Originally Posted by
GerandTwine 
Yes, conviction is in play, so is common decency, personal morality, and desire for a better life.
By simply stubbornly sticking to using AVRT (separating YOUR voluntary muscle activity from the desire to drink) results in the Big Plan and permanent abstinence.
Once again, these terms are vague and don’t have any real meaning. Decency is not common to everyone, many people can’t even agree on what decency is, let alone what is decent and what isn’t. Personal “morality” is equally non-descriptive.
CBT recognizes distorted thinking that results in anxiety and substitutes more rational scripts. “I always fail at everything” becomes “I didn’t do x task to my satisfaction but now I know what to do next time...and I am very good at y and z tasks.” AVRT also does this, but names the distorted thinking the Addictive Voice, and allows true perception and accurate memory. “Wow, I had so much fun drinking at Gary’s wedding”becomes “At first, until I spilled a plate of food all over myself, threw up on the lawn, and hit on the bride’s mom.”
I never made a Big Plan, at least not officially. I recognized the negativity in my life stemming from my addictions and recognized that any perceived benefits from drinking and using were fleeting at best and swamped by the negative consequences. It was a very easy thing to do. As I was in a controlled environment I had the space to experience a week or so of sobriety and verify that every moment is better with a clear head.
I didn’t study the AVRT material, I skimmed it about 60 days into sobriety and said ‘yup, that’s mostly it. Add that to the data like the Step 1 realization and the cognitive work.
There is no magic to AVRT, nor is there for any recovery method. It made more sense to me and fit my psyche better than the higher power jazz, but never put much faith in the path, just on the result.