You Lose an Old Friend When You Move From Smoking - But It"s Time to Say Goodbye
You need to feel proud of yourself when you succeed in kicking the habit and giving up smoking.
You may have tried to quit before and failed.
Was it because you were under pressure from other people to give up smoking, and felt as though they were nagging you all the time? Someone only has to say "you should give it up" a few times, and to you that will become nagging.
If you feel you are only giving up smoking because you are being pressurized, then you are not going to have sufficient motivation to succeed: you want to assert your free-thinking "independence" and carry on.
Smoking is an addiction; addictions become "old friends" after a while and very hard to give up.
What exactly was the attraction to the "old friend" in the first place? Did you think it would make you look cool, maybe you listened to peer pressure? Perhaps you think you are weak and were stupid to try smoking in the first place.
? Now, just suppose you have an "old friend" in a person that you have become unsure about - maybe you think they are lying to you, or that they have deceived you in some other way.
Hopefully, you would try and find out the facts.
If you are able to establish any with some credibility and you have been let down, would you seriously continue with that "old friendship" when your trust has been broken? You may have a lot of smoking friends and you are afraid of what they might say if you announce you are going to give up smoking.
People can, subconsciously, want you to fail.
A group of you all doing the same thing enables you to feel better about the habit, and it takes courage to go against the grain.
Enabling is often subconscious and very powerful - whatever you may feel on your own, when you are with others who smoke, you feel better about yourself and your smoking habit "because they all do it".
A similar pattern can be seen with heavy drinkers and alcohol - some surround themselves with "enablers" so they don't look so bad.
You could consider not telling them straight away that you have given up smoking - for a while they may not even notice, or say nothing if you don't draw their attention to the matter.
Take the first positive steps: you could tell your non-smoking friends privately and ask for their support.
In particular, if you have some irritable days you will need their understanding.
However you decide to try and give up smoking, promise yourself the best chance by using your social group in the most constructive way, take away the pressure from other people to give up smoking, seek their encouragement and support, and have every reason to feel proud of yourself when you finally quit the habit.
You may have tried to quit before and failed.
Was it because you were under pressure from other people to give up smoking, and felt as though they were nagging you all the time? Someone only has to say "you should give it up" a few times, and to you that will become nagging.
If you feel you are only giving up smoking because you are being pressurized, then you are not going to have sufficient motivation to succeed: you want to assert your free-thinking "independence" and carry on.
Smoking is an addiction; addictions become "old friends" after a while and very hard to give up.
What exactly was the attraction to the "old friend" in the first place? Did you think it would make you look cool, maybe you listened to peer pressure? Perhaps you think you are weak and were stupid to try smoking in the first place.
? Now, just suppose you have an "old friend" in a person that you have become unsure about - maybe you think they are lying to you, or that they have deceived you in some other way.
Hopefully, you would try and find out the facts.
If you are able to establish any with some credibility and you have been let down, would you seriously continue with that "old friendship" when your trust has been broken? You may have a lot of smoking friends and you are afraid of what they might say if you announce you are going to give up smoking.
People can, subconsciously, want you to fail.
A group of you all doing the same thing enables you to feel better about the habit, and it takes courage to go against the grain.
Enabling is often subconscious and very powerful - whatever you may feel on your own, when you are with others who smoke, you feel better about yourself and your smoking habit "because they all do it".
A similar pattern can be seen with heavy drinkers and alcohol - some surround themselves with "enablers" so they don't look so bad.
You could consider not telling them straight away that you have given up smoking - for a while they may not even notice, or say nothing if you don't draw their attention to the matter.
Take the first positive steps: you could tell your non-smoking friends privately and ask for their support.
In particular, if you have some irritable days you will need their understanding.
However you decide to try and give up smoking, promise yourself the best chance by using your social group in the most constructive way, take away the pressure from other people to give up smoking, seek their encouragement and support, and have every reason to feel proud of yourself when you finally quit the habit.