The Hemp Connection:
nicotine

I'm grateful to see Amber's post this week. It's very real. And it confirms, for all of you, that changing behaviors isn't a perfect journey. In fact, there will be great days, and there will be far-from-awesome ones. If you're living with the fantasy that life is going to be just peachy when you lose weight/have a baby/get a boyfriend/pay off your debts, get over it. Real people have real problems. It is not whether or not you have problems that is important, it is how you handle those problems when they arise that is key.

What Amber didn't mention in this post, is that she is almost 2 weeks into being nicotine-free! So what's especially hard for her right now is that when things get stressful, not only does she not have food to turn to, she doesn't have cigarettes. Kudos to her for riding through it and being able to be introspective and insightful in the middle of a hormone/withdrawal storm. She's not giving herself enough credit for just what she's managed!

I introduced Amber to our resident yoga teacher, Sarah Jones, who is going to give Amber some pointers that can help both with the nicotine withdrawal and the stress management. Yoga is a very powerful tool for both. I look forward to hearing how the collaboration turns out.

Keep up the great work, Amber! Glad you liked the fries!

xoxo

Monika

I was just asked about tips for stopping smoking. This is a tough one, since nicotine is the second most addictive substance known to man (surpassed only by heroin). Yes, it's that powerful.

I was once certified as a Smoke Stoppers teacher and I thought I'd create a couple of blog posts around this one. Hope you find them helpful.

It's most important, first of all, to understand how nicotine works. It doesn't actually hit your bloodstream until about 20 minutes after it's been inhaled.

So the relief you feel when you light up, is likely due to the deep breath you took, not the chemicals in the cigarette.

The anxiety that you feel when you crave…THAT's the nicotine. It's very tricky timing that works on behalf of Big Nicotine. You associate the wrong thing with relief from the symptoms. You've been associating the wrong stimulus and response all this time!

Practice this technique: Lie down on your bed or sofa, and place a pillow or book on your stomach. Practice breathing in a way that makes that pillow or book move up and down. Notice how quickly you feel less anxious? Now practice that using a hand on your stomach. If you can do that, you can use this technique wherever you may be…at work, in the car, at a party…get used to how it feels to breathe deeply. Associate breathing deeply with feeling better, to help disconnect the association between the cigarette and breathing more deeply.

If you can make it for 20 minutes the urge to smoke often passes. So don't start catastrophizing about how miserable it feels to not be able to smoke now and forever, just focus on the next 20 minutes, breathe deeply, and trust.

If you make it, put the amount of money you saved by NOT smoking that cigarette, in a jar in a highly visible place. Once you start to see that money rack up (it's about $1.50 a smoke), you'll start to question whether or not this is something you really want to spend money on. Especially if you're struggling in other financial areas of your life.

Give it a try, let me know what happens!

And congratulations for making the effort!