So when you’re trying to quit smoking, there are some general guidelines that you must follow if you stand a chance at actually quitting.
Being in the process myself, I have decided to offer the little guidance I can:
First, stop smoking.
This step is actually the most critical, as most smokers are under the impression that you can stop smoking while continuing to go outside and light cigarettes.
I’ve had this discussion several times with a smoker about ceasing our habits as we both lit up cigarettes, smoked them and then realized we were still pretty damn far from actually quitting. If you can manage to stop smoking, the next step is pretty helpful, too.
Second, don’t go out into public.
This step actually has a lot of good merits behind it: Interacting with other people while trying to stop smoking is unbearable. No one ever has anything interesting to say unless it has to do with cigarettes.
Often, this frustration in conversation will lead the smoker to hate everyone who happens to talk to him or her, and thus increase the desire for a cigarette even more, which we are trying to avoid.
Furthermore, everyone in public smokes when you are trying to stop, and that’s just the way it works. The kid down the block, your grandmother and the doctor telling you to stop smoking will all blow delicious secondhand smoke in your face, which, of course, will make you only think of cigarettes. This leads us to the next step.
Third, while staying cloistered in your home, do not enjoy any form of media.
Everything has cigarettes when you are trying to quit. All the movies feature badass-looking smokers. Songs are only about the last cigarette. Good books always have a main or secondary character drowning his woes in Marlboro smoke.
If you enjoy media while trying to quit smoking, you will end up smoking. The best alternative is to crawl underneath your bed, pull a blanket over yourself and rock back and forth.
Fourth, try to stop breathing while you’re underneath your bed rocking back and forth.
Every time you will inevitably think that breath might be better used for inhaling smoke, which again, we are trying to avoid here. There are a number of easy ways to stop breathing. One involves a pillow, another one involves a plastic bag, and you can even use your hands, but the main thing to remember is to cut off air to the lungs. Once you’ve done that, it’s likely you will do one of two things: blackout or die.
If you die, you are one lucky bastard. You have quit smoking, and no one can say anything else to make you want a cigarette ever again, but on the downside you are also dead. This decision is really something you will have to choose for yourself. A lot of you will choose the death option, understandably, but for the few of you who remain here’s where to go from there.
Fifth, after regaining consciousness and crawling out from underneath your bed, start to do normal human activities while not thinking about smoking.
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True, at first, it might be hard to approach that morning bowl of cereal or cozying up under the covers without the comfort of a burning cigarette, but if you try long enough the pain will eventually dull to the point where everything sucks a little less.
Hopefully, you will be able to go about your life without glaring angrily at every passing smoker or standing wistfully in front of the cigarette wall at Walgreens, but probably not. You might stare in envy at your friends all leaving for a smoke break and wonder, ‘Is life really a whole lot better now that I have quit smoking?’
And then you’ll Google photos of lung cancer and realize you made the right choice, even if you can’t admit it to yourself.
Later, you might even start to feel better when you’re no longer having nicotine withdrawals, and you’ll have the small triumph in your life of having quit smoking to forever hold onto.
This brings me to the next and final step.
Sixth, after quitting smoking, don’t start smoking again. This step seems obvious, but it’s a mistake a lot of people make. Just because you have stopped smoking for a while does not mean that you can start having cigarettes willy-nilly. In fact, it probably means you should avoid nicotine-related substances for a good while, until you have a good hold over your addiction. And if you ever start slipping again, you should probably stop, or begin at step one.
Also, you may want to avoid writing opinion pieces about quitting smoking. That won’t help you quit smoking either.
