Stop Smoking

Smokers are being hounded and hunted these days. With ‘No’ being probably the most frequent word they’re hearing or reading, whether it’s at their workplace, their favourite restaurant, or their own home. “Don’t smoke in here!” is getting to be the smoker’s term of the day and it’s becoming more and more frequent.

But even though these smokers know that smoking, indoors or otherwise is hazardous to their health and that of others, it’s small wonder many of the millions of adult smokers around the world can’t help feeling like a scolded, bad child who’s always being punished. You might be one of them.

Perhaps the thought crossed your mind to quit smoking? Aren’t you at least thinking about quitting? Then maybe it’s time to re-program this “deprivation” into a constructive opportunity instead of a punishment.

There are enough New-Age mumbo-jumbo suggestions out there, this is not one of them. On the contrary, it’s derived from a scientific study published in the [1] American Journal of Public Health. The researchers found that workers whose employers enforced a non-smoking policy at work doubled their likelihood of successfully quitting the smoking habit.

On a more personal level, those smokers who decided not to smoke in their homes were almost 10 times more likely to be successful in stopping with smoking in homes where smoking was permitted.

So, choosing not to smoke in your own home not only decreases the amount you smoke and the hazardous effects on others around you, it will also help you quit the smoking habit.

That’s what we mean about changing your thinking. If you think of not smoking at home as an opportunity, you’ve changed two major aspects in the process toward becoming a non-smoker: you’ve changed your behaviour and you’ve changed your route of thinking – mind over matter.

Changing your thinking from the negative to the positive feels much better too doesn’t it. Instead of focusing on the more negative like “I can’t smoke here,” and all the other “I can’ts” and “not allowed’s”, instead you’ll be thinking “I am choosing to make my home and my immediate environment smoke-free.” Doesn’t that feel so much more constructive.

So, clean out those ashtrays and put them far away for good. Your non-smoking guests, your family, your pets, and not forgetting your own body will celebrate your achievement!

[1] Chung-won Lee and Jennifer Kahende, “Factors Associated with Successful Smoking Cessation in the United States, 2000,” American Journal of Public Health, Vol. 97, No. 8, August 2007.

Related Reading: