No cigarettes for 16 hours now. 5th attempt in as many months.

[Jackpine Radical]

79. I quit 30 years ago & never looked back. Here's what helped for me--

First, right after I quit I found I had a surprising amount of energy. This was due to my blood being able to carry more O2 after the CO had cleared out, which happens in a few hours. I used this energy to exercise.

Walk, run, ride a bike, whatever you have available--get a lot of exercise. This does several things. Maybe most importantly, it causes your body to produce endorphins. Smoking also makes your body produce endorphins, which is part of the hook. With exercise you give yourself an alternative route to your endorphin fix.

The exercise also gives you something to do that breaks your usual patterns of behavior that involve smoking. You don't actually have a smoking "habit." You have a thousand little smoking habits. Smoking in your car, smoking while on the phone, smoking with your morning coffee, etc. You have to figure out a way to disrupt each of these habits.

Find little ways to reward yourself, preferably not involving high-calorie food. Food will be very tempting because your taste buts will suddenly turn on when they cleart of the nicotine & everything will taste GOOD! (I made a mistake in using mints, etc. to distract myself from the urges & gained weight, which I then went on to lose as I built up my exercise regiment & fought to get control of my eating after kicking the nicotine.) Use these rewards to keep yourself going. Indulge yourself; get a massage. A bubble bath if you're into that sort of thing.

Go to movies. Do all sorts of things that are enjoyable but incompatible with smoking. Swim. If you don't belong to a Y, join one.

And, dammit, YOU ARE A VIRTUOUS PERSON!