How to Break Up with Your Phone, Revised Edition: The 30-Day Digital Detox Plan

by Catherine Price

First, Brewer taught the “mindful” smokers about habit loops. They learned to identify their triggers and practiced paying attention to their cravings (and reactions) without trying to change anything. This step alone was surprisingly effective—just paying conscious attention to the taste of cigarettes, for example, was enough to give one longtime smoker the resolve to finally quit. “She moved from wisdom to knowledge,” writes Brewer, “from knowing in her head that smoking was bad to knowing it in her bones.” Next, he taught them to turn toward their cravings, rather than to run away. Participants practiced recognizing their cravings and relaxing into them—that is, allowing them to happen without trying to stop them. They practiced paying attention to how their cravings made them emotionally and physically feel, and they used this practice as a way to “ride out” their cravings when they occurred. Brewer also taught participants formal meditation exercises that they were expected to do each day. When Brewer’s data were analyzed, it turned out that the people who had received the mindfulness training had quit at twice the rate of the Freedom from Smoking group. What’s more, far fewer people from the mindfulness group relapsed.