Greenwood,
If I was to explain AVRT to someone who had never heard of it I would say something like this: you make a plan (a Big Plan) to never drink again and never change your mind. You say 'never' because this means that not only will you never drink again, you will never have to deal with all the unhappiness of fighting your addiction ever again. The word 'never' in your plan is needed because it prevents an endless struggle and debate that you would otherwise have about whether and when to ever drink again and so it will allow you to be happy and secure about not drinking. That is your plan. It will come true for you if you really want it, and you will know in your heart whether you do or not. So, you have a plan, one that you have freely adopted after careful consideration and one that you will commit yourself to as if your life and everything you value depends upon it, as it does. This plan is to recognise and separate yourself from any thinking, feeling and imagery that will lead you to drink again and never again to consider these things as coming from or in any way speaking for you in anyway - it is your AV, not your voice. And it's on you to do this for the rest of your life."
Now, that's the gist of what I would say and it seems to me that the application of the technique is an essential part of the recovery, as important as it was to make the decision in the first place. The same commitment, it seems to me, is needed in continuing with the plan by applying the technique as it was in making the decision at the very start. The decision was an event, sure, but it started a process, not of building up a recovery over time, but of maintaining the recovery that the decision created.