Gathering speed.

You know I had stopped smoking for the occasion of my friend Judy coming here to stay with mer because she did not smoke and as a matter of fact was a bit asthmatic.I thought that was a really good reason to quit and the state of my finances really dictated it also because it has become too expensive a habit and as it is now, I am robbing Peter to pay Paul and barely keeping my head above water. 

So, I gave quitting a serious effort with the help of nicotine patches but I am sorry to say that I failed and ended up smoking under the fan of the kitchen stove and by the open kitchen window while Judy was here. This worked well enough to keep the apartment smoke free and solved that problem and made me smoke somewhat less. When she left, I went back to my old habit of smoking all over the place which I enjoyed very much.

Of course I was still stuck with the same problematic financial picture and this bothered me very much and I did a lot of wishful thinking about being a couple of hundred Euros richer every month to make my budget come out even. That was a big fantasy and I realized I could find the solution easily if I quit smoking but I knew not how. 

About twenty odd years ago I had done a hypno-therapy session with a psychologist to deal with something from my childhood that had worked very well. It turned out that I was very susceptible to hypnosis and that it definitely worked on me. I started to think about this and thought it might be the solution to my smoking problem and that I could be suggested out of my desire to smoke. I did have the believe that it would work and that it could be a success if done well by a competent person. 

I looked in the Business Section of the phone book under hypno-therapists and found one that sounded very promising and called him up. He took the time to explain to me how he went to work and what the general procedure was and made a competent impression on me. I made an appointment for an intake meeting for next week to discuss my general attitude about smoking and my general mental state and how I deal with stress. After that, there will be the actual hypno-therapy session which is called the quitting day and you are not allowed to smoke from the evening before that. 

I have a lot of confidence in this step I am taking and I think my head is in the right place about this too. I am very motivated and want to quit before I make my journey to go see my daughter when I will not be able to smoke at the airports or in the airplanes. At my daughters house, I would only be able to smoke on the patio and that would be very anti-social because I would constantly be sitting out there. I want to be free of the urge to smoke and be part of the group like just any other ordinary person. I do not want to be separate and alone out on the patio. 

Until my first meeting, I can put alot of thought into my smoking habits and into each cigarette I light up. Hopefully I can see it for the bad habit it is and nothing more. I do have a very good picture in my head of myself smoke free and it is very liberating in which I move freely through life because it will be like being set free from a prison.

That is my plan and my general arritude and I think I will do well. Today it will be a month from the day I leave for Texas and this is just the kind of project to undertake to fill my time along with the other things I have to do to keep me busy. It will be time well spent and I will be a better person for it.