Allen Carr's easy way to quit smoking: what is its essence, advantages and disadvantages? How many years did Allen Carr smoke? What disease and at what age did Allen Carr die? How to quit smoking using the Allen Carr method?
The name Allen Carr is known not only to smokers. The British anti-addiction and fear guru started out as an ordinary accountant, but his stressful job led him to smoke 100 (! ) cigarettes a day every day.
After 30 years of regular and unsuccessful attempts to quit smoking, Allen finally discovered an effective way, with the help of which he finally quit smoking.
Since then, Allen Carr's method has helped another 50 million people worldwide. It is curious that among them there are not only smokers.
Allen Carr
The future fighter against tobacco was born on September 2, 1934 in London.
Almost nothing is known about his childhood. Carr often began his memoirs at the age when he himself became addicted to tobacco. This happened at the age of 18, when he was called to the army.
During his service, Allen Carr started smoking. After demobilization, he graduated from the faculty of accounting and day by day, due to his intense work, he was more and more involved in smoking.
A heavy smoker, Carr often smoked several packs a day. His personal record (with a minus sign of course) is 100 cigarettes a day.
More than once Carr made desperate attempts to quit smoking, but they were unsuccessful. Thus passed thirty years of cigarette slavery.
The important day that changed the life of Allen Carr, and then millions of his followers, was July 15, 1983. On this day, a chronic smoker, passionately wanting to overcome his addiction, came to a session with a psychotherapist.
The treatment didn't seem to help. Upon leaving the clinic, Allen Carr immediately lit a cigarette. True, after some time I still found the strength to overcome a bad habit by inventing and testing my owneasy way to quit smoking.
Carr's years of smoking and the years he spent attending smokers' seminars in smoke-filled classrooms took a toll on his health. The anti-smoking activist passed away in the summer of 2006. The cause of death was lung cancer. Carr was 71 years old.
In an interview with Izvestia, which he gave a few months before his death, Allen Carr expressed the belief that he would have lived another twenty years if he had quit smoking earlier.
Allen Carr's last work was the book The Nicotine Conspiracy. In it, he talked about how, under the influence of cigarette manufacturers and pharmaceutical companies, the media and government organizations support myths about smoking. This is how they make money from both people who smoke and those who have decided to quit smoking.
Allen Carr said:
"Smoking is the greatest shame of our society, even greater than nuclear weapons. "
An easy way to quit smoking and more
Interestingly, Allen Carr adapted his method to treat other addictions:
- addiction to electronic cigarettes;
- alcoholism;
- drug addiction;
- obesity;
- gambling cravings;
- addiction to caffeine and sugar.
Carr's method has also been tested in the fight against debt and the fear of flying.
Over the years, Allen Carr has published books:
- "The Easy Way to Quit Smoking" (1985);
- "An easy way to lose weight" (1995);
- "How to Help Our Children Quit Smoking" (1999);
- "The Easy Way to Enjoy Air Travel" (2000);
- "An easy way to quit smoking especially for women" (2003);
- "An easy way to stop drinking" (2005);
- "An easy way to live without a hangover" (2005).
The Allen Carr Center is recognized as the world's leading authority on the fight against addiction.
The Allen Carr method
Allen Carr claimed that it helps to get rid of addiction painlessly, without restraining oneself from the will. Carr did not scare his patients and did not use shocking pictures of internal organs and the diseases that smoking provokes (smokers know this very well).
Instead, Carr explored and helped overcome the misconceptions that shape addiction. He analyzed the reasons that make him smoke and came to the conclusion that addiction is 1% physical and 99% mental.
The first step that Allen Carr advises those who want to quit smoking is to set a time and date to quit smoking.
Carr's method is to get rid of nicotine addiction by realizing that cigarettes don't help you enjoy life. The approach of "time X" increases the value of cigarettes, so he does not recommend reducing their number.
Smokers believe that a cigarette gives them a special pleasure. This helps to cope with stress, live a full life, collect yourself, relax, concentrate, find a common language and keep yourself in shape. They feel that quitting smoking will deprive them of a part of themselves, an important part of their life, and they will feel this emptiness throughout their lives.
Allen Carr wrote:
"Cigarettes don't fill the void, they create it! "
At the same time, smokers continue to worry about how smoking affects their health, experience constant social pressure and the need to find time and space for a cigarette between tasks.
"The last cigarette"- the last exercise, when a smoker, smoking a cigarette, promises that he will never smoke again and remembers what exactly made him.
Of course thoughts of cigarettes will return from time to time, but Carr offers some exercises to do when the urge to smoke appears.
A 2014 study found that smokers who quit using the Allen Carr method were six times more likely to be nicotine-free 13 months after their last cigarette.
The Carr method has been clinically validated in two randomized controlled trials. It does not require the use of any medication or nicotine products and there is virtually no nicotine withdrawal even with severe addiction.
Smokers note that after using Carr's method, they feel as if they had never smoked. They can interact with smokers even when they smoke and do not want a cigarette.
Despite millions of positive answers, there are those whoAllen Carr's method did not help: some did not feel the effect, others broke a few months later, others decided that "nothing will happen from one". . . There are many other methods for them - domestic, foreign and even artistic.