Health

3 Mental Health Benefits of Quitting Smoking

Do you know all the mental health benefits of quitting smoking?

You probably already know that quitting will improve every part of your body. (If no, don’t worry! You can see what happens when you quit smoking here)

But what about your mental health?

Maybe, if you’re like me and most other smokers, you’re afraid that quitting will make you anxious, depressed, and unhappy. But that’s not the case.

And if you quit in the past but didn’t experience any mental health benefits, I will explain why this happened to you in a moment.

Now let me show you the best 3 mental health benefits of quitting smoking.

1. Increased Confidence

Quitting smoking increases your external confidence because you have whiter teeth, smell better, have brighter and tighter skin, and look younger.

Specifically, when you stop smoking, you slow down facial aging and the appearance of wrinkles, and you start reversing the effects smoking has on your appearance. Your skin gets more nutrients and oxygen, so you look younger.

You also look more vibrant and healthy, and health is beauty.

But, most importantly, quitting will also increase your internal confidence.

Breaking free from smoking is going to be one of the most important achievements of your life. And this achievement creates a point of reference that you can do anything you put your mind to. It becomes proof that you can achieve hard things, and this success can have a positive domino effect on your life.

Many of our members quit smoking and then go on to lose weight, overcome other addictions and bad habits, achieve more life goals, try new experiences, and stand up for themselves more. Quitting smoking can change your life in so many ways.

And if you’re already someone who can do anything but quit smoking…just imagine how great you will feel once you’re free and tackle this goal too.

It’s going to give you unshakeable confidence. Because no one can take away the confidence that comes from knowing you did something you once thought impossible.

However, to experience the quit smoking benefit of confidence, you need to own your non-smoking identity.

What do I mean?

If you’re a deprived ex-smoker and tell everyone how hard it was to quit or how much you miss smoking… you’re not owning your non-smoking identity.

Instead, you need to wear your non-smoking identity as an armor of confidence that allows you to achieve anything you want to.

Will this feeling of confidence last?

Yes! Don’t get me wrong, you’re going to have difficult days as a nonsmoker – that’s part of life. But the longer you stay smoke-free, the more your confidence will increase.

Every single day you’re smoke-free is an achievement until the days add up and become part of who you are.

2. Increased Happiness

Another benefit of quitting smoking is that it will make you happier. Yes, letting go of this addiction increases your happiness!

Right now, you may think that quitting smoking will make you unhappy. You’re not alone!

You may even say that you prefer to smoke and live a short life and enjoy it…rather than a long life where you’re unhappy without cigarettes.

When we’re addicted, we tend to mistake addiction for happiness. Addiction is not happiness.

So this is not a real trade-off that you’re prepared to make. What you’re actually trading off by quitting smoking is a life of addiction with a life of freedom.

Because living with addiction is like living a lie.

What addiction does is it makes you believe you can’t live without the thing you’re addicted to.

For example, if you ask heroin addicts, “Why do you use heroin?”…. their genuine answer is “I can’t cope without it,” “I can’t live without it,” “I can’t be happy without it.”

If someone told you that, what would you think? You’d think that heroin is making them feel unhappy, right?

It’s way easier to see the truth when we look at other addictions. But the same thing applies to nicotine addiction. Being addicted decreases your happiness and quality of life.

Nicotine is the problem, not the solution.

– CBQ Method Principles

A study by the Cancer Research UK shows that just one year after quitting, ex-smokers are happier than before and are also happier than current smokers.

You’re also going to see this from your own experience.

You’re probably not going to smoke your last cigarette and wake up the next day feeling euphoric. This can happen, but for most of us, there needs to be a period of adjustment where our brain heals and regulates its dopamine.

But this adjustment period, also called withdrawal, leads to a better and happier future.

What does being happy mean to you?

Perhaps it’s to be at peace, enjoy every moment of life, feel free, grow emotionally and spiritually, and be there for your loved ones.

Whatever happiness is for you, ask yourself, Is smoking offering you those things? Or is it taking them away?

What smoking adds to your life is guilt, agony, and worry. How is that happiness?

3. Decreased Anxiety & Depression

One of the most overlooked benefits of quitting smoking is the reduced anxiety and depression that come after the adjustment period.

Most smokers are afraid that quitting will increase their anxiety and depression and that they won’t be able to cope and manage their emotions without cigarettes.

But smoking does not help you manage your emotions; it helps you ignore the root cause and distract yourself for a moment.

So smoking is not a coping mechanism; it’s a distraction mechanism.

Think about it.

If smoking really relieved stress and depression, then smokers would be the most relaxed and the happiest people ever, and of course, that’s not the case.

Smoking is a source of mental distress all by itself: having cravings, not feeling in control of your life and your health, feeling self-conscious all the time, missing out on precious moments to smoke, worrying about your health….

The truth is that quitting smoking decreases anxiety and depression; you’re going to feel so much better. Because when you stop smoking, you also get rid off:

The cravings that cause you stress, tension, and agitation all day long
Obsessing and worrying about your next cigarette
Having health anxiety
Running out of cigarettes and worrying if you have enough
Smelling and worrying about the smell
Rearranging your life to smoke
Feeling guilty about smoking

How relaxing is that?!

A study gathered data from 26 other studies on the mental health, depression, anxiety, and mixed anxiety and depression of smokers.

And they found that quitting smoking reduced depression and anxiety and improved positive mood and quality of life – even for smokers with psychiatric disorders and even for smokers with mood and anxiety disorders.

In fact, for those with mood and anxiety disorders quitting smoking was as effective as antidepressant treatment.

So not smoking anymore was as effective as taking medication.

This says a lot about what smoking does to your brain.

Even though you may feel smoking relieves your stress momentarily, being addicted actually creates and aggravates negative emotions.

Every cigarette you smoke relieves your craving and, at the same time, causes the next craving to come along. This is a neverending vicious cycle.

Why does smoking seem to relieve stress? Why do you feel relaxed after taking a few puffs? I explain everything you need to know about nicotine and anxiety here.

Why Didn’t You Experience Any Mental Health Quit Smoking Benefits Last Time You Quit?

What if you quit and felt unhappy, stressed, or depressed?

There are a few things to consider here.

1. You didn’t go through the adjustment period.

It takes about 3 months for your brain to recover and start regulating dopamine naturally.

So you need to give your brain time to heal. But there’s no reason you can’t enjoy life in the meantime!

You can increase your dopamine in other ways. Exercise, nutrition, education, staying motivated, and asking for help are great ways to navigate the first months of your smokefree life.

If you feel bad, remember that smoking caused you to feel that way – not stopping smoking. Nicotine is the problem, not the solution.

2. You quit, but you were still mentally addicted.

It’s possible that you quit smoking, but you still believed that smoking added value to your life, so you felt deprived.

Of course, believing that smoking is your friend and helps you through tough times is just a belief created and sustained by the mental addiction.

The solution here is to work on your mental addiction so you can stop wanting to smoke. It’s never too late to overcome the mental addiction, even if you have already quit.

3. You didn’t use or learn new coping skills.

Like we mentioned a few lines above, smoking is not a coping mechanism; it’s a distraction mechanism. However, if it is the only coping tool you ever used or knew, it’s natural that you’re going to experience a void when it’s gone. So you need to fill that void with healthy coping strategies. And if you do, it’s going to change your life forever.

To sum up:

Quitting smoking will improve your mental health by increasing your external and internal confidence, by increasing your happiness, and dramatically decreasing your anxiety and depression.

How to Start Experiencing All the Benefits of Quitting Smoking

I want you to imagine something real quick.

Imagine it’s been almost three months, and you haven’t had a single puff.

You are over the moon. Not because you can stop yourself from buying a pack. But because you are enjoying being a non-smoker.

Sounds amazing, right?

The quit smoking benefits you will experience… are invaluable! Not only will you get your health back, but you will also enjoy life better than before.

That’s what thousands of smokers have achieved by overcoming their mental addiction with the CBQ method.

CBQ stands for Cognitive Behavioral Quitting, and it’s a psychology-based method that has reached and helped millions of smokers over the last decade. It’s the same method I talked about in my TED talk, and it works because it follows the 4 stages of quitting smoking.

These 4 stages take you from where you are now to a happy non-smoker.

So if you want to start with the CBQ method, make sure you get the foundational video of the CBQ.

In that video, I show you the 4 stages of the CBQ method, how they work together, and tips to get started with every stage. You’ll get an overview of your whole quit smoking journey from start to finish and a PDF starter guide for the CBQ method with tips and notes you can use along your journey.

Get the foundational video of the CBQ Method here.

Why Stop Smoking Aids Don’t Work, and What to Do Instead

by Nasia Davos

If you’ve failed to quit smoking using different stop smoking aids or if you’re thinking of trying quit smoking methods like the nicotine patch, nicotine gum, stop smoking pills or vaping…

…then this article is for you.

Because here you will learn:

What are the common quitting smoking aids.
Why most smoking cessation aids don’t work. (I am going to reveal to you what many organizations out there don’t want you to know- you’ll understand why.)
And what is the easiest quit smoking method.

See, most people think that they are not strong enough or committed enough to overcome their addiction.

But the truth is this: they fail because they use the stop smoking aids that simply don’t work for them.

What happens (or has happened) to all of us, is that we waste our hope, time and money on methods and quit smoking products that don’t give us what we need:

fewer cravings
less anxiety
and a life free from the thought of nicotine.

The worst part?

After trying and failing, you end up thinking “I can’t quit smoking. Nothing will ever work for me.”

But it’s not your fault.

And after reading this post you will know why.

But before you read any further, I need to clarify this: I am happy when people quit smoking- no matter how they do it because only good things happen when you quit smoking.

What I want to illustrate in this post is WHY most people:

Can’t quit.
Relapse.
Experience painful withdrawal symptoms.

Let’s dive in. Shall we?

The Common Stop Smoking Aids

Here’s a list of the quit smoking products available to you.

Stop smoking patches with nicotine
Nicotine gum
Nicotine lozenges
Nicotine inhaler
Stop smoking pill containing varenicline
Vaping or else electronic cigarettes with nicotine and without nicotine

Why Nicotine Replacement Therapy – Nicotine Patch, Gum, and Lozenges – Doesn’t Work

First, let’s see how nicotine affects us.

Every puff of cigarette delivers a small dose of nicotine to your brain that causes your blood pressure to rise.

Nicotine has a short-term effect so your bloodstream levels fall within 45 minutes after your last puff.

That’s when you have a craving, meaning that most smokers have a craving every 45 minutes and twenty major cigarette cravings a day.

That’s also the reason a pack contains 20 cigarettes.

Nicotine replacement products like stop smoking patches, stop smoking gum, nicotine lozenges, and nicotine inhaler do exactly the same thing.

They feed you with nicotine.

And they cause you to have cravings.

You tell me:

Would you tell the cocaine addict to quit by chewing cocaine gums? Or would you tell the cocaine addict to detox by spraying more cocaine in his mouth?

Of course not.

It doesn’t work that way.

Then WHY use the same stop smoking aids to cure the nicotine addiction?

It doesn’t make any sense!

The result?

1. One of the nicotine gum and nicotine patch side effects is getting addicted to them.

2. If you still believe that smoking is something pleasurable that gives you relief, calmness, and happiness… then no matter what you do to stop, you will always go back to smoking when you face a challenging situation.

…Even if you cover yourself with nicotine patches from head to toe.

Why?

Because it’s this repetitive familiar movement that you do with your hands, that gives you comfort when you’re stressed.

The repetition gives you the illusion of stability and takes you back to your safe place.

Gregory Connolly, director of the Centre for Global Tobacco Control at Harvard School of Public Health and his research team, concluded that the nicotine gum and nicotine patch designed to help smokers quit aren’t effective for longer than a few months.

And even then, the need for cigarettes is not eliminated. (Read more about this study here)

… That’s what I call: a short-term remedy.

Why Stop Smoking Aids of Varenicline Don’t Work

Chemical tablets like Champix and Chantix are drugs of varenicline.

Pills containing varenicline affect the brain and minimize your withdrawal symptoms.

By taking this medication to stop smoking, you don’t supply your body with nicotine and you don’t reinforce your smoking behavior.

Sounds good, right?

Is there a catch?

You bet.

Unlike the CBQ quit smoking method, varenicline pills don’t show you how to deal with the mental aspect of your addiction.

I mean, you still don’t know how to address your everyday struggles AND how to find satisfaction in things other than smoking.

PLUS by taking varenicline you experience worse psychological problems.

“Psychological problems like depression, hostility and suicidal thoughts”, said Dr. Curt Furberg, professor of Public Health Sciences at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center.

Note that in 2009, the FDA placed a warning label for Chantix and another drug, Zyban.

In fact, The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), has received over 1,513 reports of adverse reactions, including 62 reports of suicidal feelings.

In the UK alone, Champix was the cause of 80 deaths from 2006 to 2011.

Half of them were suicides.

But the side-effects of varenicline are not just psychological (as if that’s not enough).

Stop smoking drugs like varenicline have been connected to cardiovascular problems and vision lapses.

But what happens after you stop taking these quit smoking products?

People go back to smoking to cope with … depression!

Moving on…

Why Vaping Doesn’t Work

Electronic cigarettes or vaping is a battery-operated device that looks like a cigarette and turns liquid from a cartridge into an aerosol, or as they prefer to call it: vapor.

E-cigarettes are a 21st-century take on smoking. (We’ve seen them on television, celebrity photos and magazine ads).

Vaping seems trendy (since you can change how it looks and tastes)…. and although people think it’s one of the innocent quit smoking aids…

…vaping is still a delivery system for nicotine; the chemical that makes cigarettes addictive.

Vaping is not a quit smoking method.

What this all boils down to, is that you can’t really quit smoking if you keep putting nicotine in your body in other forms.

And if you think vaping is healthier for your lungs, keep reading.

Scratchy throat, high blood pressure, compromised immune system, and inflamed lungs to name a few of the side effects of vaping.

Vaping causes inflammation of the lungs. A study in the journal Cancer Prevention Research found that just one month of vaping altered the lungs of people who never vaped before.
E-cigarettes harm lung cells and make you less able to respond to infection says the director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse .
Vaping contains acrolein (a herbicide) that can cause lung injury, COPD, asthma, and lung cancer.
Aerosol from JUUL (an e-cigarette brand, partly owned by Phillip Morris) impairs blood vessels the same way normal cigarette smoke does.
Vaping can change your lung biology, even if it’s occasional or second hand. In this study, healthy non-smokers were exposed to e-cigarette aerosol. After only 20 puffs, vaping altered the expression of 60 genes (including genes predisposing you to inflammation).

In a study on mice, researchers found that e-cigarettes generate toxins and cause lung inflammation and immune system dysfunction.

Other scientists have found that vaping emits formaldehyde, which is also carcinogenic.

And now a recent study by Harvard concluded that the chemical flavorings used in e-cigarettes are responsible for severe lung damages.

These warrants MUST be taken seriously especially from those who suffer from COPD and have switched from cigarettes to e-cigarettes.

After all this, no wonder why the World Health Organisation (WHO) recommended that e-cigarettes should be banned indoors.

Vapors emit chemicals, as dangerous as cigarettes, harming both active and passive vapers!

You can learn more ways e-cigarettes affect your lungs and make you susceptible to respiratory infections like coronavirus here.

Vaping instead of smoking is like inviting a burglar into your home just because they’re wearing a fancy outfit.

What All the Above Stop Smoking Aids Have in Common

All these unhealthy and ineffective methods to stop smoking have 4 things in common:

Short-term effect of quitting.
Side effects (including the withdrawal side effects of the nicotine patch and gum that are similar to those of cigarettes).
Further psychological distress and complications.
You have to keep on buying these quitting smoking aids indefinitely!

Think about it.

You have to keep chewing gums and using the nicotine patch.

You have to keep vaping.

And you have to take the varenicline pills for 12-24 weeks.

So you never really have the chance of getting detached from the habit.

You never really have the chance to be free.

Because if you did, you wouldn’t need to buy the substitutes and the smoking cessation aids anymore.

The masterminds behind these stop smoking aids aim at your weak point: your fear of giving up smoking at all levels… physically, mentally and behaviorally.

And I understand that letting go of a 30-year-old-habit is scary if you don’t know how to do it…

So what happens, is that you’re bouncing back and forth from the tobacco companies to the quitting products…

This has to stop!

What about going cold turkey or using the willpower method?

Ask anyone who has succeeded in stopping that way:

“Was it hard?”

“Do you miss the occasional cigarette?”

“Were you depressed during the withdrawal period?”

They say yes.

To make matters worse, most of these people relapse within a year.

Why? Because they feel deprived.

When we use our willpower to stop smoking, what we are actually doing is this:

We first stop smoking and then wait for our desire to smoke to magically fade away by itself.

But it doesn’t.

Instead, we feel deprived and the thought of a cigarette becomes even more precious.

And the more deprived we feel, the more we tend to rationalize our thoughts of having “Just one cigarette”.

We think we need it.

We believe that one puff won’t hurt us.

Sometimes we even conclude that we chose the wrong time to stop smoking and that we should postpone it for another less stressful time in the future.

So eventually we have that precious cigarette.

That’s what I call: the cigarette of despair.

You know, the one cigarette that you hate yourself for lighting it.

But at the same time, you feel relieved because you smoked it.

That kind of disappointment makes you look for stop smoking aids.

But both willpower and stop smoking aids make quitting hard.

Why Stop Smoking Aids and the Willpower Method Make Quitting Hard

All the above quit smoking methods can only stop you from smoking cigarettes for a short period of time.

The stop smoking aids don’t remove the fears that keep you lighting up one cigarette after the other.

All the reasons you want to smoke, are still there.

For example, how can you be a happy non-smoker if you still feel like smoking while watching TV? You will still have cravings.

Or how can you remain smoke-free if you don’t know how to relax without a smoke?

You’ll go back to smoking.

And how can you quit without missing smoking if you feel your hands empty without a cigarette?

You will either turn to food for comfort or smoke. Or both!

The outdated stop smoking aids don’t show you how to feel relaxed and enjoy life without cigarettes.

That’s why most smoking cessation programs fail.

Don’t get me wrong. The common methods to quit smoking have helped many smokers quit.

This doesn’t mean, though, that they are the easiest and most successful stop smoking aids.

It’s like catching a cold and trying to find the right cure. I am sure there are many ways to fight a cold.

But would you rather use an outdated medicine that has helped few people in the past?

Or use the newest discovery that guarantees you will be cured in the easiest and most effective way?

The second of course!

And quitting smoking is no different.

So you see the problem is not that you can’t quit smoking.

The problem is that you’ve been using outdated stop smoking methods.

How to Quit Easily Without Stop Smoking Aids with the CBQ Method

The new way to quit smoking is this:

You stop desiring a cigarette BEFORE you actually stop smoking.

When you no longer desire smoking then you don’t even notice the physical withdrawal from nicotine.

And when you no longer need cigarettes, you don’t need to use willpower to resist smoking. Because there is nothing to resist.

The secret is learning to be happy without a cigarette. That’s the easiest way to quit smoking.

And that’s exactly how the CBQ method works.

With the CBQ you FIRST stop wanting to smoke and THEN you break the habit of smoking.

This is the solution you’ve been looking for.

The CBQ is a natural quit smoking method that doesn’t harm your health.

And it works BETTER than the common ways to stop smoking because it removes your need to smoke.

Why?

Because it follows the 4 stages that our brain gets attached or detached from a habit or an addiction.

You went through 4 stages when you become addicted to smoking and now you have to go through the same stages again to break free from the nicotine addiction naturally and easily.

Without needing stop smoking aids.

I explain everything in the Foundational Video of the CBQ Method.

In this free video, you will learn:

How and why the CBQ method works.
Exactly what happens in each of the 4 stages.
And you’ll get the RIGHT tips to get started on each stage.

This is 100% free.

All you need to do is enter your name and email address so I can send you the video.

(And make sure you watch all of it because there is a free gift at the end of that video.)

Get the Foundational Video of the CBQ Method now.