Good question @Charles4511 How do I get my brain to stop telling me it's OK to smoke? Well my answer is to retrain myself, my thinking and my beliefs, understand the nature of my addiction. The core of the addiction IS just that, even though it isn't OK we're wired to go ahead with that FALSE BELIEF. Intellectually I knew many years ago that my smoking was not good for me and yet it took decades to actually do something about it.
So each crave, each trigger, each of my "favorite" times, situations, and places to smoke I had to actively relearn healthy attitudes, connections, and behaviors by deliberate mindful intervention and HELP from others going through the very same kind of things as me. That's where your support network comes into play.
The brain, our memories, and especially our EMOTIONS, WILL STOP "telling" us in the many ways that it happens as we gradually build a new set of memories and new beliefs. Each crave that I beat was a victory, still IS in fact even though I haven't actually had a crave in (I can't remember) many years and for me those added up to like 20 or even more a day. Doesn't take real long to add up a whole pile of healthy actions and thus FEELING just like it doesn't take real long to add up a whole pile of unhealthy addictive actions. The CHOICE is ours friend.....
I believed that I would die a smoker until I started living as a NON SMOKER and the more I did it, the more success I had at dealing with life WITHOUT SMOKING, the more that guy faded away. Now my brain, but especially my EMOTIONS, doesn't say anything about ever smoking again. I simply DON'T do that any more.
It has come about from deliberately NOT doing it and learning to deal with everything in this life in other ways. Stick around and follow your course forward ONE DAY AT A TIME.......one hour at a time, one minute at a time, if necessary until you wind up realizing, BELIEVING, that you can in fact change. Take a crave and find something else to do that is positive even if it's just a distraction until the crave passes.
I'm telling you that it's NOT OK to smoke. It's a LIE the junkie you is telling the FREE you and we need to intervene until it becomes our new NORMAL state...
I believed that I was a smoker until death, then I changed that belief through grasping my own actions and the results. NOW I KNOW that I am NOT a smoker and that I will die at some point in time FREE......YOU CAN TO! We are here to help each other make that our NEW REALITY and we get to choose it.
So, TIME, it is the healer and you need to allow yourself the proper amount of time for the healing to happen. Do that by staying clear of the chemistry that got you to where you are now. Do it deliberately and with a sense of accomplishment and positive attitude and YOU WILL CHANGE.
That's some thoughts on it from my perspectives......One day at a time I'm approaching 13 years FREE.....you can to.
Papa
In a daily journey of transformation the only thing I can actually control is me and my own behavior...
