How to Quit Smoking – Barbara's Really Easy Method to Being Cigarette Free!

Have you just made the decision to quit smoking? Or are you trying – yet again – to kick the habit? There are two main reasons why giving up can be difficult for you: (1) you don’t really want to give up but think you ‘should’, and (2) you don’t think it’s actually possible. Let me respond to both these reasons.

Firstly, ‘should’ implies no choice. If it is your intention to quit smoking for someone else instead of doing it for yourself, then you are already doomed.

Secondly, anything is possible – all it takes is a change of focus, a different way of looking at things.

As long as you have a little bit of willpower, I can give you an alternative to the nicotine patch and nicotine gum. It’s a foolproof method, guaranteed to work. Well, almost guaranteed. I can’t say it’s 100% guaranteed because I don’t know you. However, I can tell you that every person who has used Barbara’s Really Easy Method has been successful in kicking the habit.

Before I tell you what it is, let me tell you a story about willpower, and the main character in this story who was my friend’s grandmother. Meg’s Gran decided, at the right old age of 82, to give up smoking. Her motivation? All her friends were (to quote her) ‘dropping like flies’ and she thought she was too young to (again, to quote her) ‘be carted off in a pine box’.

Meg’s Gran had been smoking a pack a day (20 cigarettes) - every day - for more than 50 years. When she decided enough was enough, she bought a packet of smokes, and put them on the mantelpiece, unopened, as a reminder that she didn’t need them. She decided to go cold turkey and when I met her, that packet had been on the mantelpiece for over two years. Now that’s what I call willpower!

If, like her, you smoke 20 cigarettes a day (but don’t have the same degree of willpower), with Barbara’s Really Easy method, you can be cigarette-free in just 4 weeks. If you smoke more than 20 a day, it will take you longer to give up. But it can be done.

The biggest hurdle you face is thinking about how many smokes you can’t have. So don’t. Think about the smokes you can have, instead. That’s right, think about what you can have, and by doing so, you won’t feel like you’re being deprived in any way. That in itself makes the journey easier to travel.

You know what, that thinking can apply to anything. How you noticed that as soon as you decide to ‘go on a diet’ every second ad on tv is chocolate, chips and food? Same principle.

I promise you, giving up the smokes is going to be much easier than you thought! Remember, all you need is a little willpower.

The process is simple (and for the purpose of the example, let’s assume you smoke 20 cigarettes a day): on Day 1, smoke your normal number of cigarettes (20). On Day 2, smoke one cigarette less – that means you’ll have 19 cigarettes. On Day 3, you smoke one cigarette less than yesterday – so you’ll have 18 cigarettes. On Day 4, you smoke one cigarette less than the day before (17). On Day 5, you smoke one less cigarette (16). On Days 6,7, & 8 you smoke one less than Day 5 (15). And you follow this sequence until you are cigarette-free. Which means that you will have 3 cigarettes each day on Days 22, 23 and 24; two cigarettes on Day 25; and one cigarette on Day 26. I have noticed, though, that for some people the process works better if they have one cigarette for three days, ie Days 26, 27 and 28.

Ok, let’s recap. You’ll be working an 8-day cycle: for five days, you decrease your intake by one smoke a day, then for the next three days you smoke the same number, and when you get to the end, smoke one cigarette for three days (unless, of course, you don’t need them!)

So, if you are a 20-cigarettes-a-day person, you can be free of he habit in just 4 weeks – less than a month (unless you happen to quit on the 1st of February!).

Now you may have a 30-, 40- or 50-a-day habit and wondering how long it will take you to quit smoking. Well, the answer is about 40 days if you are a 30-a-day smoker, 54 days (40) and 68 days (50). So, even if you are a 50-a-day smoker, you can be clean in a little over two months – not bad, eh?

The most important thing to remember about Barbara’s Really Easy Method is this: you are only giving up one cigarette a day.

And, giving up one cigarette a day is Really Easy to achieve.