A man came to see me recently,he wanted to stop smoking,during the pre-session interview he said he was addicted to nicotine,I asked how he had arrived at that conclusion,he said "All I do is smoke all day everyday" I asked: "What about at night?" "Well I'm asleep at night" he said,so I asked "How many hours do you sleep?" "About 6 or 8 hours" he said, "Ok so you can sleep up to 8 hours without a cigarette?" "Yes" came the reply, "So you don't wake up during the night with sweats,shakes and other withdrawal symptoms like a heroin addict would?" I asked, "No I don't do that" he replied,"That's good then" I said "This means that you aren't truly addicted to nicotine,it is merely a habit,and habits can be broken,tell me,as a child,did you use to suck your thumb?" "Yes" he replied, "Do you still suck your thumb?" I asked, "No,I haven't done that for many years" he said, "Hmm,so how did you come to stop sucking your thumb?" I asked,he thought for a moment,and said: "I guess I grew out of the habit" He then started to gain an expression of realisation on his face as I asked him "Do you think you could grow out of the habit of smoking?" He smiled and said "Now you have made me realise that I'm not addicted to cigarettes,I think I could grow out of the habit" So then we went on with the session,using all that had been discussed beforehand in the therapeutic part of the session - two weeks later,I received a phonecall from the same man,he was overjoyed,he hadn't had a cigarette since leaving my office that day. So you see,if you regard smoking as an addiction,you are trapping yourself within it,and thinking that there's no way out of it,when you look upon it as a habit,it loses its power,and seems more easily to defeat - thanks for reading.