stopping smoking - what we all know hypnotherapy is good for

Its getting close to the smoking in public places ban in England now, and of course the ban is already in place in Ireland, Scotland and Wales.

There seems to be a huge wave of activity from stores, businesses and the media encouraging smokers to quit. A few new products and medications are being released into the market and there is a general assumption that everyone will now want to quit.

The ban will of course persuade a few smokers to give up the dreaded weed, but perhaps this view is too simple.

I've helped many people to quit smoking and the most important aspect of successfully quitting is that they have to really want to stop. Sounds obvious, but actually we are not good at doing things under pressure - whether that be from family, friends, employers or the government. When we feel pressurised it can, in some cases make us want to smoke more.

One of the reasons why hypnotherapy is one of the most successful methods of quitting smoking (an independent study published in New Scientist magazine in 1992 showed that it was topped only by needing to quit urgently due to diagnosis of serious illness), is that a hypnotherapist will take time to help you discover your reasons for smoking.

If we are doing something that we know is harmful for us (very harmful in fact), that is not a natural thing to do, then we must have something in the back of our minds that tells us that it is a good idea, otherwise having done it once, we would never do it again. Anyone who has contracted serious food poisoning from eating a certain food in a certain restaurant is most unlikely to return and order the same dish again. It's instinct to avoid what harms.

If we make ourselves overcome the instinct that we are harming ourselves, then we must have a good reason for doing that. Gum, patches, medication, inhalers and going cold turkey don't address this issue, and for these reasons most have a very low success rate in helping people to quit.

People often ask me "does it work?" which is an interesting question. The answer is yes, but it depends on how you define "IT". Hypnotherapy works alongside your own mind, and it is your mind that is making the change, not the hypnotherapy. If we think back to times when we have "made up our mind about something", then change happens easily. And, even if we just focus on the hypnotherapy, hypnotherapy is not a constant. Hypnotherapists are trained at different schools, using different methods. They specialise in different areas, and have different levels of experience and knowledge. And, even if there were two hypnotherapists trained on the same course at the same time then they would still develop different styles.

Choosing hypnotherapy is not like using patches. Hypnotherapy will be different depending on which therapist you choose, and it is prudent to choose a therapist that you feel that you like. In the profession, we call this having rapport.

I guess there are hypnotherapists who read from a script, personally I never do. Suggestions are tailored individually for each client, and that means that the first part of any stop smoking session should allow the hypnotherapist and client to establish the important thought processes regarding smoking. These are:

a. why you want to quit smoking
b. why you have still continued smoking
c. why a. is now greater than b.

Some people just don't want to stop. Those people are not going to have their minds changed by a ban on smoking in public places. They will find other ways to smoke. However, the ban might just be enough to tip the balance between a. and b. above for a lot of other people.

And, let's face it, we can imagine things are much harder than they actually are. Smoking is, for many people, a really easy habit to break. Smoking can stop with no side effects and no cravings, and it can stop quickly too, not with any long drawn out supported reduction process. You might protest about this. If its so easy, why do we find it so hard to stop? Perhaps because we keep telling ourselves, and others, that it is hard to stop. Its part of the myth of smoking.

Let me tell you a story. A slightly strange one, I confess. For several years after I qualified as a hypnotherapist from the National College, I never treated smokers. The reason for this was that I was a smoker myself. I was a smoker who didn't want to quit. As a smoker I did not feel it was right for me to encourage people through hypnotherapy to quit, so I worked on other issues instead.

After smoking 20 - 30 a day for almost 20 years, I decided one day that I wanted to give up. I spoke this through with a friend, who said something very interesting to me. He asked me what I meant by "giving up", and he talked about another meaning of that phrase, which is to give up our problems to the higher self. As a therapist, this made perfect sense to me of course, so we did an exercise around that, which actually wasn't hypnosis because at that point I had not reached the place where I was completely ready to quit. We then decided that I should do nothing, and not even think about stopping smoking, but to carry on.

three weeks later I had an extraordinary dream, where I was in outer space talking to a large bright blue star. When I awoke, I knew instantly that I was a total non smoker. I had cigarettes in the house that remained untouched for a couple of days until I threw them away. Usually I would have smoked my first before leaving the house in the morning. I had no cravings, no side effects, it was simply as if I had never smoked. The only thing I noticed about smoking was an incredibly unpleasant smell. I could smell cigarettes from the other side of the street and realised how nauseating the smell is.

My sensitivity to the smell wore off after a couple of days, just as we get used to anything. That dream was over ten years ago now, and I have not touched a cigarette since. The decision in my mind was made, and therefore I simply changed. I've witnessed this effect many times since in clients that I've worked with, who have contacted me afterwards and told me how easy it was.