Psychological Law applied to Quit Smoking

If, somehow, I could keep myself from responding to a stimulus that triggered the desire to smoke-if I remained relaxed, rather than impelled to reach for a cigarette- if there were a "lack of' reaction-wouldn't that do the trick?

No. Well then, suppose I could remain "blind" and "deaf" to the things that stimulated my desire to smoke? Suppose I could achieve this by relaxing, instead of reacting? Wouldn't that work?

Sure. It sounded fine. But so does perpetual motion. Then, weeks later, while I was reading a few paragraphs written by Sigmund Freud, I came upon the answer I'd been seeking:
"Psychologically, every human being lives on the basis of the pursuit of happiness," Dr. Freud wrote. "This is the desire of pleasure and the avoidance of pain.

"To thwart this, the subconscious must learn to find imaginary happiness in unhappiness.
"The only pleasure one can derive from displeasure is to subconsciously make that displeasure a pleasure."

A psychiatrist, reading this paragraph, would think of its implications for the sadist or masochist; he'd think of "repression," and of the "pleasure and pain principles."

COULD FREUD'S THEORY BE APPLIED TO SMOKING?

I could think only in terms of smoking. Freud, I remembered, was a devotee of cigars. And his life had been cut short by a tragically painful cancer of the mouth and the throat.

"If only he'd applied his ideas to smoking," I thought to myself. "If only he'd somehow considered the pleasure of cigars an unpleasant, nasty thing-and the displeasure of abstinence from tobacco a good and pleasing thing-his life might have been longer."

It would be nice to note for posterity that I therefore leaped from my seat, shouted "Eureka," and Stopped Smoking Forever. Actually I thought about all this while rummaging through my desk for a cigarette. But I did begin to follow this line of thought to its logical conclusion. Could we reverse our feelings about smoking?

Could giving up cigarettes, for example, psychologically please you? Could I somehow be displeased by the taste, smell, and ritual of smoking? Could we find "happiness" in "unhappiness"? If we could, then we'd have psychological law on our side.