North Cardiff
Therapy
Because Change is Possible
You've Got This
Thinking of giving up smoking or vaping?
Stop Smoking or Vaping with Hypnotherapy: The Five Hurdles Approach
If you’re looking to stop smoking or give up vaping, I offer a structured and supportive approach called The Five Hurdles Approach, designed to help you make lasting change in a calm, practical, and confidence-building way.
Rather than focusing on willpower alone, this approach draws on your existing strengths, skills, and personal resources… helping you feel more in control and more capable from the very beginning. Because when you feel confident in yourself, change tends to feel more achievable.
We then use hypnotherapy to support this process. Hypnosis isn’t about losing control — it’s about becoming more focused, more aware, and better able to rehearse the changes you want to make. Together, we use this state to help you find your own realistic and sustainable route to stopping smoking or vaping.
It’s completely normal for the idea of quitting to bring up anxiety or self-doubt. In fact, when we feel anxious, the mind often overestimates how difficult something will be… and underestimates our ability to cope with it.
A key part of this work is gently rebalancing that perspective… so that stopping smoking or vaping feels more manageable, and your confidence in your ability to do it begins to grow.
This is not about pressure or perfection. It’s about working with your mind in a way that feels supportive, realistic, and tailored to you.
I have a technique called 'The Five Hurdles Approach' to help you reach your goal of giving up smoking cigarettes or vapes.
The approach is based on focusing on your strengths, skills and resources so that you feel good about yourself and confident in your ability to do this. Then we'll use some hypnosis to help you find your route to success.
The idea of giving up smoking /vaping often makes one feel anxious and doubt one's own abilities. remember that when we feel anxious our mind overestimates the difficulty and underestimates our abilities.
Changing Unwanted Habits with Hypnotherapy
A Practical, Supportive Approach
Whether you’re looking to stop an unwanted habit or create a new, healthier one, the process of change can sometimes feel harder than it needs to be. Habits are not a sign of weakness or lack of willpower… they are learned patterns, shaped by repetition, context, and the brain’s natural tendency towards efficiency.
In my work, I take a practical and evidence-informed approach to habit change, using solution focused hypnotherapy to help you move towards the habits you want, rather than simply trying to resist the ones you don’t.
We begin by identifying your preferred future — what life looks like when the new habit is in place, or the old one no longer has a role. From there, we focus on your existing strengths, skills, and resources… because even when a habit feels entrenched, there are always moments where things are already working better than you might realise.
Hypnotherapy is then used to support this process. Not as a quick fix, but as a way of helping your mind rehearse change, reduce unhelpful automatic responses, and build new patterns that feel more natural over time.
Many people find that when they try to change a habit, anxiety or frustration can make the process feel bigger and more difficult. And when that happens, the mind can overestimate the challenge… and underestimate your ability to manage it.
Part of this approach is gently shifting that balance… helping you feel calmer, clearer, and more able to take the small, consistent steps that lead to lasting change.
This is not about perfection, pressure, or “all or nothing” thinking. It’s about working with how habits actually form and change… so that new behaviours become easier to maintain, and old patterns naturally lose their hold.
What is the difference between Hypnotherapy, Hypnosis and Mindfulness and Relaxation?
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These words are often used interchangeably, which can make things feel a little confusing… so it can be helpful to gently separate them out.
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Hypnosis is a state of focused attention. It’s something between a daydream state and that feeling of being absorbed in a good book, watching a film, or driving on a familiar route and your mind begins to wander. You’re still aware, still in control, just more inwardly focused.
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Hypnotherapy is the therapeutic use of that hypnosis state. It’s how hypnosis is used in a structured and purposeful way to support change, whether that’s around habits, anxiety, confidence, or other areas of life. It’s not something that’s “done” to you, it’s a collaborative process where we use that focused state to help you work towards your goals.
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Relaxation is often part of hypnosis, but the two aren’t the same. You can be relaxed without being in hypnosis, and you can be in hypnosis without being deeply relaxed. Relaxation can be helpful because it settles the body and makes it easier to focus… but it isn’t the therapy in itself.
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Mindfulness is slightly different again. It’s the practice of paying attention to the present moment, often with an attitude of curiosity and without judgement. Mindfulness and hypnotherapy can complement each other, but they have different aims, mindfulness is about noticing what is, whereas hypnotherapy is often more focused on supporting change.
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If you’re unsure about any of this, or would simply like to understand a bit more before getting started, I’m always very happy to explain things in more detail… just ask.