4 Mental Tactics That Can Help You Kick Smoking to the Curb

Quitting smoking is undoubtedly a psychological challenge.

We’re all familiar with those treatments that can help to curb physical withdrawal, such as nicotine gum, patches or replacement therapy. But coping with physical symptoms of withdrawal are just one aspect; mental discipline is of crucial importance when giving up too.

There are several potential pitfalls the quitter may encounter, particularly during the first few days of giving up, but perhaps the most formidable of these is the idle urge to light up during menial routine tasks; whether at work or at home.

Anticipating this is key for the new ex-smoker, and it’s important to have a collection of psychological defence strategies ready.

I’m not claiming that the following are definitive tactics which will work for everyone. Proven mental approaches obviously aren’t available on prescription, and the effectiveness of these will often vary from one quit attempt to another.

However, the following mental approaches may be useful to try out for those who haven’t considered them yet.

Make quitting the start of a new you

One way to make your new non-smoking status stick is to adopt a newer, more productive routine, and initiate other positive changes at the same time.

This might be making more of an effort to eat a healthier diet, starting at the gym or finally completing those chores you’ve been meaning to get around to for some time; such as organising your personal admin or doing some DIY around the home.

This helps to prevent relapse on two levels. Firstly, you’ll come to associate smoking more closely with the old you, and not smoking with the new you. The improvements in your health and practical life you’ll attribute, whether directly or indirectly, to not smoking.

Secondly, initiating other healthy habits will take some of the awe out the fact you’ve given up smoking; rather than being the thing you’ve given up or started doing in your life differently, it’ll be one of many. This can help to make quitting a less daunting prospect.

Get to know your distraction habits

The bane of the new ex-smoker is that ‘time in-between’ where the brain has a chance to wander. This could be sitting in a station waiting for a train, during the journey to work or home afterwards.

Keeping the mind busy during these periods is essential. The first few days of a quit attempt will be the most challenging in this regard, so try to anticipate those periods where you’re going to be sitting idle in one place or travelling somewhere.

Everyone has a different distraction threshold.

Reading a book can be enough to serve as a sufficient distraction for some but this might not be enough for others; puzzle-solving might be a more engrossing activity for people who need something more engaging, as might a telephone conversation with a friend.

Whenever you’re due to face ‘time in-between’, make sure you’re prepared and have something to read or a puzzle game on your phone at the ready. If there’s someone in your phonebook you’ve been meaning to catch up with, use this time to give them a ring.

Accept that the gutsy approach isn’t for everyone

There will have been social situations you entered into as a smoker before, which will still present themselves now that you’ve given up. Among these might be the communal routine cigarette break at work, or the quick nip outside while you’re out for drinks with friends.

So when the moment of truth comes, what do you as a non-smoker? Go out and talk to your friends while they smoke? Or play it safe and stay put?

It all depends on how confident you feel.

Going out and making a point of standing with your smoker friends while they smoke, yet abstaining, is a gesture which can provide a significant sense of empowerment and spur you on even more to stay quit.

But it can also prove too tempting for many quitters to bear, and result in them giving in to peer pressure and lighting up.

Make an internal decision regarding your strategy beforehand. If you’ve been quit for some weeks and think you can resist, then going and standing with your smoker friends is an exercise your confidence might benefit from.

If you’re still in the first few days and feel as though your willpower isn’t strong enough, don’t gamble with what you’ve achieved so far, and stay indoors. Even though it might feel antisocial in the short term, your heart and lungs will thank you in the long term.

Remember: it’s just chemicals making noise

Quitting smoking may produce a handful of physical withdrawal effects during the first few weeks, while the body and brain regain their chemical balance. However, these physical effects will normally reach their peak in the first few days of a quit attempt. From a physical standpoint, quitting only gets easier from then on.

And it’s useful when the mind wanders and your thoughts turn to smoking to remind yourself of this. Try to isolate these urges and see them for what they are; merely a chemical remnant, or ‘echo’, left behind by something you used to do.

Remember that over time, this echo will become quieter and quieter, until eventually you’ll barely be able to hear it.