Cigarette Smoking Side Effects - How To Quickly Kick The Habit Using Hypnosis

Smoking is an addictive and harmful habit that affects the lives of millions of people around the world. We now know the perils of cigarette smoking and smokers are encouraged to find ways to quit smoking for their own health. This is not an easy feat, as smokers begin at an extremely early age. The average age at which many people begin to smoke is only thirteen years old.

A habit formed at that age is not easily broken. Nicotine affects many parts of the body and it is hard to break this addiction without help. There are many different diseases associated with smoking. Most smokers need assistance to quit smoking and many different methods exist for this very purpose.

There are many different reasons why people begin smoking and develop a smoking habit. The main reason that people begin to smoke is peer pressure. Some young people think it looks "cool" when portrayed on television, in movies, and in advertisements. It also is forbidden which makes it all the more attractive to teenagers, hence the low starting age for many people. This young age makes ceasing smoking more difficult in your later years.

Media can also influence the decision to begin smoking. Smoking portrayed in movies or on television can lead you to believe that smoking is a harmless activity. Parents can wield the biggest influence over their children by setting a good example and not smoking, or quitting smoking. Mothers and fathers who smoke are much more likely to have children who start to smoke.

Smokers begin to crave nicotine, a drug within tobacco. Nicotine can affect your mind and body in many negative ways. Nicotine, once inhaled into the lungs reaches the brain in a mere eight seconds. Once in your brain, nicotine affects your blood pressure and heart rate. Over time it can increase your bad cholesterol levels and narrow your arteries. Nicotine in concentrated doses is a lethal poison, so you can imagine the effects on your body. Nicotine is also addictive and this is why many people cannot quit the habit.

Smoking can impact your health on a variety of levels. Low stamina is one side effect of smoking. More serious smoking related diseases include cancer and emphysema. Strokes and heart disease are also closely linked to cigarette smoking. A person who stops smoking will dramatically reduce their risk of developing these diseases for every year they can go smoke free.

The outcome of these medical conditions caused by smoking is grim. Lung cancer is almost always fatal unless detected very early and a full 80% of lung cancer cases are caused by smoking. Lung and heart disease can subtract years from your life unless you learn how to quit smoking. Emphysema cannot be cured but only managed, plus the damage to your lungs cannot be repaired. Stop smoking benefits include a healthier, longer life and a better quality of life.

There are many different methods to quit smoking, and you must choose the right method for you as an individual. Nicotine patches and gums are made to help slowly release you from the nicotine addiction. These only work for about 10% of the people who use them. Another option is going cold turkey, and this works for up to 11% of the smokers who try to quit this way. Other well known methods to quit smoking include an herbal kit that can show you how to quit smoking. It has a success rate similar to that of nicotine patches and gums.

Hypnosis for smoking cessation is a very popular and highly successful option for those who want to quit smoking without experiencing weight gain or withdrawal symptoms. Hypnotherapy has proven to be highly effective with smokers who have decided to quit smoking. Hypnotherapy for smoking cessation might sound like an extreme solution but it delivers solid results up to 70% of the time. This success rate is far greater that of other methods.

The reason stop smoking hypnosis is so effective is that it while the addiction to nicotine makes up only about 10% of the cigarette smoking addiction, the mental and emotional aspects of the habit make up a full 90% of the smoking addiction. Hypnotherapy treats this aspect of the addiction.

About 45% of the smoking behavior is caused by stress, and hypnosis has proven to be a powerful tool that can help reprogram the mind to divert you away from stressful thoughts, and towards more positive and relaxing thoughts. In addition, the very essence of hypnosis is that it incorporates a state of deep relaxation.

Another 45% of the smoking behavior is caused by conditioned responses. This is when smoking is associated with other activities and events at the unconscious level of mind. For example, if you smoke while watching television, your unconscious will associate the image of a cigarette in your hand with the image of the TV. Every time you see the TV, your unconscious flashes an image of the cigarette in your hand, and you feel the compulsion to smoke.

Hypnosis therapy is regularly used to "extinguish" the conditioned responses by disassociating the unconscious connections between cigarettes and TV, drinking coffee, working on your computer, driving, or any other situation where an unconscious association has been formed.

In summary: While most smokers think that their inability to quit smoking is due to their addiction to nicotine, in truth it is the mental and emotional aspects of smoking that present the largest barriers. Hypnotherapy was accepted by the American Medical Association in 1958 as an effective tool. Hypnosis for quitting smoking is the second most common use of hypnotherapy today.

While hourly rates for hypnotherapists continue to skyrocket, there are some effective self hypnosis programs on the market that can greatly reduce its cost. Since everyone is unique, there are no specific "magic" words or post-hypnotic suggestions that will work for everyone. So when choosing hypnosis CDs, look for those that incorporate a broad variety of hypnotic and NLP techniques in a series of at least six or more sessions to achieve the best possible results. In any event, the cost of the very best self hypnosis CD and DVD sets equates to much less than the amount that an average smoker spends every month on buying cigarettes.

Alan B. Densky, CH created the Video Hypnosis stop smoking program that helps smokers easily break the habit. He also created other ways to quit smoking with Ericksonian Hypnosis and NLP. Visit his Neuro-VISION self help hypnosis site for free hypnotherapy videos and downloads.