CLAS

Bought the book and I have also been learning here thanks to all of you. I wanted to do some super brief bullet points and see if I've got this right.
I really am looking for insight/corrections and or anything you see that is off. Thanks in advance.

- I am me, and I don't want to ever drink again.

- Inside me resides a Beast that is a party animal that only wants to get me to drink because it is pleasurable, which is the only reason I drank.

- But I recognize that the Beast is not me, in fact, it is only an unruly tenant that resides within me. I am the landlord.

- I can't kick the Beast out, because we signed a lease and he has paid the rent on time. So he stays, but like any tenant there are rules to follow. He can say what he wants, but he can't DO what he wants.

- The beast speaks to me through it's interpreter, the Addictive voice.

- The AV is that voice we all have that speaks to us. It suggests that I should drink, that drinking is fun, and that my future will involve drinking at some level.

- I recognize that this voice is not me, but my Beast, and since I don't drink in the same way I don't rob or steal or break into houses, it is inconsequential what it says- because I don't drink.

- I made a plan, a big plan. It is this- I don't drink. I am a non drinker. In the same way I don't eat raw chicken. I simply don't do it and no amount of justification from my Beast will work. I am never drinking and I never eat raw chicken. And, to be sure, I will not change my mind.

- When my Beast speaks, I listen but don't engage. It's noise I hear but don't try to argue or really shut him up. He can say what he wants, but I don't drink-ever. So if he wants to keep talking he can, but I'm not drinking- ever.

Please give me any feedback, thanks. Hugs and love to all of you.

JimiC

Good stuff! I read that we can't prevent the beast or other unwelcome thoughts from coming through the front door. Once they enter, don't serve them tea! Practice mindfulness and show them out the back door. I find it helpful.

AlericB

As I understand it, the AV will rarely say that drinking is fun but rather keeps this secret. It would be dangerous for IT to reveal its true motivation of fun - the deep pleasure of the drug itself - because this would allow you to see the immorality inherent in pursuing an act that harms yourself and others purely for a buzz. So it would rather wrap it's reason up in the guise of a disease or of stress or depression, or that you need it to relax, socialise or enjoy an activity for example.

fini

butbutbut...do you have Beast that wants to eat raw chicken?
is eating raw chicken something you used to do and derive pleasure from?

If there were a catastrophe and no food for days on end but a raw chicken running around.....do you think you'd die beore you attemted to eat it?

just asking these questions because i don't see the analogy holding.
but possibly i don't have enough info.

dwtbd

fini
Straw chicken, not drinking is analogous to not eating raw chicken in the OP's example. Are you sure that is the only thing you have a problem with?

dwtbd

CLAS
The Beast is the desire for alcohol. Addiction isn't caused by 'having' a Beast , its cause is listening to and acting on the AV. Recognize the bark of the Beast ( the AV) and dismiss it.
The Beast is the quadriplegic tenant that is helpless to get ITs booze unless the landlord listens to and agrees with the AV. Ignore IT.

Wholesome

I would say that the AV is a revisionist and will try many tactics to get you to change your mind. Mine has used anhedonia, memories of good time past, dreams, time or future tripping, social pressure, fantasies, you name it, IT's tried it. Sometime it's so obvious it almost comical, other times IT's more insidious and tricky. The important thing is to see through those illusions and maintain the separation so it doesn't start using the I pronoun and start seeming like YOU again.

fini

no, of course not.
but it is my question.
an analogy is confusing instead of clarifying when it does not hold.

dwtbd

You changed the analogy to include not having been, presumably, addicted to raw chicken eating, which is the breakdown.

In the Op not drinking is on par with not eating raw chicken , the things that are alike, the things with similar qualities.

Are you suggesting , because I did infer , that you mean that after adopting a BP choosing to not drink is not on par with choosing to not eat raw chicken, even assuming one was never addicted to the practice?

Algorithm

I would wager that the OP meant to equate alcohol to 'raw chicken' in the same way that some people equate alcohol to poison. Eating raw chicken would make one sick, and hence, is poisonous when ingested.

The problem is, and fini almost caught it, is that the Beast is not deterred by scarecrows such as 'poison' or the proverbial skull and crossbones on a bottle. The Beast was born of drink, lives to drink, an drinks to live. It doesn't even take into consideration that the alcohol may harm its host.

The Beast's progenitors are the survival drives that make us fit for life in the jungle, where it's eat or be eaten, kill or die. The Beast is a sociopath, and it will kill you to survive, unknowing that it too, will die as a result. In that regard, it is similar to a parasite that eventually kills its host in the attempt to live off its host.

I don't believe that 'raw chicken' was an analogy to alcohol, but rather, an analog to poison -- a scarecrow.

fini

actually, dwtbd, i asked some questions. what you infer is is yours to deal with.
i asked the questions because drinking is often referred to here as this deep pleasure, and this deep pleasure and never having it again is something folks think of in regards to the BP.
therefore it is confusing and useless to draw an analogy to something else that it seems highly unlikely has ever been deeply pleasurable.

i'm not here to debate about my questions.

i wanted clarification about the OP's thinking and how they see this analogy.
because if there are circumstances under which you would indeed eat a raw chicken, then how might that transfer in your mind to drinking, when the analogy won't hold?

dwtbd

It seems I correctly inferred your implication that you are questioning the validity of a BP in the face of past deep pleasure.

Or or or , I'm incorrect and you were pointing out what Algo said visa vis the scarecrow tactic and it's ultimate uselessness if one were to engage with the AV and try to argue and debate away the Beast and its intention of getting more booze.

columbus

"I don't believe that 'raw chicken' was an analogy to alcohol, but rather, an analog to poison"

Yep.

Greenwood618

Leave it alone. There are certain enemies of AVRT who are allowed to post here. The idea of calling things as they are - deep pleasure and quitting once and forever - makes them go mental. They are trolls.

dwtbd

Yeah well that's your answer for everything , just quit

dwtbd

tursiops999

CLAS -- responding to your OP -- the feedback I would share is that your post seems to cover the basics quite well. One could always refine and improve one's understanding through continued reading (especially the "AVRT Explained" and "AVRT Discussion" threads), but I think you have the idea, and can certainly adopt a BP and do this successfully if you choose.

One thing that helped me was to really focus on the idea of separation ... if I hear a thought that suggests drinking now or future drinking or 'I might fail' or any of those things, I can label it AV and recognize that, by definition, it must be the AV because I do not drink. It may temporarily seem like it's "my" thought, but I need not be confused by that, because I recognize it's identity through the content, through what it is saying.

I posted here once about an experience I had, as an example. I went to the dentist for an awful appointment, came home and opened the frig, and heard in my head "I could have just a beer, because it's like medicine or a painkiller, and I had such a horrible traumatic dental procedure, so it really would be OK". In that moment, I was able to say, "I don't drink, so that thought has to be the AV". It prevented me from being confused, because by definition, it could not be me thinking those things.

I hope that is helpful. Please continue to ask questions. One thing I appreciate about AVRT and some of the other secular approaches, is we are not asked to check our intellect at the door, and we (ideally) won't be bullied for asking questions. Of course, it's an open forum, so one has to read with discernment.

Algorithm

Deep pleasure which is equated subcortically with survival. The mechanisms and 'forces' from which the Beast evolved are the same ones that keep us on this planet, and which have done so for eons. If the Beast goes, we might go with it. This is why science has yet to produce a satisfactory medicinal 'cure' for addiction. If someday science does, it will likely resemble chemical castration.


Agreed.

Excellent advice, tursiops999. We may not know the Beast's form or appearance, but with AVRT, we can simply recognize the dog by its bark, so to speak. It is devious, but nevertheless conspicuous by its movement towards the supply.

fini

neither of those, dwtbd, but i can't think of a better way to phrase my point.
thanks for trying to clarify.

Fusion

Hi CLAS and welcome to Secular Recovery.

Your post demonstrates a sound knowledge of the rationale of AVRT. If you have any questions whatsoever, then please post away.

I would add that my experience was, that as a technique, the learning process is frontloaded; but soon the practise of AVRT became instinctive and automatic.