6. Reward Yourself
Set up a plan for your
rewards. Definitely reward yourself after the first day, and the second and the third. You can do the fourth if you want, but definitely after week one and week two. And month one and month two. And 6 months and a year. Make them good rewards, things you'll look forward to: CDs, books, DVDs, T-shirts, shoes, a massage, a bike, a dinner out at your favorite restaurant, a hotel stay. Whatever you can afford. Even better, take whatever you would have spent on smoking each day and put it in a jar. This is your rewards jar. Go crazy! Celebrate your every success! You deserve it.
7. Delay
If you have an urge to smoke, wait. Do the following things:
- Take 10 deep breaths
- Drink water
- Eat a snack (at first it was candy and gum, then I switched to healthier stuff like carrots and frozen grapes and pretzels)
- Call your support person
- Post on your support forum
- Exercise
Do whatever it takes, but DELAY, DELAY, DELAY. You will make it through, and the urge to smoke will go away. When it does, celebrate! Take it one urge at a time, and you can do it.
8. Replace Negative Habits with Positive Ones
What do you do when you're stressed? If you currently react to stress with a cigarette, you'll need to find something else to do. Deep breathing, self-massage [for] my neck and shoulders and exercise have worked wonders for me. Other habits, such as what you do first thing in the morning or what you do in the car or wherever you usually smoke, should be replaced with better, more positive ones. Running has been my best positive habit, although I have a few others that replaced smoking.
9. Make it Through Hell Week, then Heck Week and You're Golden
The hardest part of quitting is the first three days. If you can get past that, you've passed the
nicotine withdrawal stage, and the rest is mostly mental, but all of the first week is hell, which is why it's called "hell week." After that, it begins to get easier. Second week is heck week and is still difficult — but not nearly as hellish as the first. After that, it was smooth sailing for me. I just had to deal with an occasional strong urge, but the rest of the urges were light, and I felt confident I could make it through anything.
10. If You Fall, Get Up, and Learn From Your Mistakes
Yes, we all fail. That does not mean we are failures or that we can never succeed. If you fall, it's not the end of the world. Get up, brush yourself off and try again. I failed numerous times before succeeding. But you know what? Each of those failures taught me something. Well, sometimes I repeated the same mistakes several times, but eventually I learned. Figure out what your obstacles to success are, and plan to overcome them in your next quit attempt. And don't wait a few months [...] before trying again. Give yourself a few days to plan and prepare, commit fully to it and go for it!
BONUS TIP #11: THINK POSITIVE
This is the most important tip of all. I saved it for last. If you have a positive, can-do attitude, as corny as it may sound, you will succeed. Trust me. It works. Tell yourself that you can do it, and you will. Tell yourself that you can't do it, and you definitely won't. When things get rough, think positive! You
can make it through urges to smoke. You
can make it through Hell week. And you can. I did. So have millions of others. We are no better than you, or in my case, worse. Make it happen!
