Hopefully, after reading through part 1. You should understand that the reason people begin smoking, (cool, friends, risky, party etc) has no relation to why they continue to smoke.

However as a smoker continues to smoke, reasons need to be found for justifying the behavior, because it makes no more sense to smoke ,than it does putting your head over a fire place and inhaling smoke from there. Reasons have to be made and meaning placed upon the behavior of smoking to justify why a person would do it when it smells bad, tastes bad, costs money and has long ranging health effects.

Once a smoker understands that every reason they have created for continuing to smoke is false, it takes them a giant step closer to being a non smoker. Because there is only one reason why a person smokes, and that is because of the substance nicotine which is found in a cigarette.

When a person inhales nicotine into their body for the first time, rather than relax the body, it creates a slight stress as the nicotine is expelled from the blood stream. This stress is relived when further nicotine is inhaled. The nicotine leaves again, creating a stressor and this stressor is once again relived by smoking. This is the ongoing spiral a smoker finds themselves in. By smoking a person adds an additional stressor into their live called nicotine.

However the stressor itself is very mild. We are aware of many physical stressor’s on our body, such as thirst or hunger. We can notice these physical stressor’s for prolonged periods of time and not even care that much about them.

As the nicotine leaves the body it creates a similar stress to thirst or hunger. It is subtly and relatively mild. Once nicotine is totally expelled from the body the stress is then gone. And any physical effects caused by nicotine is ended. This occurs in as little as 4-7 days. This slight stress caused by nicotine is not to be confused with what people call a craving. The stress is a slight discomfort. A craving is the meaning placed upon that slight discomfort. It is a fabricated thought process that has been created over the years as a person continues to justify their smoking behavior. People who quit cold turkey and find it easy, interpret the stressor as an annoyance that will soon be gone. Those that go through cravings, place a greater importance upon the feeling.

Say you are a builder and you are out in the sun, it is a hot day and are working high up on a two story home. You may notice you become hot and thirsty. Although you notice the stressor (thirst), but because it would require some effort to climb down the scaffolding, you can’t be bothered doing much about it, plus you have heaps of work to get completed and decide to wait to lunch time. At lunch time you get called away, to run an errand, you are running late over your lunch break, race back to work and straight back up the scaffolding. You forgot to have a drink and notice that you are now quite thirsty. The throat dry and parched. However you can’t be bothered climbing back down and instead get straight back into the work. Later that evening you arrive home, sit down, and suddenly realize how thirsty you are. You go have a drink of water.

Say you are driving along an empty desert road with a group of people. It is a hot day And the car breaks down. Hours pass. Not a single car comes by. You notice you are thirsty. There is nothing to do but wait. And the longer you wait the more you notice you are thirsty, and the sun and the heat, and the absences of other cars. And the dry feeling at the back of the throat. You have no idea when someone will come past. Someone else has a drink bottle but they are not sharing. You begin to worry about how you’ll get more water. It is late afternoon, no cars. You are still stuck. So thirsty. So desperately wanting a drink. Some people are becoming angry, beginning to panic. You so badly need a drink of water. That evening a bus comes past. Suddenly you are relived, excited, you forget about your thirst and can’t wait to get home.

The actual physical sensation of thirst for the builder and the person stranded on the side of the road is exactly the same. However the meaning stressor conveys is different and while the builder is busy and has little time to reflect on the feeling of the stressor(thirst). The person doing nothing, but waiting has plenty of time to just think and contemplate the stressor called thirst which in turns makes it worse.

People who find it easy to quit going cold turkey

Have come to the conclusion, that smoking does nothing for them. Is boring. And the only reason they smoke is to relive a stressor caused by nicotine. They understand this stressor is very mild. Over the first two weeks once the cigarettes are thrown away, they keep themselves busy and occupied. When busy you don’t have time to notice slight physical stressor’s. They understand the thought cigarette, is just that, a thought. People have thousands of thoughts many times a day and don’t do much about them. Cravings are about you. Not the cigarette. They are the value you still place upon them. Take time to go over what you believe that cigarette actually means to you. Or what a craving means to you.

You can use the so what method for this. Each time you make a statement about a cigarette you simple go So What? You continue to do this until you arrive at another conclusion. ‘So what’ refers to So what does that actually mean.

For example. “I want a cigarette”. So what? “Well it would make me feel relaxed”. So what? “It would mean I could take a break from work”. So what? Well then I would be less stressed.” So what? etc etc

Example 2 “I have a craving”. So what? ” It is uncomfortable”. So what? This process takes you from the behavior you have been doing to the actually meaning you have placed upon it.

In part 3 of the series in quitting cold turkey, we look at the second pitfall that has people going back for cigarettes. Using cigarettes as a distraction.