1. Understand why you want to quit
Figure out why you want to stop smoking. For example, is it for health, money, or living longer with loved ones?. These reasons will get you motivated to start your quit journey.
2. Learn about Quitting
Don’t just pick another method to try without understanding if it’s right for you. Understanding the problem will help you pick the right solution. Watch these videos to learn about quitting: View Here
3. Learn how to deal with cravings: If you really think about it, it’s the mental cravings that tempt you to smoke when you’re trying to quit. Cravings can continue for years after all the nicotine has left your body. Some methods promote distraction, or willpower. Others teach mindfulness techniques to eliminate mental cravings.
4. Learn how to deal with fight or flight
You know that irritable, anxious, panicky feeling you get if you can’t smoke when you want too. That’s fight or flight kicking in and creating this urgency to smoke. It will be much smoother if you learn how to handle this before you attempt to quit.
5. Retrain your brain back to the mind of a non-smoker
Both mental cravings and fight or flight are reactions that your brain has adopted and made automatic, in order for it to deal with the addiction to nicotine. The problem is that these reactions don’t stop after you quit nicotine. They continue, making you vulnerable to relapse, and requiring you to use willpower for many years to come. The answer is to retrain your brain so you don’t have these reactions. Checkout something like True Quit, who specialise in brain retraining for smokers.
6. Get the right support
Just as with learning anything, the right support can make all the difference in helping you stay on track. It’s important to get the right support group.. That is support that understands about eliminating cravings and fight or flight, as well as brain retraining for smokers. If you get stuck, ask help.
7. Celebrate your wins
Reward yourself for reaching different milestones on your stop-smoking journey. For example, you could go on a holiday and pay for it using the money you save by not constantly purchasing cigarettes. This will keep you motivated to continue until you have quit permermanantly.