Originally Posted by
dwtbd 
I think a lot of people see RR/AVRT as a method , as a system to implement in order to bring about a 'quit'.
You may count me as one such person.
I do view AVRT as a technique that must be learned. I also believe that it can bring about an awareness of the Addictive Voice, and eventually, a deep suspicion of the mentality that has been sustaining the addiction for so long.
That exposure and awareness can bring about the necessary insight for the motivation to finally do what needs to be done in order to recover from addiction.
Originally Posted by
dwtbd I see comments all the time " I thought I made a BP and yet I've had more drinks" , it seems as if they are surprised or disappointed that AVRT didn't 'work' .
I would say that AVRT contradicts entirely the idea that anything can 'work' on the addiction. One of the premises of AVRT is that there is no help for you, anywhere, beyond your own G-d given, or nature-given, capacity for self-restraint. You are on your own.
Originally Posted by
dwtbd RR/AVRT 's utility is in showing 'what quitting looks like'.
Of course. AVRT was synthesized from the experience of the self-recovered population, most of which figured it out on their own, through trial and error, without ever hearing about AVRT or Rational Recovery.
Originally Posted by
dwtbd Addiction or continued use isn't a function of the desire it is a function of indulging IT.
Agreed. In AVRT, the Beast (the desire) is not the cause of the addiction. The focus is not on neutering or removing the Beast, which evolved from the same necessary survival mechanisms that have kept us on this planet for millennia.
Its progenitors are what keep us alive, and if the Beast dies, those essential survival mechanisms would have to be disrupted, and its host may die as well.
Originally Posted by
fini i see people who drink again and are following 12-step or AVRT as ultimately being told the same, or at least very similar, things: if you drink again, you didn't do the program right. or: you didn't really make a BP, no matter what you thought.
i find it all very circular.
I understand what you are saying, fini, and even agree with you to some extent. The difference, as previously noted, is that unlike other paradigms, AVRT presumes that nothing 'works' on the desire to use, to make it go away. It is not even the focus.
Through the lens of AVRT, the desire for the absence of addictive desire in order to abstain conceals a plan to use in the presence of that desire. It is Addictive Voice.