Quit Smoking the Easy Way: Awesomeness Chapter 13

My Fifth Recommendation on Wellness

Oct 05, 2023

This is the full thirteenth chapter of my book, and fifth on the subject of wellness, from my book Awesomeness: An Amateur Potpourri of a How-To-Guide.

See part 12: Meditation, here.

Quit Smoking the Easy Way

If you’re a smoker, you’re probably like me; you never wanted to be one and never thought I would get hooked on the damn things. I think I had my first cigarette when I was 17 and became an official smoker sometime around the age of 22. During the next six years, I tried to quit dozens of times. Occasionally, I would quit for a month or two — and then I’d have a stressful day, and fall right back into the trap.

Then I read a book and quit instantly.

The book is The Easy Way to Stop Smoking by the Allen Carr. What Allen Carr does is explains why the normal methods of quitting almost always fail. They fail because they are based on willpower. Paul Popov, someone who successfully quit with Allen Carr’s approach, describes the problem with the normal willpower method,

“Willpower is, contrary to the popular belief, a finite resource, which means that there is a fair possibility that a series of negative events will crush it and your no-smoking story will end in something they call “extinction burst”[1]

Willpower is finite. So what Allen Carr did was turn the whole thing around. Instead of asking “why shouldn’t we smoke?” he asks “why do we smoke?” Everyone already knows smoking is terrible for your health, [2] costs a fortune and makes you stink and feel lethargic. I think it’s quite obvious that people don’t smoke for these reasons.

Allen Carr notes that there are only two reasons people smoke:

1) Nicotine Addiction
2) The Brainwashing

Let’s start with the addiction. While nicotine is extremely addictive, it’s an extremely weak addiction. The withdrawal pangs are almost entirely illusory. As Carr notes,

“There is no physical pain in the withdrawal from nicotine. It is merely a slightly empty, restless feeling, the feeling that something isn’t quite right, or that something is missing…”[3]

And furthermore,

“Most smokers go all night without a cigarette. The withdrawal “pangs” do not even wake them up. Many smokers will leave the bedroom before they light that first cigarette; many will have breakfast first. Increasingly people don’t smoke in their homes and won’t have that first cigarette until they are in the car on the way to work… These smokers have eight or maybe ten hours without a cigarette—going through withdrawal all the while, but it doesn’t seem to bother them.”[4]

So why do we smoke? It’s certainly not because of the petty withdrawal pangs. The reason is because we think we’re giving up something precious and that feeling of deprivations causes almost all of the terrible withdrawal pangs quitters experience. This is where the brainwashing comes in. The brainwashing makes us think that the cigarette is actually something quite good. We think the cigarette relieves stress and boredom and helps us concentrate and relax. And while these are illusions, they can have a powerful effect on us if we believe them. After all, the mind can actually make the body physically sick.[5]

For example, a smoker we’ll say “I smoke to alleviate boredom.” But honestly, what could be more boring than a cigarette? Indeed, many of these claims are actually contradictory. Carr again,

“The smoker himself will decide when [he smokes] and it tends to be on four types of occasions…
“Boredom/Concentration-Two complete opposites!
“Stress/Relaxation-Two Complete opposites!
“What magic drug can suddenly reverse the very effect it had twenty minutes earlier?”[6]

The very first instruction in the book is to smoke until you finish. This allows Carr to obliterate every possible excuse you have for smoking and let you come to the realization that smoking adds nothing to your life, but instead takes away a massive amount.

So once I realized that the withdrawal pangs were a joke and that nicotine added nothing, quitting was almost embarrassingly easy for me.

And this has certainly been the experience of many others. I bought the book about two years ago the book had over 1000 ratings on Amazon.com and still had a five star rating! That is something I have never seen for a book with that many ratings. And the few negative reviews seem to have missed the mark entirely. For example,

“I wish this book were true. Unfortunately, it is wishful thinking. It does not take into account the actual physical symptoms of quitting smoking. It assumes that all physical ills are psychological, which they aren’t. I am so disappointed with both the book and the reviews.”[7]

This, of course, ignores the fact that Carr demonstrated that the physical side effects of nicotine withdrawal are extremely mild. How exactly, if the “symptoms of quitting smoking” are so bad, do we sleep through the night without them bothering us in the slightest?

Furthermore, other forms of quitting don’t work anywhere close to as well (I can certainly attest to that). For example, it’s correctly claimed that nicotine replacement therapy doubles the chance of success. But then again, it doubles your chances only to about 10 percent.[8] On the other hand, a study in the Internal Archives of Occupational Environmental Health showed Allen Carr’s seminars to have a 12 month success rate of 51.4 percent![9]

He also offers a money back guarantee at his live seminars, and claims that less than 10 percent end up requesting such a refund. Given how it seems that Carr’s message flew over the heads of those who failed, how many of those that failed just didn’t take the book (or seminar) to heart?

So if you are trying to quit smoking, do yourself a favor and give The Easy Way to Stop Smoking a try. To see more, view his website at www.allencarr.com.

Author’s Note: I am not affiliated with Allen Carr or his organization in any way. I’m just a very happy customer.

[1] Paul Popov, “Why You Need More Than Willpower To Quit Smoking”, Thought Catalog, http://thoughtcatalog.com/paul-popov/2014/05/why-you-need-more-than-willpower-to-quit-smoking/, May 8, 2014

[2] In case you need reminding, see “Health Effects of Cigarette Smoking”, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, http://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/fact_sheets/health_effects/effects_cig_smoking/index.htm, Accessed May 2, 2015

[4] Ibid., Pg. 34

[5] See for example, Eric Yosomono, “The 5 Strangest Ways Your Mind Can Get Your Body Sick”, Cracked, http://www.cracked.com/article_19209_the-5-strangest-ways-your-mind-can-get-your-body-sick.html, May 27, 2011

[7] Jla, “false advertising”, customer review on Amazon.com, http://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/R2BCAY08MHBH9S/ref=cm_cr_pr_rvw_ttl?ie=UTF8&ASIN=0973468408, June 20, 2012

[8] See John R. Polito, “Is Nicotine Replacement Therapy The Smoker’s Last Best Hope?”, Why Quit, http://whyquit.com/whyquit/A_NRT.html, November 14, 2000

[9] H. Moshammer and M. Neuberger, “Long term success of short smoking cessation seminars by occupational health care”, Journal of Addictive Behaviors, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17097816, November 13, 2006

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And the audiobook here.

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The Syrios Brother

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