The Voices

I was dealing with a heavy smoker last year. He was one of the few that come in for a second session. He came in and said that he had been having a hard time. When I asked him to tell me what he was finding hard, he said. "Well most of me wants to stop, but there's a little voice in my head that says, Go on you know you want one, and it makes me smoke". So I said to him, "What does it sound like"? His reply being, that it sounded like a little Irish leprechaun sitting on the other side of the fence." Well I replied, "What does 'most of me', sound like"? As he had said that most of him wanted to stop. He said that he couldn't really tell as it spoke very faintly. So I said back to him, "Where about in your head do you hear the little fella"? He said, gesturing over his right ear, "over here". So I went on to ask, "where is 'most of me' whispering from" he said putting his hand over his heart, "Here". How interesting, I thought, so I said, "Tell me, what do you think 'most of me' would look like if you had to put a face to the whisper... He said, he would look like a really healthy fit and strong looking version of me with a calm peaceful look. So I said to imagine 'most of me' but with a very clear loud voice instead of whispering, he said that that was hard to do. So I said to him, "say out loud right now in a strong calm voice, 'I'm a non smoker and I feel great! He could do that, so i said "now imagine 'most of me' saying it just like that". He smiled and said oh he can do that now. Now I said move the new 'most of me' with the loud voice to the other side of the fence but in front and louder than the leprechaun. He closed his eyes, and took few moments to do this, then turned quite flushed, opened his eyes with a smile and started to weep..he then said, "I'm never going to smoke again".. I checked up with him yesterday and he has never felt better and is a non smoker still. It reminded me of what my teacher had told me, sometimes you just have to tear up the script and go with what you've got. Not all smokers are the same, but all smokers can be non smokers if they really want to!

With love Nigel