Anxiety When Quitting Smoking: How To Overcome It In 6 Steps
Leaving an addiction behind is always a challenge, since it forces us to introduce changes both in our management of attention and impulses, and in our habits. In the case of tobacco, one of the most popular addictive substances, this is complicated not only by the biological part of the dependence, but also by the contextual part: we have become accustomed to having a cigarette in our hand, and we are surrounded by a society that It constantly reminds us that many people smoke.
In this article We will see several tips on how to overcome anxiety when quitting smoking, and how we can adapt to the new healthier lifestyle. Of course, in any case, it must be clear that nothing will free us from having to invest time and effort in it.
Here are some tips to help you keep anxiety at bay when you’re trying to quit smoking. But you should know that if you don’t do your part to put these initiatives into practice, simply staying here will be of no use to you. So everything must start from a commitment to doing everything possible to keep your physical and mental health in the best possible state.
1. Learn to see discomfort as part of a challenge
There are people who, in response to the problem of experiencing anxiety about quitting smoking, they add the problem of entering a pessimistic mentality
For example, this is what happens to someone who sees something completely imposed from outside in that suffering, and who consequently believes that nothing can be done to limit its effects, that perhaps it will always be there. Or in those who see in anxiety the first signs of an inevitable relapse, which is practically written in their destiny.
But there is another, much more constructive way of looking at this: discomfort is a constituent part of a challenge that we are going to overcome against addiction. That’s what makes it challenging in the first place. AND It is also the indicator of our progress: As we progress, we will see the decrease in that anxiety as the consequence of a job well done. Leaving the monkey behind is a very real possibility.
2. Practice sports
Sport is an excellent way to help our attention focus “disengage” from certain obsessions and their physiological impact on us: anxiety.
By engaging in an absorbing and complex task, but subject to a series of stable rules, our attention is focused on the immediate objectives of what happens here and now in the context of the objectives of the game in question. Things that belong to another area lose importance in a matter of minutes they take a backseat.
Of course, we do not have to start practicing sports every time we notice that the anxiety to quit smoking is at the door of our consciousness, about to put our well-being in check again, since this would be exhausting. But it is good to opt for this from time to time, to get used to not thinking about tobacco for most of the day
Much of the challenge of combating anxiety about quitting smoking has to do with the way we expose ourselves to the “danger zones” in which everything reminds us of smoking.
Choose the smartest strategy It is part of what we must do to ensure our health. Therefore, as far as possible, we should avoid reminder stimuli linked to smoking. Stop going to places characterized by their high concentration of smokers, change of scenery, etc.
4. Walk through nature
Regularly exposing yourself to places with clean air is a way to erase tobacco from your mind. Firstly, in that context it is very easy to relax, and secondly, the experience of breathing well It helps us miss smoking less.
5. Practice relaxation techniques
It is a very good idea to learn relaxation techniques and apply them in moments when we feel anxiety approaching. For it, We must try to have areas located where it is feasible to withdraw for a moment and carry them out for a few minutes.
6. Lead an overall healthier life
If when you quit tobacco you embark on a more global lifestyle change, it will be easier to leave the anxiety of quitting behind. Because? Because your self-esteem will improve and in your way of generating self-concept (the idea you have of yourself) there will be a turning point in which you “change your life.”
In this way, by feeling more capable of breaking with the old vices of the past, the feeling of building something new with your identity will prevail, and that illusion and sense of self-efficacy will remain above anxiety (which in any case, in the early stages will not disappear completely).
