What is willpower?

Willpower is an important part of any smoking plan.  For many, it is the only strategy you will rely on!

Everyone has at least a little bit of willpower to get their quit journey underway, and everyone will use their mental skills or strengths to some extent to get through cravings should they arise.

Yet what is 'willpower', and more importantly, how do you grow it?

When someone quits smoking 'cold turkey', they probably mean that they are quitting abruptly. They may also plan to use only their mental strengths, or 'willpower'.

When you think about it, what this means is that willpower is a set of psychological strategies that allows you to;

1. Enhance your motivation to start your quit journey, or re-start your journey if you slip up.
2. Talk yourself out of smoking and into staying a non- smoker when you need to, such as when a craving comes along.

Willpower might also be used to simply maintain your motivation even if there is no craving present. For example, you might say to yourself each day

"I am going really well today. I can do this"

You may find that willpower is a most powerful strategy when cravings occur.

One example of willpower in action

Often when a craving comes along, a challenging game is played out in our mind.

In one corner of our mind it can be a thought like.....Go on, one won't hurt.

Did you notice a thought like that the last time you quit?

In another corner, we hope to have a thought (or set of thoughts) that is powerful enough to manage this intrusive pro-smoking thought or feeling, until the craving goes away.  The thought might be something like;

"If I have one, I'll just go back to smoking, and I really don't want that. I've come too far to spoil things now"