Smoking Cessation
Smoking Cessation is a hypnotherapists bread and butter. On the whole, I get more people coming to me to help them stop smoking than any other change. To help someone stop smoking is also one of the hardest of all the changes I do. You would have thought that hypnotherapists would have a set rote or procedure for this specific change, but no. It really requires the hypnotic or NLP practitioner to evaluate the client very rapidly and to use the leverages they find to make the change as quickly as possible. There are some people who are particularly susceptible to this type of work and other for whom it is much more difficult. There are so many factors to any single session, that often it feels like everything is stacked against the change. One thing however is crucial: The client must be 100% committed to the change. Without this single factor, any work I do it fairly likely to fail. I cannot make some one stop smoking, in fact it would be morally wrong for me to apply a change that deprives someone of pleasure. For most clients this tipping-point is reached once the negative effects of smoking outweigh the positive effects they receive from smoking. I can help apply weight to the balance, but it is in the clients court to decide if that limit has been reached.
Another factor that can often make my work more difficult is the fact that the anchors for smoking are very common. For many other changes the anchors are sparse, but obvious, such as spider phobias or drug addiction. Smokers are bombarded with anchors that require them to think about smoking much of the time, and it is also very easy to fulfill the desire or craving they might have to smoke. This means I have to be absolutely sure that the new responses for the anchors are well integrated. It is also very important I cover all eventualities.
One of the major reasons people fail to stop smoking is their belief that the work I do stops once they leave my office. It is absolutely crucial that clients continue to run the patterns over and over again until these new patterns become habits. They must do them consciously to begin with so that the change can be made at an unconscious level. I had one client recently with whom I was having a great deal of difficulty with, after a mammoth 45 minutes I finally found the leverage I’d been looking for, and began applying pressure. The client reported that for the first day they found it easy to reject cigarettes, however the following day they succumbed to the cravings and slowly began smoking again, having failed to continue the new patterns we had discussed. Oddly they only told me this some 3 weeks after the initial session. By this point all the work we had done together had most likely been unraveled, suffice to say that this client continues to smoke, never came back for their top-up session and is probably bad mouthing the entire field of hypnotherapy by now. We are progressively living in a blame culture where we are all too ready to apply blame, but almost never accept it ourselves. The responsibility for the change a client wants rest firmly on the shoulders of the client. This client simply did not follow my instructions and was not committed to the change. In so doing he lost faith in the process and so sabotaged the change.
This all said, the success rate I have with clients wanting to stop smoking is much above the common methods for smoking cessation. If a client is committed to the change, but finds it difficult, I will remain committed too. I will do whatever is necessary to make sure my clients get the change they really want.
Jonathan charges 2 months worth of cigarette budget or £200 whichever the greater for a session with him. Alternatively his “Stop Smoking… NOW!” mind-programming pack is available though this site and sites across the UK. If you want to find out more about smoking cessation or any of the other work Jonathan undertakes then don’t hesitate to contact him on 07789 405404, or email him at jonathan@entrance.me.uk.