I feel I'm really starting to learn a lot from this forum. About people. We all have our own experiences, and different mindsets work for different people. The outcome, the important part is the same. We're sober. Yet, we argue, though some people don't like to call it that. The argument usually stems from someone taking an ever so slight, yet clever dig at what works for other people. And some people just can't seem to contain themselves. They have to throw that little dig in. Myself included, although I'm really working at healing that.
My experience with cigarettes. I picked up cigarettes in the 5th grade. Smoked about a pack every 2 days, which quickly went to a pack a day, and by the time I was in HS smoked 2 1/2 to 3 packs a day. That went on until I was 30 years old.
I tried to quit hundreds of times. I read books. I wrapped my cigarettes in charts with rubber bands. I had nicotine fixes prescribed (you needed a script back then). I bought this little computer gadget that was supposed to ween me off them. I tried smoking Carlton. And wound up breaking off the filters. I took supplements. I quit countless times, and every time lasted until about 8PM. I tried everything and anything to quit, and then I finally threw the towel in. I know this is in the secular recovery section, so I'm not looking for argument here - just my experience, I accepted it as my HPs will that for whatever reason I was meant to smoke for the rest of my life, and quit quitting. I sometimes think that acceptance, what some view as helplessness, is where some, not all of us, find the power we need to get away from the substances that kill us. It's what works for us when everything else failed. I really don't see a need to argue or take digs at that, but I've learned someone here probably will. Anyhoo...
By coincidence I moved into an apartment that had a smoker living under me dying of emphysema. Didn't really think much about it, but it was horrible hearing this guy night after night coughing till I thought it was the end for him. Eventually it was. This had no conscious effect on me and my smoking habit... but one night I was on the phone with my friend, who previously lived in the apartment. We got to talking about this guy, bla, bla, bla... my friend suggested we quit smoking right on the spot. I laughed and said sure. We both put our cigarettes out and said we'd call the next day should the urge arise. Sure as anything, next day my first break in class (was in college at the time) I was ready to light up. I dropped a quarter in a payphone, remember them
, and called. I asked how he was doing, and he said "with what?" I said the smoking! He said, "Oh. I hadn't even thought about it yet." Somehow that slammed my ego against the wall and I got determined not to smoke that day. I succeeded. And then I did it another day. And another... and so on and so on....
Anyhow, my point was that my best thought out efforts couldn't save me from cigarettes. Me. Others can and DO quit all the time. It wasn't until I gave up giving up, what I guess people call learned helplessness (which has a much different connotation than powerlessness), that I found the power to finally quit. Whether that power came from inside me, or power greater than me, outside of myself really doesn't matter. The needed result was achieved.
Why am I posting this here? I guess I just want to state that there is a difference for me between helpless and powerless. And state in regard to the OP that I believe whatever works to keep one sober, can and will work to keep someone away from cigarettes - if applied. I don't think there's any difference if one believes there is a universal power greater than them, or not. What works for half the people, doesn't work for the other half. Thankfully, it just works.