Using Patches to Stop Smoking
By Jack Sillow

When you first take on quitting smoking, you might feel like a little external help is welcomed. In these cases, you might want to consider using stop smoking patches.

The way these work is that they are a replacement way for you to continue getting your nicotine. Basically, using quit smoking patches you're addressing the psychological addiction first, and the physical one afterwards.

When you're using what goes under the name of 'replacement methods' (and this includes quit smoking patches, as well as nicotine gum and electronic cigarettes), you're still getting your fix, and so you're not yet experiencing withdrawal symptoms. This way, it will be easier for you to deal with the psychological addiction. But let's see what exactly is this psychological addiction, so we can truly understand the importance of the quit smoking patches.

When you are addicted to a drug such as cigarettes (or, more to the point, the nicotine in cigarettes) you develop some habits. In order for your body to keep on getting its fix, it will make it seem unimaginable to go through an entire day without the drug. This way, your brain will create some patterns that you feel you MUST follow or else. Such "patterns" come down to: you being used to smoke when you took a break from work; or when you had your coffee; or when you were in a fight with someone; or when you were happy about something; and so on. When you've decided to beat your addiction and use quit smoking patches to do so, you should remember that you're already getting your 'fix'. So whenever you have a quit smoking patch on you and you really really feel like smoking, that is just the psychological addiction talking, because you HAVE nicotine in your body.

You will need to be very aware of this thing, so that you don't just end up using quit smoking patches AND cigarettes. Although it may seem like a really difficult task right now, I can assure you from my own experience that it is not; not as long as you stay focused and remember the reasons you're doing this. Keep in your mind that this is an addiction, and that you do not, in fact, want to smoke. If at some point you really, really feel like you WANT a cigarette, you must remember that you don't. Because if you did, you would not have decided to quit smoking. It's just a mean little game nicotine is playing with your mind. But since it's YOUR mind, YOU have all it takes to win the game.

And if you decide to go for the quit smoking patches, pay extra attention to the game, and really try to concentrate on beating the psychological addiction. Once you've succeeded in doing this, the battle is half won. After that, you will only need to gradually decrease the amount of patches or the concentration of nicotine you use in your quit smoking patches, and you'll start beating the physical addiction as well. And, before you know it, you're as good as new, your body is regaining its health, and you'll start feeling better that you have been in a long time!

Jack Sillow is an NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming) expert who specializes in quit smoking treatments for normal people.