When I quit some 15 to 18 years ago, I did it without really thinking about it. I used to play a little bit of Trumpet (I was never really very good, but it was fun), and when I was practicing in my rec room, I'd play a little, smoke a little, play a little, smoke a little - you get the idea.

One evening I was down there playing and smoking, and I pulled cigarette out of the pack and started to light it, but for some reason I can't explain, I didn't. I just didn't feel like it. I figured, I'd just lean it in the ash tray and light it in a couple of minutes. After a couple of minutes, I picked it up and was about to light it, but again, didn't really feel like it, so I leaned it back in the ash tray. And so on. If I didn't clean up around here a couple of times a year, that cigarette would probably still be sitting in that ash tray.

I never did smoke it, and I haven't smoked since. I haven't felt like having a cigarette since that day, and quitting turned out to be one of the easiest things I've ever done. Very weird.

The funny part is that maybe a year before that, I did consciously try to quit. Lasted about a month, and it was a hard month. This time it was completely non-deliberate, and a snap.

>Marcia
>
>I highly recommend the book "The Easy Way to Stop Smoking" by Allen Carr. I used it and it totally worked for me.
>And it really is easy. The book un-brainwashes you from cigs.
>
>An example:
>
>Some people have their 1st cig the moment they wake up, some at breakfast, in the car, or when they get to work.
>The thing is the cigs don't wake you up in the middle of the night with the screaming ab-dabs, craving nicotine, like maybe meth anphet. or Skank might. Some can go 8, 9, 10 hours before refilling the nicky in the body. Thus the withdrawal symptoms from nicotine are so subtle as to be unnoticeable.
>
>The thrust of the book is that it's your BRAIN that craves a cig.
>
>He decries the use of patches, willpower, bribery (With the money I save I can buy a new laptop), and doesn't ask you to stop (never uses the words "give up" in that he convinces you that you're gaining) until you've read the whole book.
>
>If you have problems I'd say read this.
>
>Terry