We will begin to understand that tobacco use becomes a childhood brain disease, which embeds a neural pathway in our brain. It cannot be undone, but it can be put to sleep.
In this section, we begin filling out your geneology chart, a quick self-assessment, some deep breathing exercise and meditation techniques.
All of your forms and charts you fill out will be saved and you can update/review at any time.
Here we use the intergenerational charts to determine how long tobacco has been in our family tree.
Construct a family history of tobacco use over 6 generations to assist in identifying the extent to which tobacco use is part of the family tradition and to develop insights that are useful in building an action plan for recovery.
SUPPORT
Watch this video to help you get started filling in your Genealogy Chart.
ACTIONS
Genealogy Charting:
When you are ready, you can begin to fill in your Genealogy Chart below.
This chart provides a clearer picture of the overall genetic structure and provide deep insight into your genetic make up.
As smokers, we tend to utilize tobacco smoking as our prime coping tool. We need to identify which core areas of our survival strategy will be significantly impacted by our recovery program and take steps to have a plan ready to deal with these areas.
The number of smokes we inhale is not the real issue. It is our relationship to them that really matters.
By doing this self-assessment, it will arm you in a skillful way to achieve your true goal, to become a happy non-smoker.
ACTIONS
This self-assessment is designed to provide you with enough information to structure a recovery approach, which will give you a certain degree of insight that has proven useful in recovery from tobacco addiction.
Practices to calm body and mind
Anxiety affects many people and causes a lot of suffering. If you suffer from anxiety, you are not alone. No one plans on having anxiety. Many impinging forces, such as trauma, stress, family history, personal biology and environmental forces contribute to anxiety.
SUPPORT
Read the sections below and watch the associated video clips to help you with your practice and show how deep breathing can create a balance and provide a tool to cope with stress.
Calming breath, an intentional breathing exercise, focuses our attention away from stress and on a particular form of breathing that engages the relaxation response.
Instructions:
Take a nice breath in. Purse your lips and breathe out through your mouth like you are blowing out a candle. Close your mouth, breathe in through your nose and out through your nose.
Repeat this one more time only. Then re-sume normal breathing. Sit quietly for a few minutes and focus on breathing. Be aware of breath coming in and breath going out. When your attention wanders, gently bring it back to your breath.
This breathing exercise is wonderful medicine. Like a mantra, you are more apt to remember to do this when you are stressed if you practice daily. It takes only a minute and
is a great way to start the day. Do it when you are having your morning beverage and it will become as natural as brushing your teeth.
Comfort pose, a way to sooth yourself, is a simple yoga pose that feels reassuring. When we are anxious and upset, we need support and while it is wonderful to receive it from someone else, it is transformational to receive it from ourselves.
Instructions:
Lie or sit comfortably. Place one hand over your heart, with a touch that feels soothing. Place your other hand on your belly. Pat and rub gently to let your belly know you are there for it. Breathe into your belly or into your heart, which ever feels better to you. Some people prefer to just touch their heart and some prefer to just touch their belly. Adapt the pose to best suit you. Remain in this comforting pose and focus on your breathing for as long as you need to.
This tender pose is a way to be kind to yourself. Many people, when taught this pose, have said, “I never knew how to be loving to myself, this feels wonderful.” Remember, you deserve support. Transform your limiting beliefs, an inquiry into negative, disempowering ideas about who you are and also into who you truly are, is a way to release the grip of self limiting beliefs that hold you back. Any thought of being “not okay, not enough, somehow flawed” is a limiting belief about who you are. Not challenging the idea that you are insufficient perpetuates anxiety. When you hear yourself say, “I’ve always been this way” or “this is just the way I am”, you may be under the influence of unexamined beliefs.
Rather than being stopped by self limiting beliefs, focus on what really matters to you and put your energy into fulfilling your deepest desires.
How using simple yoga techniques can help you lower your anxiety and get through the times when you feel like you need to use tobacco.
Meditation, taking time to sit and be with yourself, is a profound practice. Meditation concentrates your mind, teaches you to witness your thoughts and shows you the peace that is found in silence. These benefits are calming balm for anxiety.
Instructions:
Sit comfortably on a chair or cushion in a quiet room. Set a timer for five to thirty minutes. Select something to focus on, either the movement of breath flowing in and out or your mantra. Begin to concentrate on breathing or your mantra. When your attention drifts to your thoughts, simply notice, then gently refocus on your breath or mantra. Witnessing
how your attention becomes distracted by your thoughts reveals how easy it is to get lost in thoughts.
Witnessing your thoughts means to observe them. Like sitting on the bank of a stream, watching leaves float by, sit with your breath or mantra while meditating and watch your thoughts pass by. You will discover that although you have thoughts, you are more than what you think. You cannot be reduced to what you can witness.
Demistifying Meditation
This video, as the title suggests, demystifies meditation by explaining how it can help you regroup and provides examples on how it can be done.
The recovery plan is the key to becoming tobacco free. It is designed to give you the best possible opportunity to enter into the recovery process with all the basic tools necessary to accomplish the task of breaking the hold tobacco has on your life.
Keeping a journal is an extremely effective recovery tool which provides an external access point to our unconscious drivers. It it you can record all your essential experiences including your dreams, your setbacks, and stumbles, lessons learned and your own internal sabotage patterns.
Your journal is composed of two parts.
ACTIONS
Your journal is for you and you only. Give it a try.
You don’t have to be a great writer. Keep it simple.