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Setting Your Goal

JonesCarpeDiem
5 7 80

Just what is your end goal?

Feel No Pressure Please. That Isn't What The Question Is About.

Simply, what would be the freedom you choose?

Is it strictly less harm?

Or

Is it not having to smoke every time you think of it?

I never realized anything about my need to smoke or

what I gave up to go smoke while I was a smoker,

Did you? It's not like I was in denial, I was in acceptance.

So, what are you looking for?

Plenty of people will just choose to vape.

That's a choice and it's okay for someone who has no idea how much

of themselves they devote in time and money to smoke,

and simply don't want to know.

Or,

Is it the nicotine or the habit that holds you?

Some will choose to make nicotine replacement their quit and continue

putting out money to feed that addiction.

We all know when things get tight, we addicts

always find a way to get our drug.

Some people want to be totally free.

They don't ever want to think about smoking again and,

they don't want to feed a nicotine addiction.

That's what I call TOTAL FREEDOM, but, it takes time to

unlearn the connections to the memories you made

while a smoker. I believe they're all rolling around in our cabesas.

Newsflash

The unlearning process doesn't have to be a war with yourself.

How do you overcome the battle?

You have to think. That is the secret to success.

When you first start your quit you have set your boundaries but you must 

be willing to reset them as you grow in knowledge.

That NRT isn't all of a sudden going to stop you from thinking

about something you did 20 times a day for 40 years.

That is not how it works. It's to take the edge off only.

Now, if you have your thinking cap on, you should realize that

using the NRT every time you would have smoked

is locking you into the same addiction cycle.

My suggestion with the NRT is to test yourself.

How?

If you forget to use your NRT, don't panic, Just see how you do.

There's no pressure or timetable to stop using them. 

Getting yourself off auto pilot is paramount.

Using something for 6 months or longer is no guarantee of anything.

 

Test yourself. The worst thing that can happen is you slap a

patch on or use whatever other NRT you were using.

What have you got to lose?

This is a WIN WIN proposition.

BE FREE!

7 Comments
About the Author
Hello, My name is Dale. I was quit 18 months before joining this site and had participated on another site during that time. I learned a lot there and brought it with me. I joined this site the first week of August 2008. I didn't pressure myself to quit. HOW I QUIT I didn't count, I didn't deny myself to get started. When I considered quitting (at a friends request to influence his brother to quit), I simply told myself to wait a little longer. No denial, nothing painful. After 4 weeks I was down to 5 cigarettes from a pack a day. The strength came from proving to myself, I didn't need to smoke because I normally would have smoked. Simple yes? I bought the patch. I forgot to put one on on the 4th day. I needed it the next day but the following week I forgot two days in a row I put one in my wallet with a promise to myself that I would slap it on and wait an hour rather than smoke. It rode in my wallet my first year.There's nothing keeping any of you from doing this. It doesn't cost a dime. This is about unlearning something you've done for a long time. The nicotine isn't the hard part. Disconnecting from the psychological pull, the memories and connected emotions is. :-) Time is the healer.