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A Personal Story. Let me tell you a story. I was a smoker for fifteen years. I really used to look forward (or so I believed ) to a cigarette.....
In fact I really, really believed that there was no way -- NO WAY -- I would EVER be able to enjoy myself in the pub if I couldn't smoke.
Even the thought horrified me.
For me, this is my most vivid memory. I can honestly say that if a hundred people, no a million people who had already given up smoking had told me that I REALLY could enjoy myself without smoking - in fact that I would enjoy myself infinitely better, I would not have believed a word. Not a word. It is amazing how much we genuinely believe all the illusions about smoking. We all genuinely believe that they do something for us - that they are a help, a joy, a comfort, a friend....... And that if they go, we'll miss them terribly. We should never underestimate the power these beliefs can have on us. In my case, I accepted WITHOUT QUESTION the assumption that I NEEDED to smoke. I could not even visualize myself, enjoying a night-out without being able to smoke.
And yet to-day it is true. I CAN enjoy myself totally without needing to smoke. And I don't tell you this out of pride but hope. Hope that you might consider it possible also for yourself. Remember again.......
Won't you let the life-experiences of thousands of people like myself, even persuade you to consider this even as a glorious possibility? Allow yourself to think the
unthinkable: You can
FULLY enjoy yourself without NEEDING
to smoke. To-day, I genuinely look forward to going out and the thought of wanting to smoke does not even enter my mind, even if EVERYBODY around me is smoking.
However.....
The main thing is to be patient. Take your time. Let all this new information about the psychology of non-smoking sink into your mind so that everyday you grasp a deeper and deeper understanding of the principles involved. As you do this, you will find all the illusions which you so dearly believed in falling away of their own accord.
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