Stop smoking NLP

Stop smoking NLP programming

I have just noticed the new stop smoking NLP service being offered on the Internet. The marketing approach is low-key. It avoids the common hype of screaming banners and flashing pop-ups. Which is nice.

What I find interesting is the approach. The marketing for this service says that it hypnotises you in order to remove the programming that makes you smoke.

Whether this works or not depends on whether smokers are actually "programmed". If you are not programmed, then you cannot be deprogrammed. The whole idea of "programming" is at the heart of NLP. NLP started back in the 70s when computer programming was the latest and greatest technology. Every business idea wanted to use the term "programming".  But there is no direct evidence that the human mind is actually programmed, in the same way that computers are "programmed".

The marketing also claims that NLP can program you to feel that you have never smoked. And if you feel like someone who has never smoked, then the idea of smoking will just never occur to you. In my experience, this kind of modelling works for a couple of days, at most. At the first touch of stress, the person reverts back to their standard way of responding.

Smoking to feel sad

The second part uses NLP to associate smoking with a feeling. The advertising says that the CD put you into hypnosis, then get you to think of something in your life that made you sad. Then they use NLP to link that feeling of sadness to smoking. So that every time you have a cigarette, a period of sadness overwhelms you. The marketing says that you will find no difficulty in giving up smoking, if every time you have a smoke you feel sad and tearful.

A separate part of the process uses NLP to link not smoking to some joyous event in your life. So that every time you think of not having a cigarette, those feelings rise up in you.

It is certainly an interesting idea. However, NLP has a very spotty record of success. I studied it personally for many years. But I came to the conclusion that most of it just didn't work. The NLP community has never managed to prove that "programming" is anything more than a metaphor.

I would be very interested to know if this actually works.