Originally Posted by
GerandTwine 
I do not tack insurance phrases on the end of my Big Plan such as "and I will never change my mind", or "for better or worse". I guess it's my science background, because I do not need any further definition of NEVER in my Big Plan. Those extra terms in the equation are unnecessary to me, almost to the point of their suggesting the term NEVER might not mean NEVER all by itself.
You are correct, and
"I will never drink/use again" is, by itself, entirely sufficient for a Big Plan. The
"I will never change my mind" part is common, and
"for better or for worse" is obviously just an adaptation of the anti bargain/payoff thinking which is already a part of AVRT ("Illusion 12" on Pg. 81-83 of TNC). Both are redundant, but both are also implied by the "short" Big Plan.
Originally Posted by
GerandTwine Not "or did I", I think you mean "and did I", unless you figured out how to cancel a Big Plan.
"I didn't intend to quit and I changed my mind."
That certainly simplifies things!
Originally Posted by
GerandTwine Well, now all the above can eventually be forgotten - except for that once in a lifetime plan regarding nicotine getting inside your body.
That is the obvious conclusion. If I'm never going to smoke again, none of this actually matters. All this analysis of what "went wrong" is just the addictive voice trying to make it seem like there are hidden reasons for smoking, and trying to inject doubt by suggesting I need to figure out what went wrong in order to prevent it from happening again.
Still, all of this could be useful for someone else, and there are two ways of looking at this incident. The first is that I "failed" to not smoke, or that something happened to "make me" smoke, but the second is that I succeeded at doing exactly what I wanted to do at that moment, which was getting that nicotine kick. Time to get back to AVRT basics here.
Smoking is neither a symptom nor a failure. It is purposeful, voluntary behavior, and I know exactly what happened. I decided I wanted to smoke, I had a purpose in doing so, and I did it. I'm certainly not downplaying the fact that I didn't keep to an earlier decision, but it is better to take responsibility for what I did do, and not what I didn't do. I know AVRT well enough to have done otherwise, after all.