Addictions – my 7 tips on how to defeat them

There are many addictions that may afflict us human beings. There’s not just actual drugs; but there is also sex, food, alcohol, cigarettes and gambling addictions that are the obvious; and then there are the less unknowns like emotional, power, control, greed, money, cutting, negative thinking, depression, exercise (because too much of anything is actually bad for us!) and a whole bunch more. I am going to take one addiction from my own personal life and use it to tell my story, but please know that the tips I’ll give can be applied to most of them.

I was only 11 years old when my uncle (he was only 4 months younger than me) and I stole our first cigarette from my mother’s cigarette box to go and hide under our apartment block’s staircase and experiment. That was the beginning of the end for me and I went on to smoke for 34 years! Even though I eventually absolutely hated it, I got to a stage in life where I could not remember life without a cigarette in my hand. I smoked up to 40 cigarettes a day and by the time I was 26 years old, I was wheezing permanently, and I failed my lung function test. I was told that my heart was so strong that I could live to be a 100 years old, but my lungs were so messed up that I would die from the pneumonia and bronchitis that I was being ailed with annually from the smoking. Still, I smoked. I tried a gazillion times to stop. I went cold turkey, I gradually reduced, I bought the nicotine gum…the longest any of it lasted was 6 weeks and ‘something’ would always happen to make me return to my crutch. It was either a bumper bashing with my car after 2 weeks, or a massive fight with my husband after 6 weeks or any excuse I could find and tell myself. Always a reason to go out and buy my beloved friend the cigarette who was always there for me to calm me when I lit them up. Even after the doctor – who did our Mom’s autopsy – told us that we were at high risk of pulmonary embolism and deep vein thrombosis; and smoking had killed our 52 year old mum suddenly; and that none of us should be smoking in my family, I still smoked.

Then, at the wonderful age of 40, I decided to join a gym for the medical aid benefits. There was no harm in getting fit and healthier! Our medical aid was always exhausted by March, April or May (if we were so lucky for it to go so far) and we were being offered a deal where we received cash back for meeting goals. In hindsight, this was a complete blessing in disguise for me because, as I started to train more and more, I started getting winded easily and I realised that I was struggling with my breathing. It turned out that I had a deviated septum that needed surgery to rectify, but the doc and hubby also recommended stopping smoking as they said this would up my game during exercise (coz lordy did my chest burn to the degree where I wanted to vomit whilst exercising) and I would have massive coughing fits during and after every session too!

So, one day I marched myself off to buy an e-cigarette. I had tried everything else countless times, so I figured it couldn’t hurt hey. I felt the difference immediately. Exercising become a joy. My horrid morning cough disappeared. I could breathe easier. I could taste food so sweet and divine like I had never tasted before. And, oh my gee, could I smell again! And guess what? The ‘smokers’ stank horribly, and I was completely embarrassed at how I must have smelt for 30 years. My wheezing even disappeared completely. I could just feel the overall good impact the change had on my physical being and I was loving it. Having used the device as it was originally intended, I managed to weaned myself all the way down to 0mg nicotine from 24mg! I mean WOW!! I was so super chuffed with myself man… However, I was also very contented at being a ‘vaper’ now until my dying day. I had accepted that I had moved my addiction from one to the other, but I was very happy with that decision.

I read somewhere that someone said that drug addicts are not addicted to drugs, but rather that they are addicted to escaping reality. That made sense to me. Something clicked when I read those words. We are human beings. Part human/ego and part being/spirit. As I started caring for myself – genuinely caring for myself – not just with exercise, but on my mindful and awakening path, the vaping just seemed to become a nuisance. It almost became an effort to fill the device, charge the device, make sure I had a spare battery, a spare devise etc. It somehow just became a bother to me, to the degree where one day; as I was about to board a flight to Australia; I just threw it all away. I was done. And, I never ever went back…for no reason – and let me tell you, there could have been many reasons.

My point here is that the minute I started working on a healthier all round lifestyle, like exercising; eating healthier and going inside of myself and doing a whole bunch of work there; it kind of became an automatic thing over a 4 year period where I was able to walk away from my addiction to nicotine and cigarettes. Deepak Chopra explains that our brains have 3 natural states:

• The first state is unconsciousness. This is a state where the ‘you’ that you are is not even aware of that 5th cigarette that you’re lighting. It’s ‘autopilot’ mode where you act or behave in a way that is completely out of habit.
• The second state is what he calls being AWARE. In this state you are actually aware of lighting that 5th cigarette and ‘see’ yourself doing it – you are observing yourself.
• The third state is SELF-Awareness. Here you actually ask yourself things like “Why am I lighting this cigarette? What am I getting out of this? Why am I actually smoking? What pay back do I get from this?”

Once you reach that state of Mindfulness (which Fabian wrote about in his last blog post), you are ready to kick your addiction and get rid of habits that aren’t good for you!

So, here are some of my own personal tips you can pick from if you have any kind of addiction that you’d like to be rid of:

1. BE KIND AND GENTLE WITH YOURSELF! This is the most important tip I can give you. There will be times you slip up and, trust me, self-whipping of any form will not take you back in time to “fix it”. Practising forgiveness toward yourself will be crucial to your success. We are all fallible. Keep that in mind.
2. Relaxation skills like breathing deeply, just closing your eyes and meditation are great ways to retrain your brain and habits.
3. Another way of retraining your brain; which requires you to build and strengthen new neural pathways whilst letting the old circuits (your old bad habit/addiction) fade away; is to repeat a positive affirmation (or phrase) when a negative thought pops into your brain. So, for example, when I was stopping, I would have random negative thoughts like “I’m just gonna fail again coz this has never worked before in over 30 years”. So, I would replace that with something like “I am strong” and “I live in a body that is pure and clean” and I would say it over and over again. Also, try to picture (visualise) yourself addiction free. I would see myself in my mind’s eye as living energetically without a cigarette in my hand.
4. Good sleep is always an absolute must for every part of your overall health status and one way to make certain you get good sleep is by switching off all devices one hour before bedtime and have NO devices in your bedroom while you sleep.
5. Try to replace the addiction or habit with something new. For me, I drank water when I wanted to smoke. I’ve known of other people who took up new hobbies like running etc.
6. Distraction. I have a friend who decided to quit smoking during her annual leave and decided to sleep every time she craved a cigarette, so that by the time she went back to work in the new year, she was past the cravings. My husband gave up during a 30 day fast.
7. Finally, take it one at a time. So, for me, it was one cigarette at a time. When the craving hit, I breathed and drank water through it, and then carried on. They say it only takes 90 seconds for a feeling to pass through our bodies from beginning to end…so just worry about that particular 90 seconds. If you’re going to worry about tomorrow, or next week, or next month, or next year then you are dooming yourself to failure. Stay present in the NOW of the moment and just deal with each thing as it comes up.

Good luck on your journey to a healthier version of yourself!

If you feel that you are ready to combat your addiction, but are not exactly sure how to go about it, please get hold of us. We would love to coach you to your best overall well-being!

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Until next time.

Yours in kindness,