Well, I have had to cut back from other things (never weed), but it has always helped to do things gradually like you already had in mind. You just need to be really dedicated to it.
"Ignore the ramblings of the ignorant, and step on or over their crumpled bodies as you make your way to the top of the mountain. Eat upon their flesh for fuel, and, through your determination and will, banish them to obscurity and a life of complacency and self righteousness that is the hell in which they live"
-Richard Safreed
"Civilize the mind, but make savage the body."