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Stop Smoking for Good
It's Not About the Nicotine
Most people think smoking is mainly a nicotine problem. But for most smokers, the harder part is not the chemical withdrawal. It’s the emotional dependency and the subconscious pattern attached to smoking. That’s why you can know smoking is hurting you and still feel pulled to do it.
You’re not just dealing with cigarettes. You’re dealing with a learned relief strategy.
So if quitting has felt hard, it doesn’t automatically mean you lack discipline. It usually means you’ve been trying to use conscious effort to overpower a habit that’s being run by deeper patterns.
Why It Seems So Hard to Quit
Most smokers already know the risks. That’s not the part you’re missing. The real issue is what you think smoking is doing for you in the moment.
Smoking gets tied to stress relief, comfort, routine, identity, a break, or a way to change how you feel fast. So even when part of you wants to quit, another part still believes cigarettes are helping.
Shame Keeps You in the Cycle
That’s the internal debate: “I know I should stop… but I keep doing it.”
And that’s also why shame doesn’t help. Beating yourself up doesn’t remove the pattern. It usually just adds more stress, which can drive the urge even harder. We've been helping clients to quit smoking since 2007, and hundreds of them were trapped in this cycle.
How to Break the Chains of Smoking
A lot of stop-smoking approaches focus almost entirely on chemistry: patches, gum, pills, or white-knuckling it with willpower. Those can help some people.
But they often miss the part that keeps the habit alive: the emotional and subconscious attachment.
Having that awareness is key. Withdrawal is chemical and temporary, and cravings often last longer because they’re tied to belief, emotion, and habit loops.
If your mind still sees cigarettes as relief, comfort, or something you “need,” the urge keeps showing up even after the chemical part is over. That’s why so many people can quit briefly, and then relapse under stress.
Todd Goodwin wrote all about this in his 2019 book, Break the Chains of Smoking: How to Escape the Mental and Emotional Prison That Keeps You Addicted.
Why Willpower Isn’t the Answer
Willpower Is a Conscious Tool
Smoking is usually being driven by something underneath: automatic routines, emotional triggers, and subconscious beliefs. So if you’ve “failed” before, it’s not that you didn’t want it badly enough.
You were simply trying to fight the behavior without changing the reason your mind kept reaching for it.
The truth is that changing your mind's relationship with smoking requires a different approach.
The Good News
Stopping smoking gets easier when you stop treating it like only a nicotine problem and start changing the pattern that makes cigarettes feel necessary in the first place. The good news is that because you learned to depend on smoking to help you in various ways, you can unlearn your dependency.
That’s where using NLP and hypnosis to quit smoking can help.
Our approach is designed to work on two levels, in this order:
- Emotional: Resolve the root causes of the emotional discomfort you've used smoking to soothe
- Behavioral: Change how you think and feel about smoking, so you stop seeing it as a solution
Instead of forcing yourself to “be a non-smoker,” you update the beliefs, emotional associations, and stress patterns that kept the habit in place. When that happens, quitting stops feeling like a fight and happens naturally and easily.
Your Next Step
NOTE: Our process is more thorough than how most hypnotists approach smoking cessation, because we first target what are often deep emotional roots (including unresolved trauma and childhood issues).
If you're NOT willing to look deeper than the smoking behavior, then we're not a good fit.
However, if you are ready to address and resolve the emotional patterns that have supported your habit, schedule an initial consultation. We’ll map what smoking has been doing for you, what’s been keeping the habit in place, and build a clear plan for changing the pattern at the root so quitting can actually stick.
Take the first step toward freedom
This process begins with you.
We'll guide you the rest of the way.
“I worked with Todd many years ago !! and I am living proof that it works, I had a nasty cigarette habit. I would quit and even a year later slowly start again.
The yearning for that smoke made it all very hard for me to stay clean! Well almost 7 years ago on Valentines day I went to see Todd and after the first session I was free of it ! I have never smoked again, never had dreams, never suffered any of the withdrawal symptoms of stopping this ugly smelly harsh addiction —even when people have smoked around me I feel nothing !!! I went to Spain 3 months after I quit and had ZERO urge to have a puff.
I would recommend going to see him, he is awesome and really cares !!! Thank you Todd !!”
Helena G
”I tried so many different smoking cessation products and programs over the past years. These included gums, patches, and pills.
Finally, armed with a determination to quit, I decided to try hypnotherapy.
I found Goodwin Hypnosis on-line and it changed my life. I used to smoke like a chimney and enjoyed it like anything else, and now I’m happy to finally say that I am a non-smoker.”
Pasquale Pisana
“I was an avid smoker, smoking about 2 packs per day. I was smelling like a cigarette and thought that I would never be able to stop until I read and hear about this center. It gave me hope and I tried it out. I have never smoked a cigarette again. I also have NOT gained weight.
On the contrary, I have lost weight because now I am doing more sports than ever before. Everyone around me comments on how my skin is glowing.
I feel FREE and most of all, it showed me that I am not controlled by anything and that I am in control of my choices and my life. I now go out with friends and drink my usual wine or beer and see smokers all around me and it seems to me like smoking is part of another life of mine, one that I already forgot about!
THANK YOU GINA! I strongly recommend this method for anyone who has tried to quit alone or thinks they are a slave to cigarettes.
It was a GAME CHANGER for me!”
Myrna Domit
“I don’t usually write reviews but on this ocasion I am more than happy to do so since Gina and Goodwin Hypnosis have changed my life for better. I am 60 years old, having smoked cigarettes for the last 45 years and having tried to quit several times without success. The last several years I have been a very heavy smoker. More than a pack a day.
In my search for options on help of how to quit I found Goodwin Hypnosis on the internet and after reading all the information they provide on their web page I decided to try. It was the best decision I have taken in a long time.
Gina guided me through their cigarette quitting method and gave me tools to stay a non smoker. Today it is six weeks now that I dont smoke, coping with the quitting process without problem.
If you want to quit smoking dont loose more time and call Gina at Goodwin Hypnosis.
Their method works!!”
Enrique Chiappori
“I was blown away with the outcome of my sessions at Goodwin Hypnosis.
I met with Gina Goodwin for a consult to quit smoking. I wanted to kick the horrible habit and get myself into tip top shape. Heath & nutrition is a big part of my life so I wanted to practice what I preach!
Well after just 3 sessions with Gina I feel like I have never smoked a day in my life. I’m going to the gym 4 times a week and at 43 I’m in the best shape of my life!! I’m full of energy & so much more positive. I cannot believe how easy it is to be around smokers or even drinking a few glasses of wine and have NO desire or urge at all to light up.
THANK YOU GINA! You have changed my life and I’m forever grateful.
I highly recommend if you want to say goodbye to bad habits & have positive changes in your life that you go see Gina NOW!”
Jodi DeJesus
Hypnosis can be a powerful tool to help you:
- Change How You Think About Smoking
- Dissolve Your Habit at Its Source
- Regain Self-Control and Self-Respect
Frequently Asked Questions
Unfortunately, most people think wrongly that smoking is mostly an addiction to chemicals. Nicotine has a lot of chemical effects on the body, including temporarily changing how the brain works. Rodents get hooked because their brains get used to that stimulation and look for it when it’s not there.
Smoking, on the other hand, is much more complicated because most humans are more complex than rats. With people, the mental and emotional parts of smoking are much more important to the “addiction” than the nicotine itself. Even with animals, the “stressed rat” and “happy rat” experiments have shown that emotional stress predicts whether someone becomes addicted. This is especially true for people.
Using NLP and hypnosis, we can reduce your stress and change how your subconscious mind thinks and feels about smoking. Doing this removes the urge to smoke and breaks the compulsion, making the effects of nicotine much less important.
Yes, but first you need to understand that withdrawal and cravings are not the same thing.
Withdrawal is mostly a chemical process that can cause physical (and, because of that, emotional) discomfort. Symptoms usually only last a few days and can be lessened by changing some things you eat. For instance, it helps to drink more water, consume less caffeine, and keep blood sugar balanced. You can also reduce withdrawal symptoms through hypnosis, since the mind itself can block feelings of physical pain.
Cravings, on the other hand, are signs of emotional dependency, like the feeling of missing a loved one when you’re apart. Believing that you need cigarettes makes you emotionally dependent on them and is why cravings can last a long time. The absence of cigarettes causes discomfort that can be reduced by smoking again. This is why cravings cause people who have just quit smoking to go back to it. Once you stop believing that you need cigarettes, you are no longer dependent on them and no longer want to smoke.
Absolutely. Willpower is a part of the conscious mind, which is not strong enough to change habits. This is why you and everyone else struggles to quit smoking and other bad habits. Attempts to quit cold turkey fail 95% of the time because they depend on willpower, and willpower fails.
Hypnosis works directly with the subconscious, which is much more powerful and controls your beliefs, feelings, and habits. Hypnosis can help you stop smoking easily and naturally without using willpower. It works by changing how you think and feel about smoking, including erasing the belief that it’s hard to quit.
There are a lot of reasons why. First, mentioned above, smoking (and quitting) is mostly mental and emotional in nature. This means that the best way to help someone stop smoking is to focus on the mind, not the chemistry.
Second, a lot of research has shown that nicotine replacement (patch and gum) fails more than 90% of the time. The reason is that it focuses on nicotine, which is the least important part of smoking.
Third, it’s become clear to scientists in recent years that prescription medications for quitting smoking don’t work very well. This is a fact, despite the impressive marketing efforts of the drug companies (and the doctors they have convinced).
So, while some people do quit while using the patch, gum, or pills, their success may be due to other causes and not the drugs themselves. Hypnosis and NLP help you change your mind at the subconscious level. That’s where your thoughts, feelings, and actions are controlled, especially when it comes to smoking and quitting.
Take the first step toward freedom
This process begins with you.
We'll guide you the rest of the way.
984-733-6733
984-733-6733
Serving Raleigh, Durham, and Cary, NC
and clients nationwide via Zoom
Serving Raleigh, Durham, and Cary, NC
and clients nationwide via Zoom
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DISCLAIMER:
DISCLAIMER:
Testimonials by former clients of Todd or Gina Goodwin are true and factual. Goodwin Hypnosis, its officers, and personnel, do not imply or claim that these comments represent typical results. Results vary depending on age, gender, lifestyle, motivation, and individual commitment to achieve a desired result. These clients voluntarily offered their feedback and were not compensated in any way. Each comment is the opinion of one person at a specific time and should be considered only in that context. Comments may reference conditions or medications in the client's own words; see our Scope of Practice.
Copyright © 2007-2026 Goodwin Hypnosis LLC
Goodwin Hypnosis LLC
Copyright © 2007-2026