Originally Posted by
freshstart57 
As Tolle says, become the watcher of the thoughts of drinking by observing them without judgement. .
I totally agree with this statement, But heres the rub for me.
If we call our AV a beast, we cannot help but start out with judgement, calling something a Beast is an emotive word, it suggests something that by its very nature is judgmental. When we start our mindfulness of on this foot we have just created something that goes directly against the practice we try to fulfill. Personally I follow buddhist traditions that teach there is no "you" underneath anything, its all just one thing and efforts to sincerely separate stuff as a means to an end actually work against us in the long run. The idea of separating and compartmentalizing things is very easy to do and sometimes maybe thats part of how our brains work to solve problems. However many people take it to an end that transcends metaphor into a "separate self" reality. kind of like ideas of a "soul" found in much religious practice.