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Addictions

Smoking

Dialogues with Smokers--Parts I & II

Important Note: This article was written prior to 2010 and is now outdated. Please use my newest advancement, Optimal EFT. It is more efficient, more powerful and clearly explained in my free e-book, The Unseen Therapist™.  Best wishes, Gary

Dialogues with smokers--Parts I & II
By Willem Lammers

Part I--Adult format: smoking in the here and now.
(Part II appears below)

Dear List,

In the past year, I worked with a number of smokers, more or less according to the same format. Since it looks about 90% successful, it's time to share it. There are mainly two formats, one focused on the smoking in the here-and-now and one focused on the "Inner Child". I will focus on the here-and-now format in this post, and present the Inner Child type later.

The here-and-now format seems to work fine for people who make an impression of being balanced and healthy apart from their smoking behavior.
In the here-and-now format I focus on the conditional bodily experience, without which the smoker doesn't *need* to smoke. I ask the smoker to refrain from smoking the day he comes to me. I prefer to schedule the appointment late in the morning or in the early afternoon. After the contact and contract stage, it goes like this:


Willem: Why do you smoke?
Smoker: Because I'm addicted.
W: How do you know you're addicted?
S: Because I need to smoke x cigarettes a day.
W: How do you know when you want to smoke a cigarette?
S1: As soon as I see someone smoking, I need to smoke, too.
S2: As soon as I smell the coffee in the break...
S3: The moment I wake up, I need a cigarette...
S4: It's my way to relax...
W: What happens in your body, when you see someone else smoke, smell the coffee, wake up, want to relax?
S: (making movements with arms and legs, smacking his lips) I have this urge...
W: What do you feel in your body when you feel this urge?
S: What do you mean?
W: Think of this urge and concentrate on your body and tell me what's going on inside.
S: I have this feeling in my chest (typically makes a hand movement, pointing from his stomach to his throat and back)
W: Please describe that urge for me.
S: It's a tension here (points again)
W: Show with your hands how big that tension is.
S: About this big (shows with his hand, typically about 5 to 6 inches)
W: If you didn't have that tension in your body, would you need to smoke?
S: I don't think so.
W: So that means, that you could see someone smoke and not light up yourself?
S: (hesitantly) Yes.
W: So that means if we can do something to free you from this feeling, you would not smoke anymore?
S: (shaking his head in disbelief) Yes.
W: It would have to be something which works very fast to beat nicotine. That will reach your brain 10 seconds after inhaling.
S: Yes.
W: How long do you feel this tension before you light up a cigarette?
S: Let me think... About a minute.
W: So if I can teach you something which would take a minute and 10 seconds, we could beat nicotine in taking away your discomfort.
S: Yes.
W: You know, I spend some time in America last year to learn this new method. It takes about a minute and 10 seconds. Do you want to try it?
S: Yes, you make me curious!
W: How do you call this feeling you have in your stomach and chest?
S: XX
W: On a scale from zero to 10......
The rest you can guess.

Some smokers have to repeat tapping all the time, others stop after only a few rounds.

Try it and let me/us know what happens.
Ciao,

Willem Lammers


Part II--Developmental format

Dear Colleagues & Friends,

A while ago I posted the here-and-now (Adult) Format for smoking cessation. This time I offer you the DEVELOPMENTAL FORMAT for working with the Child and Parent Thought Field.

In the developmental format, the first steps until the identification of the somatic component of the craving symptoms, are the same as in the "here and now" format. Afterwards, I access what I call the Child Field and the Parent Field.

The DEVELOPMENTAL FORMAT is meant for people who make the impression of "needing" their habit to stabilize themselves on a deeper personal level. I start focusing on the conditional bodily experience, without which the smoker doesn't need to smoke, just like in the Adult Format. I ask the smoker to refrain from smoking the day he comes to me. I prefer to schedule the appointment late in the morning or in the early afternoon. After the contact and contract stage, it goes like this:

Willem: Why do you smoke?

Smoker: Because I'm addicted.

W: How do you know you're addicted?

S: Because I need to smoke x cigarettes a day.

W: How do you know when you want to smoke a cigarette?

S1: As soon as I see someone smoking, I need to smoke, too.

S2: As soon as I smell the coffee in the break...

S3: The moment I wake up, I need a cigarette...

S4: It's my way to relax...

W: What happens in your body, when you see someone else smoke, smell the coffee, wake up, want to relax?

S: (making movements with arms and legs, smacking his lips) I have this urge...

W: What do you feel in your body when you feel this urge?

S: What do you mean?

W: Think of this urge and concentrate on your body and tell me what's going on inside.

S: I have this feeling in my chest (typically makes a hand movement, pointing from his stomach to his throat and back)

W: Please describe that urge for me.

S: It's a tension here (points again).

W: Show with your hands how big that tension is.

S: (shows with his hands)

---

Until here, the procedure is the same for the Adult and for the Developmental Format. From here, the Developmental becomes specific.

---

W: Please concentrate on this feeling, tell me some more about it.

S1: It's like a tension, it feels warm and vibrating

S2: ...like a pit in my stomach

S3: ...it is cold and feels like a log/ etc.

W: Now I want you to go back on a timeline, to earlier occasions where you had this feeling, this urge

---

S1: When I was 21 and my mother died...

S2: When I was 20 and fired...

S3: When I was 17 and my girlfriend left me...

W: Describe that situation and how you feel this sensation when you think of it.

S: (describes situation in detail, usually without emotions).

W. Now go back on that timelines and allow your unconscious mind to show you other situations...

S1: When I was fourteen, I was with the other guys and they invited me to smoke a cigarette with them...

S2: When I was 15 and I was kicked out of school...

W: Describe that situation and how you feel this sensation when you think of it

S: (describes situation in detail, usually without emotions)

W: Now I want you to go back on the timeline to the first time you had this sensation...

---

Here I may e.g. use a hypnotic technique, called the affect bridge: Imagine a bridge and when you go over it, at the end there is this memory of the first time you had this sensation... and you are there...

---

Here comes the Child Field:

---

S: I'm three years old and I'm in the kitchen and my mother is cooking. I made a drawing and want to show it to her, but she doesn't attend to me, instead she hits me and yells at me "don't you see I'm busy" (or any other scene where the little child is abandoned, e.g. Mum has just lost her mother and turns to the little child for relief)

W: Describe that situation for me and describe how you feel in that situation (directly attunes the child).

---

Here comes the Parent Field:

---

W: Imagine you are this Child's mother and look at this kid. How do you see that kid?

S: I see he needs me, but I cannot give him what he needs.

W: What kind of emotion is in the foreground for you as a mother?

S1: I feel very stressed and I see how the child needs me but I don't have time for him...

S2: I just lost my mother and I'm totally filled with my own grief...

---

Tap here to treat the mother for her intensive negative emotion, until SUDs are considerably lower. This goes usually very fast, because the Parent Thought Field is very rigid and not very differentiated.

---

W: How do you see your child now?

S: I see that he needs me and I'm able to give him what he needs.

W: Now be yourself again as a little child... How do you feel?

S: I see that Mum sees me now, and that feels good.

W: Is there still anything there that hurts you?

S1: No, I feel much better

S2: Yes, I feel that I lost my grandmother and she was very dear to me.

---

Tap here for the grief or hurt that's left in the Child Thought Field after treating the perturbations in the Parent Thought Field.

---

W: How do you feel now?

S: Much better, I see that Mum loves me...

W: Now go to the next situation on the time line, when you were 7/14/21... What has changed in that situation?

S: I feel much less pressure, but I'm anxious to say no to those other guys who want me to smoke...

---

Tap on the fear for rejection or any other negative emotion here

---

Go through all the situations on the timelines and clean up the debris in Child Thought Field and eventually again in another aspect of the Parent Field. Then go back to the original sensation in the chest.

---

W: What happens when you think of that feeling in your chest again?

S: It's almost gone...

W: What happens when you think about smoking now?

S: It doesn't have any connection with this sensation anymore, I didn't know it was so old, I always thought that this feeling meant I just needed to smoke...

W: Do you still need to smoke?

S: No (smiles).

---

This is the shortest way. Usually there are more aspects connect to the smoking and you might have to teach the EFT algorithm or the TFT algorithm for addiction.

---

W: Until now, you suppressed this feeling with the help of nicotine, and that was very effective. I'm going to teach you another way to eliminate this feeling, so you don't need to smoke anymore or at least you may be able to choose...

---

I'm interested in your experiences with the use of the Child and the Parent Thought Field (my terms). You can of course use this format with any traumatic experience and with any symptom. My rationale behind the use of EFT with the introject (the Parent Thought Field) is that this field is usually much more powerful and rigid than the inner child. Treating the Child Thought Field alone does not eliminate the power of the inner Parent and thus cannot create stability in the long run: the inner polarization still exists. Some colleagues use positive affirmations to neutralize the power of parental messages and introjects. We'd better treat them directly.

Hope this helps,

Ciao,

Willem Lammers

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