Frequently Asked Questions

Quit Smoking and Hypnosis Frequently Asked Questions

...success is judged by the resolution of all subconscious needs around smoking.

Will I put on weight if I quit smoking?

It is normal to put on a pound or two when you quit smoking, but this is not fat.

Smoking dehydrates the body (that's why it's bad for your complexion). When you are a permanent non-smoker your body will re-hydrate.

Weight gain can be a problem if we substitute snacking for smoking, and this can happen if we have an unresolved subconscious need for smoking.

However, with our method of stopping, this is not an issue. You pay a flat fee and have as many sessions as you need; success is judged by the resolution of all subconscious needs around smoking.

Will hypnosis make me quit?

Nothing can "make" you quit smoking.

However, hypnosis is scientifically proven to be the most effective method of helping you stop smoking (New Scientist, volume 136)

If someone said that they would harm you if you lit a cigarette, that might "make" you stop for as long as that hypothetical situation existed. But it wouldn't stop you being a nicotine addict.

You smoke because you have a deep subconscious desire to smoke. If you want to quit smoking, you have to come to terms with that desire and release it.

Hypnosis is a very powerful technique to help you quit smoking, and we use it more than any other single therapeutic technique.

Why do I continue to smoke even though I hate the habit?

All drug addictions work the same way. The drug fools your subconscious mind into thinking that you get a benefit from it.

After he puts a cigarette out, the smoker experiences a gradual heightening of the withdrawal effect. The next time he lights a cigarette, the smoker gets very rapid relief from the withdrawal effects.

Unfortunately, the subconscious mind is both not very good at spotting gradual changes, and very good at spotting sudden changes.

The peculiar result is that the subconscious ignores the withdrawal effects completely and notices the relief. In other words, the subconscious mind believes that the drug has a genuine beneficial effect.

Of course, all the genuinely genuine bad effects of smoking happen gradually as well, and so the subconscious ignores those as well!

So the damage to your vital organs, the poisoning of your body, and the deterioration to your complexion, are all ignored because your subconscious has been tricked into thinking that it benefits from the relief from the withdrawal effects of the previous cigarette!!!

Is there an easy way to quit smoking?

If we can convince our subconscious that smoking is a bad idea, we will avoid the extreme withdrawal symptoms such as "Tearing our hair out" or "Climbing the walls". Fortunately, the subconscious is in charge of running the body, so it has vested interest in stopping a habit that is damaging your vital organs.

What about the withdrawal symptoms when I quit smoking?

There are two types of withdrawal symptom: psychological and physical.

The psychological symptoms are usually much worse, and are caused by subconscious need for the habit. This is what causes us to "Tear our hair out" or "Climb the walls".

The physical withdrawal symptoms of the drug nicotine are very mild. We experience an empty feeling and perhaps feel a little light-headed.

If the physical withdrawal symptoms are so mild, how did I form the habit?

Smoking, like any drug habit, works back to front. Normally we do something because we enjoy it, but with smoking we do it because we don't enjoy the effects of not doing it. After we put a cigarette out, the nicotine level in our body starts to fall and we begin to feel the withdrawal effects. When we smoke the next cigarette, the withdrawal effects stop.

The subconscious mind then associates the stopping of the withdrawal effects with the cigarette and we are fooled into thinking that we are getting a benefit. That is what keeps us smoking.

I get a lot of pleasure from smoking, why should I quit?

Here are seven reasons why you might want to consider quitting:

Smoking related illnesses kill 120,000 people in Britain every year. The vast majority of people that die of lung cancer are smokers.
If you smoke twenty cigarettes a day, you spend £1642 per year – that's enough for a decent holiday every year. At today's prices, someone who started smoking at the age of 16 and continued at an average of 20 per day until the age of 46, will have seen nearly fifty-five thousand pounds disappear in smoke!
Smoking is no longer considered a polite or acceptable form of public behaviour
120,000 men in the UK are impotent because of smoking.
Many women spend a small fortune on anti-wrinkle creams, but the best way to stay beautiful is to stop smoking. For every wrinkle on the face of a non-smoker, the smoker has ten.
The smell. Any non-smoker will tell you about the revolting smell of a smoker.
Smoking controls your life; the smoker is quite prepared to go out late at night for a packet of cigarettes so that they will have a cigarette available for morning.
Smoking is banned in public places.

What about nicotine patches?

The latest studies show that nicotine patches or gum are no more effective than 'will-power' alone.

"The use of nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) for smoking cessation is no longer effective in helping moderate and heavy smokers quit for the long term, and it has no benefit for light smokers" (Sept. 11 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association, Vol. 288, No. 10: 1260-1264).

I've been smoking for ages, why give up now?

Unless you have just a short time to live, there is always something to be gained from giving up smoking. If you were to stop smoking right now:

If you quit smoking, you feel good about yourself.
After 20 minutes the circulation in your hands and feet will start improving.
After 8 hours your chances of a heart attack start to fall.
After a couple of days nicotine is no longer detectable in your body.
After a few weeks the quit smoking therapy has paid for itself, and you will have money to burn (not literally!).
After a few months your eyesight and senses of smell and taste are back up to their pre-smoking levels.
After a few years your lungs are as healthy as someone that has never smoked.

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Quit Smoking Frequently Asked Questions

Will I put on weight if I quit smoking? Why do I continue to smoke even though I hate the habit? Is there an easy way to quit smoking? What about the withdrawal symptoms when I quit smoking? If the physical withdrawal symptoms are so mild, how did I form the habit?

Hypnosis FAQs

What's the difference between hypnosis and hypnotherapy? Will I enjoy it? Will you make me bark like a chicken? What does hypnosis feel like?

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Stop Smoking

"I had a sixty-a-day habit, and I quit in just one session";

"...it was so easy. In fact 'easy' is the wrong word; I didn't give up cigarettes, they gave me up!"

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OCD

"You are so easy to talk to."

Weight Loss

"It's rather freaky finding myself eating fruit rather than chocolate; I lost 3 pounds last week."

"Thanks David. Whatever we talked about, it seems to be working - I feel great about myself and have lost 7 pounds! Much appreciation."

Self Esteem

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Phobias

"After seeing you about my fear of flying I took my partner for a ride in a hot-air balloon. She got scared, and I ended up comforting her"

Anger

The weirdest thing I discovered was that I wasn't angry at all - it felt like anger, but it was something else.