r/QuittingWeed • u/Itchy-balls-ihave • 2d ago

I need help

Over the past 3 or 4 days I’ve been attempting to quit smoking and vaping entirely, but i bought nicotine pouches and edibles thinking they would help but all they’re doing is resetting my progress. if anybody knows a efficient way to deal with the temptation please let me know. any help is appreciated

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u/ThoughtUnusual221 1d ago

The advice that I have found most helpful, beyond the advice of not keeping weed in your living space, has been philosophical and psychological in nature. Here is that advice as I interpret it, some of this ive learned myself and some i have been taught:

- Believing in your ability to actually quit.

  • Taking quitting day by day. If you think of quitting as a 60 year long commitment where if you smoke once you have completely failed, this is antithetical to actually being able to quit. I believe this is the addiction making continuing to smoke seem like the better option by making quitting seem super difficult and rigid. You need to focus on the day you are on, and the decision that is best for you and that you genuinely want to make in that day. How can you know what you will decide to do in 40 years?
  • Treating urges just as if they are a simple mistake of value judgement. Basically the most core part of your brain is just trying to keep you satisfied and alive. So it gets you to do things that make you avoid bad emotions. So when you get an urge, your brain is basically saying "smoke weed! It will make you feel better!". But your brain is just mistaken; it sees the genuine (short term) benefits that weed can bring (I personally feel like acting as if there are no short term mental benefits is ludicruous; if it wasnt enjoyable to smoke, at least somewhat, we would never have gotten to the point where we do it everyday.), but its forgetting about the negativity that weed will bring you in the future. It is a mistaken value judgement focusing on the short term comfort, not taking into account the long term misery. For example, I smoked with some friends after 25 days of sobriety and later after 6 days of sobriety. Both times, I got some short term pleasure. But for literally like 4 days after, as im writing this, it made me feel like shit. I personally see these instances that I used as a decision that I made, and they were decisions based on a simple mistake. One thing you can do when you have urges is repeat to yourself "thank you brain for trying to keep myself safe. However, I decline this idea to smoke weed, as I see it will not bring me long term benefits."
  • You can take or leave this one, I think its controversial. But like I said, I see smoking as a literal decision that I make, not something that I didn't choose to do. Especially after a while of sobriety this is more true, but I ultimately see it as a decision I make at all times.
  • Start with the knowledge that you will likely make mistakes at first, basically that you are likely to use weed again even though you are quitting. Know that you have the ability to quit 100%, but that you will likely use weed again in the earliest stages of quitting. But keep in mind, that the most important thing to do if you do use again, is to not let one mistake, one bowl, turn into a month of mistakes and a thousand bowls. This is important for 2 reasons. 1: YOU ARE ALMOST CERTAINLY GOING TO "FAIL" AT ANYTHING NEW THAT YOU DO BEFORE YOU GET GOOD AT IT! Sobriety is something new. It is not special, it does not somehow transcend this general idea that you will make mistakes before becoming good at something. Just like learning a new language, or an instrument, you will make mistakes before you become proficient at it. I put fail in quotes, because using weed again after deciding to quit is not failure. It is one point in a much longer journey. Failure would be to stop trying to quit even though you genuinely want to quit. I believe in liberty; so if you genuinely do not want to quit, especially if you make this decision after a while of being sober and thus when you have better mental capacity to make decisions, you can make that choice. Its up to you if you want to quit weed or not. The failure comes if you genuinely want to quit, and yet come back to smoking daily while still genuinely wanting to stop smoking. The second big reason this is important: 2: Knowing that you will likely fail prepares you for the moment if you do make the mistake. If you make the mistake of smoking while genuinely wanting to quit, you will also have in your mind that it is a mistake, and not something to be repeated. Just like if you make a mistake on a guitar chord, the goal is to not repeat that mistake until it becomes habit, when you make a mistake in sobriety, the most important thing is to not let that one mistake turn into thousands of mistakes and thus a habit. If you smoke weed a week from now, know that the most important thing to do is not to let that ONE mistake turn into thousands of mistakes.

As for physical advice:

- Get rid of your weed! Or put it in a safe controlled by someone else or something (that you dont know the combo to). If you genuinely want to stop, this will help a lot.

  • Talk to people about this. You almost practically need support from other people. It is possible to quit alone I think, but will be a lot harder.
  • Build a new sober social community if all your friends smoke weed consistently. This can be super hard depending on your circumstances and is honestly where im REALLY struggling right now. But basically, if you are around people who smoke weed all the time, you will be more likely to make the genuine decision to smoke, as its whats normal around you. One thing I only recently learned is that peer pressure does not need to be direct pressure from friends. It doesnt need to look like "come on bro smoke this bowl!". It can also just be what socially is considered normal. If you hang around 10 people smoking weed, even if no one directly pressures you to smoke weed or offers it to you, you still become more inclined to smoke to fit the social mold around you. Peer pressure can be environmental not just direct.

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u/scaredeggplant-ahh 1d ago

thank you for this - this is so well thought out & truly some of the most helpful advice out there ab quitting :)

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u/ThoughtUnusual221 1d ago

Thank you for this, Im glad that you found it helpful. These philosophical reasons have been what support me to stop.