When your Addiction starts whispering to you...refer to this list of "The Five D's". And do it BEFORE you allow the whisper to get any louder!
DETERMINE: Determine what's going on in your head. Are you bored? Upset? Sad? WHY am I thinking that smoking right now is a good idea? What do I think will be improved if I choose to smoke right now?
DELAY: Delay your response to your craving by making yourself take the time to actually imagine the ramifications of picking up a cigarette right now. Don't light up right NOW. Take a little time to consider the whole idea of lighting up at this point. How many days of freedom will you be giving up? How will you feel about yourself after you smoke right now? Just a few minutes of delaying can be the difference between keeping your Quit or throwing away your Quit.
DISTRACT: Distract yourself from the sensation of a craving by doing something else for at least ten (10) minutes. Do ANYTHING that will make your brain think about something other than the craving. (This doesn't have to be calculus, for heaven's sake! My favorite distraction was to bite into whole lemons. My second favorite distraction was to clean my toilets. No, I don't like cleaning toilets. I HATE cleaning toilets. But the smell of the toilet bowl cleaner and the act of scrubbing/flushing was enough to get me through a bad crave. Find your own favorite distraction.)
DISTANCE: Distance yourself from temptation. Remove yourself from your current situation. At the least, CHANGE your current situation if you can't physically leave the scene of the craving. (Now, the obvious thing is to NOT HAVE ANY CIGARETTES where you can get your paws on them. And I'm always surprised at the number of EXers who keep a pack around "just in case". In case WHAT? But that's an entirely different blog, I guess. Back to how to distance yourself from temptation... Temptation comes in a lot of different forms for different people. All you need to know in order to successfully distance yourself is to be able to recognize the danger signs in your thinking. If you can do that, then you can either RUN AWAY ((that's figuratively for most of us! Hah!)) or immediately FLIP YOUR THINKING around so that you are at least emotionally distancing yourself from the idea of smoking.)
DECIDE: Make a conscious decision about what you are going to do. Am I willing to take on the consequences that smoking right now will create? Am I being honest with myself about how I will actually FEEL after I smoke right now? Is smoking right now more important to me that the pride I feel about my x days of freedom? Am I willing to give up all that I have accomplished and gone through to get to where I am today? (This is the Moment Of Truth in a craving. You must THINK hard. You must DECIDE if this is the action you really want to take. Don't let the nicotine addiction make this decision for you!)
Copy and print out "The Five D's". Keep it with you in your purse, wallet or pocket. When you have a craving, take it out and work your way down these five steps. Make yourself imagine what happens AFTER you give in to this craving.
Don't wallow in moments of craving. ALWAYS take action of some kind! There are lots of ways to work through moments of intense craving. It won't always be easy, but you can do it.
And think how proud of yourself you will be tomorrow when you look back on today and know that you took personal responsibility for keeping your Quit! (Especially since you can blog about it and get lots of cool, encouraging, loving comments!!!) Congratulations!
xxxooo, Sky
