blog makes very little sense if you start reading the top post or even any of the posts in the middle. Also, if you are not a smoker who wants to give up, this blog will bore you rigid after 3 or 4 sentences. If, however, you are a smoker with a strong desire to give up or if you are wondering if you should quit smoking, or if you are not sure if you are ready or not, start reading the first post (at the bottom of this page), called Why and What? and work your way up to the last one near the top called: The Challenge!

The Challenge

2009-01-01T11:02:00.000-08:00

So, I am setting you a challenge to give up smoking. Please dare to take on this challenge, I guarantee you that it will dramatically improve your life, financially and in terms of quality. It will also greatly improve your chances of your life not being unnecessarily and prematurely interrupted because of a smoking related disease.

If you think you suffered long enough from those who held you financially hostage? If you think you suffered long enough from those who ruled a part of your life against your will and made you believe you enjoyed it? If you think you suffered long enough from those who would have killed you as they have killed nearly half a billion people in the last century and who would have killed you without even thinking about it, because your life is worth less than the cigarette paper one of your cigarettes was rolled in? If you had died, that would only have made them richer as you would have smoked a bit longer and bought more of their killer products. If you believe that you want your life back as it is not theirs to squander, then …………. it is time to really seriously give up smoking for life!

I know what my part is and I can do my part extremely well; your part is to let me do my job. The result may astound you as there is more than just a likelihood that from one day to the next, you will become a non-smoker and the next day you will become a non-smoker for life and it will be a simple, easy and effortless process, which you will actually enjoy.

So – Go for it! Go to www.nosmokingagain.com/profile.php and follow the instructions. If you manage to answer all the registration questions correctly, then I know that you really are ready to give up and only then will you be given access to the first of two hypnotherapy sessions, which combined, will make you stop smoking for life within 24 hours.

What are we to do about it?

2009-01-01T10:59:00.000-08:00

In a different world and a different time, tobacco manufacturers would have been closed down long ago. When it transpired that their product actually kills half its users, normally, there would have been an enormous scandal, people would be up in arms that this could have happened, people would have given up in droves with lots of support and that would have been the end of it - Tobacco No More! However, this completely illogical existence of a killer industry actually continues to this day, to the horror and complete surprise of most intelligent people. How, on earth can this be? Why have we not started to eradicate smoking and why do we tolerate this lethal menace?

There must come a point where decent people in a modern society should expect their governments to ban the sale of tobacco products by voting for those political parties who stand for such a ban. We have to do everything to stop the next generation starting their smoking habit & their addiction and thus perpetuate this scourge and considerable draw on the resources of our health industries because of the treatment of smoking related diseases. This would mean that we have to cross swords with The Tobacco Industry who will use all their resources to continue the incredibly insane notion that it is allowed to sell tobacco products that kill people. Tobacco use is unlike other threats to global health.
In comparison:
Infectious diseases do not employ multinational public relations firms.
There are no front groups to promote the spread of cholera.
Mosquitoes have no lobbyists.

I have a modicum of understanding for those who wish to protect animals from cruelty, although I totally reject and abhor the violence that is applied by organisations such as the Animal Liberation Front in order to achieve their goals. However if people can defend the rights of animals with such vigor and vehemence, but we leave an industry in tact that kills more people than cancer, HIV, car accidents, heart disease plus all other diseases together, then something is not right. Is it then not high time we all become more active and more assertive in freeing the world's various multi-cultural, multi-ethnic, multi-racial, secular and multi-religious societies from this tobacco abomination?

A WHO report published in February 2008 projected that tobacco abuse may kill one billion people by the year 2100. In spite of this, the authorities preserve the legal status of cigarette sales, for instance in the UK, on grounds of upholding personal liberty. The expensive marketing and glamorisation of tobacco products to potential victims is sanctioned on similar grounds too. We ought to be as shocked at tobacco promotion as we'd certainly feel, if instead it urged kids to try heroin because it's cool. Yet familiarity breeds moral apathy. Youngsters are typically hooked before they are in any position to make an informed choice of their preferred poison - or even to abstain altogether. Meanwhile a state-supported export drive targets the poor in vulnerable Third World countries. With a cynicism that almost beggars belief, Margaret Thatcher accepted a million-dollar bribe from a leading member of the drug-cartels for her services. Her party's Home Secretary then delivered himself of blood-curdling calls for a crack-down on evil drug-pushers(!). He went on to increase the draconian penalties already available for personal users of cannabis. The former Chancellor of the Exchequer Kenneth Clarke is a deputy chairman of British American Tobacco.

ABOVE: Actor James Spader as Lawyer Alan Sure taking on The Tobacco Industry during an episode of TV Drama Series Boston Legal. I don't think it cannot be said any better and more convincingly, and I just love the reference to cockroaches!

New Smokers!

2009-01-01T10:51:00.000-08:00

Anybody who starts smoking in this day and age must be having a problem or a temporary lowering of the IQ or a “brain melt”. I personally call it utterly mind-blowingly stupid. All of us accept that there is a problem with global warming (man-made or not). However, there is 100 times more evidence that smoking kills than that there is evidence for global warming. In spite of that, young people discuss the environment but still become addicted to smoking. In fact, every single day 3,000 children start smoking and 1,000 of those children will die from a smoking related disease.

Starting smoking is, as it always has been, due to peer pressure. “Everybody smokes and I do not want to be the odd one out” is the axiom that sucks (no pun intended) them in. I presume it is also part of rebelling against parents, smoking appears to be daring, a dangerous, reckless habit which is sold as “living on the edge” or even something as totally ridiculous as a fashion statement and with the ubiquitous medical evidence that advises people strongly not to smoke, it can now be construed as a form of self-harm. It is also a fact that young people who smoke tend to be more depressed than those who do not smoke.

How is it possible that young people want to blow their money away. Somehow, we must be able to get to them and persuade them to stop this total senseless and idiotic behaviour and to make young people decide that not smoking is cheaper, makes life better and for many reasons is preferable to smoking.

To a degree, I can understand "binge drinking" as you get intoxicated and lose a lot of brain cells before you pass out. However, somewhere between the first drink of the evening and the blackout there is a point where the drinker feels quite pleasant as the dopamine levels in the brain are raised. I cannot however understand smoking, as there is never a point between smoking the first cigarette and the last one in a pack where you feel anything else but relief because for a little while you are not craving nicotine.
There is a form of nicotine use that does create a "hit". This happens when a bundle of chewing tobacco (Bandit) is positioned in the mouth, in between the lower teeth and the lower lip. On the downside: it does require the user to frequently spit tobacco juice and developing cancer of the mouth is practically secured.

Add CBT

2009-01-01T10:47:00.000-08:00

So how can you give up smoking immediately without any cravings via a couple of hypnotherapy sessions? I have already mentioned in earlier posts that there are a number of prerequisites in order for my hypnotherapy and that of my colleagues to be successful. Any resistance to the hypnotic suggestions, any reluctance to accept any of the suggestions, any querying of anything that is said during the session or attempts to analyse the suggestions you are given, immediately works counter productive and you either have difficulties giving up or in the extreme, you remain a smoker. In other words: Accept the challenge and subject yourself totally and unconditionally to my hypnotherapy sessions and I will guarantee you that you will be a non-smoker afterwards. There is just no doubt about the power of hypnotic suggestions, especially when it is used in its modern and contemporary form, mixed with a ample dose of psychology and borrowed elements of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy.

Because I believe in fairness, I offer my hypnotherapy services on a no-cure-no-pay basis, so if you cannot find that inner belief or you feel that you are not up to it, and for one reason or another the hypnotherapy will not work, then it won’t cost you a cent. There is nothing to pay up front, nor do I take credit card details in advance. It is all done on trust. If you trust yourself, I will trust you. The cost of success is the equivalent of what the average smoker spends in one week on cigarettes: $40 (£35 - €35)

Dare to desire

2009-01-01T10:40:00.000-08:00

Those smokers who feel they do have the inner conviction that can be reinforced with a little hypnotic help, are capable of giving up for life and never ever want to smoke again. They succeed because the stronger that belief is, the easier the quitting process is. I have had many clients like that, most smoked for more than 30 years, subjected themselves completely and unconditionally to my hypnotherapy and they turned into non-smokers. The majority of them found it very easy and a considerable number of them felt after the hypnotherapy as if they never smoked before and they forgot about smoking very quickly. They never had the slightest craving and never considered smoking again. They could hardly believe it themselves, but, in essence, they had trusted their own judgment to allow me as a hypnotherapist to turn their strong desire to quit into an easy way to give up.

Of course, it does not always work, but that is not because of people like me not doing our job properly, it is because the desire to quit is not strong enough or there is a doubt that stops people from subjecting themselves completely; so they hold back, sometimes out of skepticism, disbelief, sometimes out of some irrational fear and the result is that they may still give up, but then have a hard time trusting themselves that they have actually become ex-smokers and then also suffer from cravings. Most of them end up being non-smokers anyway, but they do it “the hard way”. If it is possible to believe in something as vastly complex as a God, and to allow your entire life (and beyond) be heavily influenced by that belief, for which objectively (some say) there is no actual proof at all, then it must be very simple to come to believe that it is possible to allow hypnosis to be a determining factor in giving up something as simple as smoking.

Brain Power

2009-01-01T10:34:00.000-08:00

The human brain it is by far the most complex mechanism in the universe and it is unbelievably powerful. In principle, each one of us have the same tools in our brain as Einstein, Da Vinci, Hawkins, Planck, Marx, Aristotle, Plato, Heisenberg and all those other people who caused major breakthroughs in their own field of science, art and technology. If you consider what you are capable of over a lifetime, the changes in your life that occur and that you take into your stride without even thinking about it, then giving up smoking is a only a minor task that can be undertaken and fulfilled without the slightest bit of effort. Think of all those athletes who achieve world records, of those people who accomplished what was considered impossible, the drive that some people have to achieve their goals and the notion that whatever it is you really want in life, you can accomplish.

For some strange inexplicable reason, most people believe that they are capable of very little and many people have given up trying to achieve anything. Those are the ones who will never give up smoking as all their attempts will be half-hearted, because they do not have enough faith in themselves to believe that they are capable of giving up and if for some reason, they manage to give up, they will for the rest of their lives be miserable because they feel they are missing something they once had and enjoyed.

Trust the Human Mind

2009-01-01T10:30:00.000-08:00

I mentioned in one of my first posts that if you strongly believe that giving up smoking will be incredibly difficult and you will suffer horrific side effects, mood swings that are unbearable for others and cravings that cannot possibly be resisted, then that is exactly what will happen. If however, you trust yourself and allow yourself to believe the evidence that there are significant and very valid reasons why you should stop and that stopping will be effortless and you will have none of the above withdrawal symptoms, because of undergoing targeted clinical advanced hypnotherapy, which was developed specifically to make people quit smoking without side effects, then that is what will happen. The human mind is incredibly flexible, but only when it is necessary to be flexible. I could of course easily fall into the trap of stating that the human mind is also very flexible in continuing to be rigid.

The Secret

2009-01-01T10:26:00.000-08:00

For those who have read the book or seen the DVD "The Secret" (if not, perhaps you should), it is an interesting theory that promotes The Power of Positive Thinking and how it can be applied to attracting more money, better health, and relationships; in short, happiness). Hypnotherapy is the practical application of something very similar to “The Secret”. A very strong desire to become a non-smoker is executed via hypnotherapy and then turned into absolute reality. If that strong desire includes any absence of withdrawal symptoms, then there will be none. The beauty of hypnotherapy is that by subjecting yourself completely to the hypnotherapy, you can make it very easy to stop immediately and to never want a cigarette again without a single craving. Hypnotherapy only deals with the psychological side of smoking, which makes it perfectly placed to help people give up.

The smoking habit is pure psychological and resides in the subconscious. The total withdrawal from nicotine takes in essence only approximately 72 hours. In order to deal with that, hypnotherapy is capable of creating a state of euphoria based on kick starting life as a non-smoker, which euphoria easily overrides the reduced dopamine activities because of lack of nicotine. This euphoric state of victory of good over bad, being reborn as a non-smoker, giving yourself health and several other very positive suggestions easily lasts until the nicotine has left the body and the initial craving disappears. In parallel, the hypnotherapy helps to create very strong psychological barriers that can be used to easily withstand and deflect the strongest nicotine cravings. Very importantly, hypnotherapy circumvents the essence of nicotine withdrawal, the fight-or-flight response: fight and resist the craving or flight and give in to smoking again.

In addition, modern hypnotherapy includes CBT (Cognitive Behaviour Therapy): a form of psychotherapy that emphasises the important role of thinking in how we feel and what we do. Modern Hypnotherapy for Smoking Cessation is Applied Psychology in order to reverse conditioning

It's in the Genes

2009-01-01T10:20:00.000-08:00

We are genetically programmed to survive and therefore, our unconscious mind always has our best interest at heart and it makes sure that we function every day at our peak. Hypnotherapy encourages a dialog between the conscious and the unconscious mind of the person under hypnosis. It is a scientific fact that smoking is a matter of the subconscious. The unconscious mind does not resist smoking as it realises that nicotine deficiency is more of handicap than a blessing. This inner dialog (something we do all the time when we deliberate with ourselves about decisions we need to make) persuades the unconscious mind to alter its perception to smoking and to heighten the awareness of the smoker. The dialog includes suggestions planted by the hypnotherapist about some behavioural changes that simulate a life without cigarettes as well as reprogram the immune system so it will resist toxic fumes being inhaled into the lungs.

The result is a change in the brain that often removes all the aspects of smoking from the day-to-day life of the smoker and therefore also removes the craving and all other withdrawal symptoms. In effect, hypnotherapeutic suggestions create new neural pathways in the brain of the smoker, which stop the associations with the habit and remove the triggers that make people smoke.

In scientific terms, Hypnotherapy alters the Withdrawal Pathway (locus coeruleus) and the Reward Pathway (mesolimbic dopamine system). It assists the brain in coping successfully with lowered dopamine and noradrenaline levels and activities by creating a new reward pathway whereby the actual victory of giving up becomes the reward and celebrates the new state of being a non-smoker, which overrides the withdrawal path.

Mind the Unconscious

2009-01-01T10:15:00.000-08:00

In using hypnosis to give up smoking, the hypnotherapy process is based on bypassing the critical faculties of the conscious mind and the notion that we all have a subconscious, which combines in evolutionary terms our “reptile brain” and our “mammal brain”. (Stages of our evolutionary brain development that are day-to-day part of the general brain) Our conscious mind resides in the frontal lobes of our brain, which we use for making decisions and for taking certain directions in our life, as well as for interacting with others. The conscious mind is the youngest part of the brain in terms of evolutionary development. In addition, we have an unconscious mind or a subconscious. This subconscious or unconscious mind makes sure that all the processes that we have in our body and our brain are executed correctly. The unconscious mind takes care of our continuous heartbeat, our breathing, our blood circulation, our metabolic and glandular systems, the working of our larger and smaller organs, our health and all the other processes in our body that we do not consciously control or are able to directly influence. The unconscious mind is like an older and wiser version of ourselves, it our physical "minder" and our trusted psychic friend that will never let us down.

How does it work?

2009-01-01T10:09:00.000-08:00

The reasons and why and how hypnosis works, has been a mystery for centuries. Recently, since the availability of better scan equipment to monitor brain activity, we have learned that the state of hypnotic trance is similar to the state between being awake and asleep, during which the brain produces alpha waves.

The input of the hypnotherapist only partly determines the success of the therapy. There should be a determination and willingness to allow hypnotherapy to do its job. It is therefore absolutely vital that you have complete faith in the hypnotherapy concept, the delivery of it and also in the practitioner. Now that sounds a fair bit like “alternative therapy”, but it isn’t. It is the same concept of believing what somebody with authority tells you, or wants you to believe, and you do believe it, because you have no reason to query it. It is what advertising does every day, making you believe that a product is exceptional, and you believe the advertisers and buy the product. You believe what news broadcasts tell you and what newspapers want you to believe and also why the concept of placebos was invented and are usually applied in clinical trials.
Hypnotherapy works at its very best if you want it to work!

All is lost then, isn’t it?

2009-01-01T10:06:00.000-08:00

So, what to do then? Is there a solution that makes a smoker give up immediately without craving, irritation or withdrawal symptoms? Is there something that stops all the anxiety, the craving and all that goes with it and turns a smoker into a non-smoker within a very short space of time and causes not one single psychological after effect?

The answer is: yes, there is indeed a solution for people who desperately want to stop, for those who hate to be addicted smokers, who have tried all the NRT products and the drugs and who have failed time and time again. The solution to giving up smoking is: Clinical Hypnosis or Hypnotherapy.

For some bizarre reason, hypnotherapy is regarded as an “alternative solution”. Hypnotherapy is frequently placed in the realms of quacks, snake oil, homeopathy, new age spiritualism, Reiki, and other alternative medicines.

It is also true that hypnotherapy still suffers from a bad reputation because of stage hypnosis, where clever manipulating “hypnotists” make audiences believe that they can make people on stage do whatever they want, for instance make them look totally ridiculous, make them jump around like chickens and even (pretend to) control people’s minds. Many people are frightened of Hypnotherapy, because they fear that their minds are being altered or that they are unable to wake up from their trance.

There is in the history of hypnotherapy never been any person who suffered any negative consequences from hypnotherapy.

What it looks like on stage is completely different from what it really is: a very clever spectacle that manipulates outgoing and imaginative members of the audience (specially picked as a result of their positive responses to a “hypnotic” audience participation exercise) in such a way that it looks real “hypnosis”. Although stage hypnosis is fun to watch, the whole spectacle has nothing to do with Clinical Hypnotherapy. Stage Hypnosis is as different from Clinical Hypnotherapy as Playing “Doctors and Nurses” is from Providing Professional Healthcare

Starting over

2009-01-01T10:03:00.000-08:00

That first cigarette after a period of not smoking is likely to cause, dizziness and feelings of queasiness. The taste of that first one is certainly not pleasant. They will still smoke it and either continue immediately as a smoker or they may not smoke again for a while, sometimes even for months after. But one day, another crisis or perceived crisis will occur, maybe even a minor upset or some stress and the opportunity to have another cigarette offers itself. Soon a pattern will have been created that leads to becoming a smoker again, smoking as many as they did before their interruption, or even more.

There is a familiar pattern that some people may recognise, which consists of: after that one “crisis” cigarette (which people never admit did not really steady any nerves at all), people then start to having “drags” of other people’s cigarettes, then they start “bumming” cigarettes from people, sometimes even total strangers and then they start buying them one by one from other smokers, paying over the odds for each cigarette, and then they finally give in and they start buying their own again.

Giving up again after reverting to smoking once more is even more difficult. The notion that you have failed before and that giving up was a most unpleasant experience makes people think twice to go through the “ordeal” again. Often, failure at second and subsequent attempts is the result, and now smoking has become associated with guilt and there is that feeling of desperation and of being trapped for life as a smoker. More desperate attempts follow, a lot of money is spent on patches and other products. Unfortunately, the result in most cases is a depressing series of failures.

Smoking at work ban

2009-01-01T10:01:00.000-08:00

The governments of a growing number of countries have now banned people from smoking on or around work premises, or even when they drive a vehicle owned by their employers. What is still ignored is the amount of untold damage that can be caused by smokers who, because of severe craving, suffer from loss of concentration, make mistakes, lose interest in their work, try to engage in extracurricular activities in order to get distracted from their craving, have far more sick days and do not work as efficiently or accurately as they should. It is a known fact that loss of concentration because of craving causes people to make mistakes. We have not even begun to assess the results of those mistakes in terms of financial losses, human injury or even human lives. What looked like a good idea in order to force people to stop smoking during work hours was never properly thought through, as there was never any kind of support system set up that helped smokers deal with their craving. It is safe to say that the loss of productivity because of the work smoking ban runs into billions.

What we wish to ignore!

2009-01-01T09:59:00.000-08:00

The smoking habit is ingrained and plays an important part in people’s lives primarily as part of the subconscious. The habit and the addiction together have made sure that the smoker has been made totally unaware of the awful taste of tobacco smoke, the rancid smell of stale tobacco, the sick making odour of full ashtrays, the smell of clothes worn whilst smoking, the yellow-brown stained fingers, nails, and teeth, the absolutely foul breath. In smokers’ houses, there are discoloured walls, ceilings, smelling curtains, burn holes in clothes, carpets, furniture etc. All this is accepted or overlooked and usually deliberately ignored, because any change would involve giving up and that idea interferes with The Smoking Habit and makes the smoker immediately reach for a cigarette. Most people do not like change, giving up smoking would alter their lives and the anticipation of moments during the day-to-day routine, where normally a cigarette would fit in, fulfills the smoker with dread.

One of the complaints of new ex-smokers is that they don’t know what to do with their hands, which means that lighting a cigarette is also a way to alleviate boredom and a way to avoid awkwardness in social situations when for instance people stand around and talk. Most smokers find chatting a lot easier with a cigarette on the go. All smokers live their lives according to patterns that include The Habit. They adapt their lifestyle so that it fits in with The Habit. Smokers, for instance, hate long haul flights and would rather not travel, because they can’t smoke on an aircraft. Frequently the press tells us stories about fights on holiday flights due to people become irate because of lack of nicotine and subsequent attacks on airline personnel. Sacrifices have been made recently by smokers, because of the smoking ban and their living pattern has been altered to still include The Habit.

Panic

2009-01-01T09:53:00.000-08:00

A smoker usually knows approximately how many cigarettes he or she needs every day. There are however those harrowing moments late in the evening when you come to the conclusion that you may not have enough cigarettes to get you through the entire evening or the night and you then may also not have enough for the morning. Panic sets in at first and then a decision has to be made to either go out and hunt for your favourite brand (usually the only brand you smoke) or slow down and keep some for the morning. Both decisions are very unpleasant as the stress of that situation causes you to really want to smoke 5 in a row as you anticipate with fear the risk of having to be without.

The Habit

2009-01-01T09:52:00.000-08:00

It is not just the addiction to nicotine that hampers many smokers in their efforts to give up. There is also the smoking habit. When somebody smokes for many years it becomes a well rehearsed and “grooved” habit. Some cigarettes have been smoked at certain times of day for many years. The first one smoked in the morning, either still in bed or with a coffee, or just after breakfast. Those who drive to work usually know exactly where they light one. Weekend cigarettes are different but without much variation from week to week. Meals have always been finished with a cigarette, coffee, tea and perhaps alcoholic drinks have been enjoyed with a cigarette. Phone calls are best made with a cigarette on the ash tray and so are a number of other activities, work or leisure related, that involve smoking. The public smoking bans have recently driven the smoker to do his/her smoking in the open air, defying rain, snow, heat and cold. Most smokers have taken the public and work smoking bans in their stride, under the banner: “Capnodulium Evinco Omnis” (Smoking Addiction Conquers All) and nicotine patches are helping smokers to get through their working day, exactly as the pharmaceutical companies intended, so they can keep selling those patches for many years to come, although they will of course never admit that.

Give up giving up

2009-01-01T09:50:00.000-08:00

How come so many fail when trying to give up? Many smokers give up giving up within the first 2 days. 80 percent will have started smoking again within the first 3 months. Most smokers who stopped and then start again will tell you that, after having given up for a longer or shorter period, they decided to have just one cigarette, in almost every case this happened because of a crisis situation that caused a lot of stress. Before that crisis, they dealt with being a non-smoker well enough to stay away from the cigarettes. When a substantial crisis or severe stress occurs, two things happen: the brain is looking for a relief from that severe stress and the memory of those deep breaths through inhaling smoke looks a very acceptable option. Most ex-smokers still miss the habit of smoking and now, all of a sudden, they have a really good reason to have a cigarette. Without fail, the ex-smoker, who went for that cigarette during a crisis, does not blame his or her own weakness or stupidity (sorry, but I can’t call it anything else); they blame the actual crisis for smoking again. “When I heard that my cousin had the accident, I needed a cigarette to deal with the stress”. Unfortunately, when there is a crisis in people’s lives, there is always a “well-meaning” friend, relative or neighbour around, who says: “here, have a cigarette, that will steady your nerves!”

What really happens when you quit?

2009-01-01T07:01:00.000-08:00

Within about 45 minutes of smoking your last cigarette, you will begin to experience a small craving or urge to smoke another cigarette. This is your brain gently reminding you that it is time to inhale some poisonous fumes again, in order to get your fix of nicotine. At this time the nicotine levels in the body are falling and those levels must be replenished so you can remain feeling normal.

When these cravings for nicotine get stronger, signs of anger, regret and confusion may occur. The notion that “this is stupid, I’d better have a cigarette and try another time” occurs frequently. Irritation caused by anxiety and stress sets in and the slightest problem or discomfort is exaggerated and becomes far more difficult to deal with than normal. There is loss of concentration as there is a fixation by the brain of wanting its regular hit of nicotine.

The nicotine withdrawal symptoms will be the strongest for around 24 - 48 hours after giving up. The craving, are not continuous, but occur in waves and strong pangs (similar to hunger pangs). They will begin to ease off considerably after 72 hours when all the nicotine has left the body. There will be occasional pangs for the next few days, but those become weaker every time. They will however not completely disappear until two to three weeks have passed, and possibly beyond, depending on the person. Nevertheless you will still probably have the occasional urge to smoke a cigarette and unfortunately, this occasional urge may actually never go away. Often, there is a degree of envy of others smoking while you can’t, especially if you were part of a group of smokers who regularly congregate outside public places or outside the work place. You are now ousted from that little community, as you chose the “dark side” when you became a non-smoker.

Tobacco vs Heroin

2009-01-01T06:59:00.000-08:00

It is an absolute fallacy that giving up smoking is more difficult than reversing a heroin addiction. I would not be surprised if that rumour originates with the Tobacco Industry, as it is another wonderful deterrent to give up smoking. Kicking the heroin habit causes very severe mental and physiological discomfort. The withdrawal symptoms are so intense that many of those who withdrew from heroin thought that during the actual first period of withdrawal felt in fear of losing their lives and often they would have preferred to die instead of having to continue the terrible ordeal. Withdrawing heroin from the body causes physical illness and often severe pain to such an extent that often medical intervention by means of sedation is necessary. In comparison with smoking cessation, it won’t be necessary to sedate the smoker for a few days to help him/her to quit.

Giving up smoking is not even remotely like kicking the heroin habit. Even after smoking for 40 years or longer, there is very little, if any, physical discomfort. A headache, some constipation and worst case, some flu-like symptoms, is as bad as it gets. There are no feelings of being distinctly physically unwell, let alone that one experiences feelings of dying or wishing to die. Importantly, there are also no signs of anhedonia (the inability to experience pleasure from normally pleasurable life events such as eating, exercise and social or sexual interaction), proving that nicotine does not invoke any pleasure or pleasurable stimulation. Instead there is substantial psychological discomfort that manifests itself for instance in suffering a high degree of anxiety and stress.

How difficult is it then to give up?

2009-01-01T06:57:00.000-08:00

It is not easy, as we all know, especially if you are not prepared and if you have to rely on what the pharmaceutical industry has to offer.

The real answer to the question how difficult quitting is depends on your state of mind and your ability to psychologically come to terms with taking away a highly addictive substance that your brain craves every single day. In addition there is the equally strong habit, which you have lived with for over a quarter of a century and that has become a second nature. Giving up the two equal parts that make a smoker smoke is the difficulty.

Why do most smokers actually apprehensive about giving up? The reason is fear of discomfort, stress, anxiety or, in other words, fear of psychological discomfort, which is translated to fear of pain, which, in essence, is fear of death. The need for preservation is paramount, so the fear overrides the concern for long term health, which is traded off against the comfort of maintaining the status quo, thus the smoking is prolonged.

Big Pharma loves the smoker too

2009-01-01T06:55:00.000-08:00

The same goes for nicotine chewing gum, which also contains Sorbitol which, when frequently used, has the very unpleasant side effect of causing diarrhoea. NRT is based on a continuation of distributing nicotine to the brain and then, in theory, lowering the dose of nicotine until the smoker has been weaned off nicotine completely. NRT does nothing about the habit and, in principle, continuing to administer nicotine to an former smoker is not just odd, it is criminal, as the last thing a former smoker want is to maintain his/her dependency on the substance. NRT works equally as well as telling a smoker to smoke less and less every day until he/she is weaned off smoking completely. Not much chance of success there either!

There are drugs that deal with craving, such as Champix, which has a warning attached that it may cause depression. Some people who tried the drug showed signs of such severe depression that they wanted to commit suicide. In the UK, the National Health Service have set up smoking cessation groups, usually in doctors' surgeries, lead by people who can only offer NRT as a means to give up, whilst knowing very well that only 2 or 3 percent of smokers succeed long term to quit. There are support groups where you can talk about your smoking habit, which helps slightly, until that moment that you are on your own again, having to deal with the anxiety, the stress, the cravings, the pangs, the desperation culminating into a deep hunkering desire to get back to the comfort of the smoking habit.

There is, in my view, absolutely nothing that The Pharmaceutical Industry and the Health Industry produce or offer that makes it relatively easy to give up smoking!

Why Stop, there is always NRT!

2009-01-01T06:54:00.000-08:00

Most people have more than one reason to quit smoking. They realise they are jeopardising their long term health. The discomfort of smoking bans also influences their decision to stop and then there is the money, as smoking has become more and more prohibitive. In addition there are those who don’t really want to give up but they have been given medial advice to do so as they show signs of an emerging smoking related disease.

But how do you quit? Smoking Cessation is the medical term for giving up smoking. There are several routes to a non-smoking existence; all of them, except “cold turkey” involve spending money. There is of course NRT (Nicotine Replacement Therapy) a great idea and a wonderful way for the smoker to get into the clutches of another large manufacturing group: the Pharmaceutical Industry, who are all too happy to make the smoker do some more financial bloodletting. There are the patches, the most popular way to remain hooked on nicotine without having to smoke.

More often than not, patches do not provide the required result, as only a small percentage of people who use them actually give up for good, less than 3 percent in fact. Many smokers now use patches in order to get them through the day when they cannot smoke at work. Nicotine patches do not actually fully take the craving for a cigarette away and they also have no effect on the smoking habit. Nicotine patches are sold as a panacea, but are a disappointment for those who hope to give up smoking using them.

Statistics

2009-01-01T06:52:00.000-08:00

The Tobacco Industry has manouvered itself in a position where they have no culpability, there is not the slightest control over their products. They have a free reign, especially in their “new” territories such as Africa and Asia, where they sell single cigarettes in order to get children hooked. Smoking continues to kill at least 5 million people per year, which by most people’s standards is a total abomination of genocide proportions. Unfortunately, in statistical terms it is not half as sad as a sick puppy dog. In other words, 5 million deaths per year or one death every 6 seconds is just a statistic, which neither moves people nor governments.

So, if it is an undeniable fact that smoking does not do anything for the smoker, it does not help the smoker in any way, and as far as risk are concerned, it can be compared to playing Russian Roulette with three blanks and three bullets in the cylinder, then perhaps quitting would not be such a bad idea at all!

Prohibition

2009-01-01T06:06:00.000-08:00

The number of smokers in every country makes it politically impossible to declare prohibition on tobacco products, as they are likely to be voted out at the next election by disgruntled smokers and opposition parties who will undoubtedly claim that another piece of our civil liberties will have been squandered.

The tobacco industry does not specifically care if their clients live or die as long as they do not get too much of a bad press. They would prefer them to live, as they can get more money out of them. The Tobacco Industry is happy to put up with losing 50% of their clients to smoking related diseases, as most people will continue to smoke until the very end. Often, ill people continue to smoke, even after being diagnosed with terminal diseases such as lung cancer or COPD which leads to a rather slow and painful death. Unfortunately, thousands of stupid/ignorant young people are ready every day to fill the void of a dead customer and pick up their first “fashionable”, “rebellious”, “sophisticated” peer pressure induced smoke.

The balance is always heavily weighted against the smoker who, by buying cigarettes, contributes to the wealth of the tobacco companies and its investors, but does not get anything in return, except temporary breaks in nicotine craving and runs a 50% chance of being killed as a result of a smoking related disease. Have you ever come across any odds worse than those? Ironically, exactly like weapons, when cigarettes are used in the way they were produced, they kill equally as efficiently as any weapon, and whilst smoking is slowly killing you, YOU, the smoker are paying for that privilege.

Peddling Death

2009-01-01T06:01:00.000-08:00

It is in the interest of the tobacco manufacturers to sell as many of their products as possible. They do not particularly care who they are selling them too, as long as they are sold. It is Governments, not the tobacco manufacturers, that put age restrictions on cigarettes. Every new smoker will generate revenue for the Tobacco manufacturers for many years to come. That is why the tobacco industry prefers to have their clients starting as young as possible, so they can get a lot of “ financial mileage” out of them.

Making and selling cigarettes is very profitable, it creates substantial amounts of revenue, so much, that the legal supplier vs consumer equilibrium has gone and Big Tobacco has become more or less untouchable, especially through the courts. In legal circles it is an axiom never to sue the tobacco companies, because it is too prohibitive. The tobacco companies make sure they are no easy targets for torts. They have developed legal strategies that are aimed at long drawn-out court cases including lengthy pre-trial hearings, they have hordes of scientists on tap who are paid to use the tobacco manufacturers own version of science in order to defend the indefensible. So by the time we may get near a verdict, the client may be already dead, as only those who become terminally ill with a smoking related disease are inclined to want to sue the tobacco companies.

The Tobacco Industry also retain armies of lobbyists who persuade governments to continue to allow their products to be on the market. They hire (buy) former or even current government ministers, senators, governors, members of parliament and people of that ilk and pay them substantial retainers, under the guise of product promotion, but what they really want out of those politicians is to take advantage of their positions, their knowledge and their contacts, so the Tobacco Industry can stay one step ahead of government attempts to curb the sale of their products.

The Tobacco Industry

2009-01-01T05:59:00.000-08:00

Let’s look at where the cigarettes come from: The Tobacco Industry!
Current annual sales of a thriving World Tobacco Industry vary between US$300 and US$400 billion. The Tobacco Industry agrees in principle with what the Scientific Community has discovered and has been unequivocally stating for many years: smoking tobacco products kills people. Every 6 seconds or so, one person tragically and unnecessarily dies from a smoking related disease, usually in pain, severe discomfort or because of an opiate painkiller overdose in order to prevent even more suffering.

The Tobacco Industry claims that it is people’s free will to smoke. They state that nobody forces smokers to smoke and they claim that everybody can quit smoking whenever they want, thereby totally omitting and deliberately ignoring the addiction element. By agreeing to have death warnings on their packaging, they can now claim: we warned you, you should not have smoked!

Most people have once smoked a cigarette or part of a cigarette, it is almost part of life. Unfortunately, nicotine stimulates the same parts of the brain that crack cocaine and heroin do, which is fortunate for the Tobacco Industry as it makes sure they maintain their client base (read hostages). Crack cocaine and heroin give you a proper high, but nicotine is not even very good in that department, although the hold it has over the smoker is just about as strong.

Take your brain for a wash

2009-01-01T05:51:00.000-08:00

You believe that everybody who stops smoking puts weight on. Wrong! The majority of former smokers do not put weight on. If you have been used to finishing every meal with a cigarette for many years, then it is difficult to stop eating in the beginning, as that cigarette is not going to be there and you feel that the meal has not finished properly, so you continue to eat. Also, in the beginning you can quickly tell the difference in how food tastes as your taste buds start to work normally again and your ability to smell returns. There are indeed also people who substitute food for cigarettes in order to fulfill a need for oral satisfaction. But it is not the stopping smoking that makes you put on weight it is only overeating and eating the wrong food that makes you put on weight.

People smoke because they are addicted to nicotine and they need regular fixes of nicotine, any other reason for smoking is either imagined, the result of self delusion or brainwashing.

Highs and Lows

2009-01-01T05:50:00.000-08:00

Let’s look at the “high” that smokers perceive they get from lighting up, inhaling smoke into their lungs and extracting the nicotine from it to bind with certain brain receptors. Smoking affects the human brain's natural system of chemicals called endogenous opioids. They play a role in quelling painful sensations, heightening positive emotions, and creating a sense of reward. It is that same part of the brain stem that is stimulated by heroin, morphine and crack cocaine. However, with nicotine, the prime stimulus, which is stronger than all the other stimuli is still the relief of craving for nicotine. The absence of craving gives that pleasant feeling of relief which is interpreted by the brain as a high, but is only reduced anxiety and a climb back up to normality.

Most smokers believe that smoking both relieves stress and helps concentration. This of course is a contradiction. Smoking can’t do either, let alone both. It can’t help the smoker to concentrate and also help him/her to relax. First the relief of stress: the best way to relieve stress is to take some deep breaths, which is exactly what you do by lighting a cigarette. So, it is not the smoking that gives you some relief from stress, it is taking deep breaths when you inhale the cigarette smoke that immediately reduces that stress. It is also a fact that smokers actually have higher baseline stress levels than non-smokers or ex-smokers.

You think you concentrate better when you light a cigarette? Wrong again! Your concentration improves because of the deep breaths and the relief from craving, not the smoking itself.

You think you need a cigarette when you are out with friends or enjoy yourself more whilst smoking in a social situation? Sorry, wrong again! Smoking dries out your mouth and urges you to drink more. Alcohol reduces the relief from craving, so you need to smoke more to get the desired “feeling normal” effect. You have all been at social situations with alcohol when you smoked one after the other because the brain could not get to the “normal” state. Drinking therefore makes you smoke more, which in turn gives you that tight and unpleasant feeling in your chest. So again, there is very little to enjoy for the smoker in a social situation, when combining alcohol and cigarettes. Again, the smoker’s mind plays tricks and let the smoker believe that undertaking certain leisure activities will not be as pleasant without smoking.

What Smoking Does NOT do!

2009-01-01T05:47:00.000-08:00

Other than interrupting the craving for nicotine, smoking doesn’t give you any benefits. Contrary to popular belief, smoking does not give you a high, smoking does not relieve stress, smoking neither relaxes you nor does it make you concentrate any better. Smoking adds nothing to your body that you actually need. But it does a fair bit of damage to your body.

There has been scientific research that tells us that smoking and fueling the brain’s need for nicotine causes an increase of the secretion of dopamine and noradrenalin in the brain. In reality, this negates the feelings of anxiety and irritability as a result of nicotine craving, so the two cancel each other out, making you feel just “normal”.

You may think otherwise and you may have fooled and possibly brainwashed yourself into believing differently, but the only one thing smoking does for you is: interrupt the craving for nicotine for a short space of time. Absolutely nothing else!!!! I have to repeat this several times because most smokers refuse to believe it, because smoking is important to them as it is their crutch.

So let me repeat: Smoking does absolutely nothing for the smoker! There is not the slightest benefit for your body or your brain! Like most smokers, you may be deluded to think that you actually like or enjoy smoking, but even that is impossible as, in order to smoke, you have to override your immune system and inhale toxic fumes. Again, people who claim that they like smoking have only convinced themselves that they do, as there is absolutely nothing likable about forcing yourself to inhale bad tasting and foul smelling toxic fumes.
Claiming that you actually like smoking is a rationalisation, a phrase psychiatrists define as: a defense mechanism by which your true motivation is concealed by explaining your actions and feelings in a way that is not threatening.

The most likeable thing when you smoke a cigarette is that the craving stops temporarily (there, I mention it again). You can actually compare stopping the craving for nicotine with hitting your head against a brick wall for a while and then stop; that is a very pleasant feeling too, similar to a high.

How Normal is "Normal"?

2009-01-01T05:44:00.000-08:00

What in most cases has prevented you from giving up, is a dependency by your brain on nicotine. Believe it or not, but you have in fact only become dependent on smoking cigarettes, so you can feel "normal".

“Normal” in this context means: for a short while, usually around 45 minutes, the craving for nicotine has stopped completely and therefore, you feel just as normal as a healthy non-smoker who of course never craves for nicotine.

Let's turn that around slightly: If you were NOT a smoker, you would always feel exactly as if you just had a cigarette. In addition, you'd be richer and healthier!!!!

That idea must make "being a non-smoker" a lot more interesting, but hang on, there is a lot more.....

You and the "BIG QUIT"

2009-01-01T05:35:00.000-08:00

If you are "The Average Smoker", you may have been smoking for more than 25 years. When attempting to quit, you may have tried the patches, the gum, perhaps even medication and certainly the “not so warm” turkey. It may have worked temporarily, but you have gone back to smoking after a while, usually because some kind of a crisis in your life, some severe stress or just after a few drinks. Perhaps you started again when people around you were lighting up and your resolve all of a sudden just crumbled or when you just thought "what the hell, other people smoke, I miss my cigarettes, so I am going to have just one, who cares, I can always give up tomorrow!" Or maybe people around you have asked you to start smoking again because you became so irritable and moody that they began to feel uncomfortable in your presence. Alternatively, you perhaps thought: “I know this old guy, he was in his 80s; he had smoked since he was 12 and there was nothing wrong with him, I can be like that!”
You may have started smoking again with just one drag or one cigarette and you thought: "I am OK, I won't go back to full smoking", but soon you were back and you were smoking as least as much if not more than before. It a scientific fact that 70 percent of smokers wants to stop, 30 percent tries at least once a year and between 2 and 3 percent actually succeed. The fact that you are reading this blog probably puts you in that 30 percent “try quitting once a year” bracket.

Where does it begin?

2009-01-01T05:29:00.000-08:00

Most people start smoking well before the age of 20, it tends to be peer pressure that make people smoke that first cigarette. Friends do it, it looks sophisticated and fashionable, and as there are no examples of young people dying from it or even getting ill from it, smoking generally starts as a fairly innocuous habit by adolescents who are genetically wired to believe that they are indestructible anyway. Those young people, like you once were, are The Tobacco Industry’s ready made client base. They have, on average, another 40 years of smoking ahead of them during which they are forced to spend, in real terms, around $500,000 on their addiction. No wonder The Tobacco Industry projects smoking as something youthful, fabulously hip, on the edge and fashionable for young people.

You are more than likely one of those who have come to the conclusion that for a variety of reasons, enough is enough and you want to quit now, preferably today, but, like most smokers who are contemplating the “BIG QUIT”, you are scared and worried witless! You are worried that you cannot live without smoking; you are worried that you are going to suffer terrible cravings, severe withdrawal symptoms, irritation, awful mood swings and even pain. You are convinced that you will be suffering substantial discomfort after giving up as it is likely that this has happened to you during your previous attempt to quit and perhaps all those times before too. You may have heard the term: self fulfilling prophecy, as that is indeed what will happen when you quit.

But maybe not necessarily so …………………!!!

Smoking Information

2009-01-01T05:08:00.000-08:00

I have learned a thing or two about smoking, about the process of giving up and whilst helping others, I learned a lot about why people smoke and how they can be persuaded to give up. I have also learned things about the Tobacco Industry and most of all, I have found out that most people have absolutely no idea why they smoke, what makes them smoke, what drives them to spend money every day on tobacco products against their will, what they think they get out of smoking, how smoking influences their behaviour and to what degree their lives are controlled by cigarettes.

If you are a smoker, intending to give up, I am happy to share some of that knowledge with you, with the aim to make it easier not to just give up smoking, as that sounds way too nice and friendly; I want to help you to stop deliberately abusing and damaging your own body beyond repair by inhaling heavily toxic fumes with strictly no other use than fueling your nicotine addiction. I will change your views on your own smoking habit, which ultimately will make it considerably easier to give up smoking for the rest of your life.

I am hoping to give you a wake-up call, NOT by listing all the diseases smoking can cause, as that does not help you at all; it is more likely to make you leave this blog, as you already know smoking is bad for you. The fact that smoking kills people (lots of them) is unfortunately not much of a deterrent. If that was the case, smokers would find it much easier to give up. Even if smoking was ten times more dangerous and ten times more likely to kill you (hypothetically of course), it would not make any difference in your smoking behaviour. What I want to do is make you look more objectively at both your habit and your addiction, helping you to analyse your smoking, find the weaknesses in it that help you to quit quickly, effortlessly and without any side effects.

Is that possible? Yes, it certainly is! Read the whole blog, with an open mind including the last post, then follow the link to the website that can be found in the last post called The Challenge and it will happen!

Why and What?

2009-01-01T04:59:00.000-08:00

As a Professional Hypnotherapist, my only specialisation is Smoking Cessation. Over the years, I have helped a growing number of people to quit smoking. Those who chose my method suffered minimal aftereffects such as craving, mood swings, withdrawal symptoms etc. Most had none of those problems at all. They stopped immediately without any problems normally associated with quitting smoking; they didn't need any patches, gum or any drugs and they never wanted to smoke again. How is that possible? Spend 20 minutes or so reading this blog and you will have an idea why.

For openers, I have become aware that most smokers, even after smoking for 30 or 40 years, have absolutely no idea why they smoke. They have no idea about the mechanisms and the psychology behind their smoking. Smokers are not aware that they are being deceived, manipulated, and literally led to the slaughter. They also have no idea that there is a cheap, simple and easy way out of the smoking hell that works instantaneously and lasts for life.

For a while, I have been looking for ways to help more people than those who come to my clinic in Cheshire, England and receive hypnotherapy on a one-to-one basis. As a result, I launched the World’s First On-line Hypnotherapy Clinic for Smoking Cessation, a Hypnotherapy delivery methodology that assists smokers to give up at home in their own time, in front of their PCs. It is an absolute unique service that is available on a no-cure-no-pay basis, that's how convinced I am that it works. The website is called www.nosmokingagain.com but...... don't go there yet, read some more (better read it all) before you decide to quit today.