Does Stop Smoking Hypnotherapy Work?

I remember when in 2007, I did the Stop Smoking module in my training. This is it I thought, now I can really get to work; just like every other newly qualified therapist ready to change the world, I thought I could ‘cure’ smokers. The problem is most smokers don’t want to be ‘cured’.

Let’s be honest here, people generally connect Hypnotherapy with Stop smoking, its part of the general public image and perception of my profession, and that perception is not good one. Ask half a dozen random adults what they know of hypnotherapy and overwhelmingly the answer will be “My friend tried that to stop smoking and it did not work”… or at best the person stopped and put on weight! Most hypnotherapist try to scare their clients in to stopping, and that does not serve them well at all..

Let me explain, and even though there are exceptions to every rule, in my conversations with smokers the following things hold true …The idea of quitting is a good one; logically they ‘know’. They ‘know’ they should stop, they ‘know’ it is bad for their health, they ‘know’ it makes them smell, they ‘know’ it costs a lot of money, they ‘know’ it leads to bad skin and they ‘know’ it causes cancer, to someone else, it probably wont happen to me.

Whilst they ‘know’ they should stop, they don’t ‘feel’ like it, well not today, “I will give it up one day, I really should, and I know I ought to”

The difference is between ‘Knowing’ and ‘Feeling’.

Ever had a ‘hunch’ about something, a “this does not feel right” type of moment, a gut feeling; have you looked back and thought, “I feel bad about what happened” That’s the category of emotion that’s needed.

 When someone ‘feels’, when they have an emotional connection, then they are playing for keeps, they will stop. Hypnotherapy trainers know this, for it is a truth, when a person has a ‘felt experience’ things change, and often in a big way.

The problem is, most hypnotherapist's are only taught a very basic Aversion technique, and that’s all, nothing else. A one trick pony.  "This will work or you can blame the client for not being ‘ready to change’ for being ‘resistant’" is how it is taught, and that is very poor quality indeed..

Basically this technique is designed to scare the client in to stopping, to give them a great big ‘felt experience’, to connect them very vividly to the consequences of their actions, to link the choice to light up with the probable result... Death, and a painful one at that too.

Aversion aims to make a connection with the results of smoking and to make those results bigger then the benefits of lighting up; it is common to have a client vividly hallucinate being on a death bed surrounded by family, watching them die because they smoked one too many cigarettes.

“How would you tell your loved ones?” they are taught to ask. Which is not a bad question to pose to a smoker, but it is not enough on its own.

Just creating an aversion to smoking is a poor idea, which is not really going to do you any favours.

One of my very early clients saw me to stop smoking. For a while, I considered it a great success. She stopped immediately and stayed stopped. I follow up with her after two months only to learn she had put on 2 stone and wanted me to help her with that instead.

This client of mine had been put off the idea of smoking very convincingly and had simply gone and found another way of satisfying the very things smoking had done for her in the past.

‘and that’s the problem with an Aversion technique, it does nothing to satisfy the reasons a person is smoking that specific cigarette at that specific moment.

There is a reason a person is smoking, it is not just a habit, it is not just something that happens, “oh fancy that, I seem to have lit up a fag, how did that happen?” Ask a person why they started to smoke and they might well be able to recall; chances are it was peer pressure and a social conformity.

The reason why they now continue to smoke, many years later is totally different. Yes, there is a chemical additive element to the answer, but it is more than that, it’s emotional, it is a ‘felt experience’. Often it is one of those emotions that just does not fit into words so easily. For many smokers, it is part of who they are; it’s an identity thing. They do it because it gives them something that nothing else is giving them, in that same way, at that very moment.

I no longer try to scare my clients; come and see me and I will guarantee no deathbed hallucinations for you

….The irony is, some therapists cause so much stress and fear with this technique, the first thing a person wants to do when leaving the office is light up a smoke to calm down. Lighting up is that persons way of calming down, or taking a break, or rewarding or distracting themselves; having a deathbed fantasy attached to that does not help at all. I will never do this to you.

To stop smoking will cost you about 20 packets and a couple of hours…Your willing participation is also required, and I will make it as fun as possible.

One day a man meets a banker at a party, “can you give me some advice?" he asked "What should I invest in right now, what's the next big thing?" “Certainly” says the banker “I have a great investment I am working on right now, it could be open to a few of the right people.” “Please tell me more,” the man said with a touch of excitement. “Well, you give me £130 and in return for that investment, I would pay you back in 12 month's time approximately £1300, for some people it could be double that, and this one same investment will pay you, over and over, the same again, year on year, index linked, for the rest of your life. Oh and by the way, the side effects will be that you feel healthier, food and drink will taste better, you are likely to live much longer, you will no longer be ostracised in public places, you have more control over your life, and you gain a highly reduced chance of lung cancer, strokes, diabetes, heart disease and stress disorders.” “That’s amazing,” the man exclaimed, “what do I have to do to gain that?” “Oh that’s very simple and easy” the banker exclaimed, “that’s the incredible easy part, you simply stop smoking..."

Richard Stone 0208 647 7441
Richard.Stone@ModernHypnotherapy.co.uk