Dalek

Sorry for the late response to this, R&A, but I had to think it over some. I personally do not believe that I 'relapsed'. Neither did I 'fail', or 'give in' to my Addictive Voice, as people will sometimes say. The Beast didn't make me do it. My AV may have suggested that a cigarette would be a good way to relax, but even though I had second thoughts, I remember agreeing with my AV, and actually wanting that muscle relaxant effect from the nicotine (i.e., no separation). I did, in fact, get that specific, desired effect for about an hour or so at the time. In other words, I succeeded at getting that nicotine fix, and the intended effect from that fix. That's a big difference!

This can be a very useful shift in perspective, BTW, and is not just a question of semantics. When people drink or use again, they very often start thinking that they have failed, or that something happened to them (e.g., 'had a relapse', like cancer returning out of nowhere). The Beast will actually encourage and then leverage that sort of thinking to its advantage, though. It has a remarkable ability to first direct our thoughts towards that next fix, and to then lord it over us if we do actually indulge. The AV will first suggest a fix, and then beat us over the head with the fact that we got a fix. The AV makes it seem like we are 'out of control', and this is where the illusion of powerlessness over the Beast comes from.

The book talks about "Mr. Beast, Esq., prosecutor-at-large" pulling up our rap sheet, and it fits. After you indulge, the Beast will try to build a case against you, and it certainly tried to do this with me. It was telling me that I relapsed, I failed, that I was weak and gave in, *again*, and that I was therefore a big time loser, obviously incompetent to not smoke, etc., even as it was telling me to go out and get a whole pack. Had I gone along with that kind of thinking, I probably would have kept on smoking for years, on schedule, with the Beast lording each cigarette over me all along the way. I almost resigned to it, but by shifting from "I failed to not smoke" to "I succeeded at smoking", I was able to deny the Beast its victory dance, put things in their proper perspective, and regain my bearings.

Even though smoking again might have been perfectly stupid, and I went against a previous decision to not smoke, there are really no 'failures' or 'relapses' when it comes to recreational drug use. The use of such terms is misleading, essentially a deflection obscuring the fact that using drugs is actually willful conduct, and not some random, inexplicable, deterministic event. The way I see it, we either succeed at getting high, or we succeed at abstaining. The choice is always ours to make, since we are always in control, and unless already under the influence, never truly out of control. In order to get out from under the Beast's thumb, we need to take responsibility for what we did do, and not what we didn't do. No deflections. No obscurantism.

Now, to actually answer your question...

I believe I left a Beast hole unplugged, and as Trimpey might say, the Beast can drive a beer truck (or a cigarette truck) through a pin hole. I had stopped smoking because circumstances (illness) forced me to go without the smokes for over a week, long enough to get through the withdrawal. I had tried all kinds of quitting schemes, and cold turkey I would go two days, maybe three. I really hated those things, since they were really messing up my lung capacity, making me dizzy, coughing, all the usual stuff heavy smokers go through. I really saw the cigarettes as cancer sticks, as actual poison, and so I saw the forced withdrawal as a blessing, and decided I had better just not start smoking again.

My Beast soon became mostly quiet as far as smoking was concerned, and I couldn't get much of a reaction out of it after a while. The Beast doesn't ever really die, but it felt like it gave up on the smoking thing. There was no craving anymore, and the very few times my AV did make an appearance, I just thought 'poison', and that would be sufficient to shake any thought of smoking. At that point in my life, I hadn't really stopped drinking, though, nor had I learned AVRT. I believe that my decision to not smoke anymore wasn't quite an AVRT-style Big Plan, and that the 'poison' strategy, while useful to an extent, left the Beast an opening. I did start to forget what heavy smoking actually felt like over time, and the Beast eventually exploited that.

So, there you have it. My view through the lens. I probably gave you far more than you asked for, but I hope that helps. If some of what I wrote sounds cold, it's because I don't view the Beast as a 'toddler' throwing a tantrum. With its amorphous AV at its disposal, it can be very shrewd, pulling no punches. When unleashing AVRT on my own thinking, I try to be as unforgiving as the Beast itself.

Just make sure you know whether or not that self-interest is actually self-doubt. I trust you know how to handle that by now.