Allen Carr
| Allen Carr | |
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Allen Carr
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| Born | Allen Carr 2 September 1934 London, England |
| Died | 29 November 2006 (aged 72) Benalmádena, Málaga, Spain |
| Occupation | Author, accountant |
| Nationality | British |
| Genre | Self-help |
| Notable works | The Easy Way to Stop Smoking (1985) |
| Website | |
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Allen Carr (2 September 1934, London – 29 November 2006, Benalmádena) was a British author of books about quitting smoking and other psychological dependencies including alcohol addiction. He quit smoking after 30 years as a hundred-a-day chain smoker.
London-born Carr started smoking while doing National Service aged 18. He qualified as an accountant in 1958. Carr finally quit smoking on 15 July 1983, aged 48, after a visit to a hypnotherapist. However, it wasn't the hypnotherapy itself that enabled him to quit – "I succeeded in spite of and not because of that visit" and "I lit up the moment I left the clinic and made my way home...". There were two key pieces of information that enabled Allen to quit later that day. First, the hypnotherapist told him smoking was "just nicotine addiction", which Allen had never perceived before that moment, i.e. that he was an addict. Second, his son John lent him a medical handbook which explained that the physical withdrawal from nicotine is just like an "empty, insecure feeling". He claims that these two realisations crystallised in his mind just how easy it was to stop and so then enabled him to follow an overwhelming desire to explain his method to as many smokers as possible.
Carr teaches that, smokers do not receive a boost from smoking a cigarette: smoking only relieves the withdrawal symptoms from the previous cigarette, which in turn creates more withdrawal symptoms once it is finished. In this way the drug addiction perpetuates itself. He asserted that the "relief" smokers feel on lighting a cigarette, the feeling of being "back to normal", is the feeling experienced by non-smokers all the time. So that smokers, when they light a cigarette are really trying to achieve a state that non-smokers enjoy their whole lives. He further asserted that withdrawal symptoms are actually created by doubt and fear in the mind of the ex-smoker, and therefore that stopping smoking is not as traumatic as is commonly assumed, if that doubt and fear can be removed.
At Allen Carr Clinics during quit-smoking sessions, smokers are allowed to continue smoking while their doubts and fears are removed, with the aim of encouraging and developing the mindset of a non-smoker before the final cigarette is extinguished. A further reason for allowing smokers to smoke while undergoing counseling is Carr's belief that it is more difficult to convince a smoker to quit until they understand the mechanism of "the nicotine trap". This is because their attention is diminished while they continue to believe it is traumatic and extremely difficult to quit and continue to maintain the belief that they are dependent on nicotine.
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