If you think smokeless tobacco is "up to snuff" and harmless, think again. Whatever you call it - chewing, dipping or spitting - it is every bit as hazardous as smoking. Many medical professionals think more so because people are unaware of the risks. Cancers of the lips, mouth, tongue and throat can swiftly grow in people who use smokeless tobacco and cause debilitating and grotesque - even lethal - results. 

Even with the painful and dangerous consequences of smokeless tobacco, quitting with traditional ways remains extremely challenging. Many people think the reason lies in nicotine, a natural, super toxic element found in tobacco that is the plant's protection against being eaten by bugs. Evaluating equal amounts, nicotine is more lethal than snake venom or strychnine, and three times deadlier than arsenic. 

When dipping, the nicotine makes its way to the brain in less than 10 seconds, where it produces a flood of dopamine, resulting in a relaxing feeling. Nicotine also promotes adrenaline production, so it both calms and energizes. However, the emotional element of smokeless tobacco addiction is much stronger and creates far more challenges to quitting smokeless tobacco than nicotine.

Many users had their first dip as early as nine years old. In as little as a few months, using smokeless tobacco becomes an ingrained habit that delivers reliable stress relief. In addition to the psychological conditioning, a social conditioning transpires, as images of many athletes dipping also attract young users.

Knowing that there are individual emotional and physical issues that play a role in a chewing habit makes it easier to create a plan to prevail smokeless tobacco addiction. Let's examine each element individually and look at effective methods to curb them.

Dipping for Relaxation and Pleasure: Just like using a pacifier to appease an anxious infant, over time, people who use tobacco products start to associate putting something in their mouths with relaxation and satisfaction. Curbing the effects of tobacco usage involves addressing all aspects of the addiction.

Tobacco Dipping is a Conditioned Response: The classic case in point of a conditioned response relates to Pavlov and his dogs, which were trained to anticipate food - and thus began salivating - when a bell was rung. In relation, if, for example, you always chew tobacco after each meal, you will consequently develop a craving to chew when you are done eating. 

In your mind, the images of folding the napkin and pushing the play away may be connected to using snuff, even if you are not conscious of it. Becoming aware of the situations or trigger images can help you overcome cravings. 

The Physical Addiction to Nicotine, But … : Despite the intense addiction, medical professionals maintain that the physical component of nicotine addiction is quelled after people quit using tobacco for a week. It's my strong belief that nicotine addiction comprises a scant 10 percent of smokeless tobacco dependency. Therefore, 90 percent of the fight to quit dipping is overcoming the emotional and mental components. So what does this mean for people like you who would like to quit?

Quitting becomes much more feasible if you are able to:

A. Address and eliminate the anxiety and tension that compels you to use smokeless tobacco B. Cancel the conditioned responses to chew in particular settings

But how does one triumph over those issues?

Self-hypnosis offers a way to address the psychological and emotional parts of the addiction while eliminating difficulties, which will eliminate the symptoms of withdrawal. When we recognize how self-hypnosis works, it makes the decision to quit dipping much easier to accept. 

When people dip for relaxation and pleasure, it's to pacify stressful feelings. People often play the same images over in their heads, like a bad movie, which leaves them feeling anxious and tense. With self-hypnosis and various Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) techniques, you retrain your brain to instantaneously and automatically prohibit stress-inducing images and substitute them with calming images and mental movies. This creates relaxation and satisfaction while eliminating cravings and oral compulsions. You elude the impulse to put the chew in your mouth, and you don't get any desire to substitute food in its place. This controls weight gain.

In order to battle the conditioned response of chewing smokeless tobacco, the NLP Flash technique removes the associations of dipping during certain activities or situations. This means your subconscious will no longer trigger the compulsion. Further, the Flash can even be used to create a compulsion to reject smokeless tobacco.

Employing specific and strategic NLP methods makes the decision to quit dipping easy and painless by sidestepping cravings, withdrawal and weight gain. The process involves retraining the unconscious mind to follow the same thought patterns that create your mental addiction to smokeless tobacco in the first place, to eliminate the habit. 

Your brain is a powerful instrument—far more powerful than an addiction. With dedication and the help of self-hypnosis and NLP, you can quit smokeless tobacco forever.

Alan B. Densky, CH is a pioneer in the use of hypnotherapy stop smoking methods. He offers a potent Stop Chewing Tobacco program based on those same methods. See more at his hypnotherapy downloads site where you can use Free hypnosis videos and articles.

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