I definitely support views and approaches implying that many/all addiction-like problems (and obsessions) have the same mechanics. Tons of direct scientific evidence for it also these days. Why people sometimes recover from one addiction and trade it with another even before they notice, why simple things like eating can alleviate cravings for alcohol etc etc. It's a good thing because we don't need to look for completely different solutions to these issues, I think it's very common that people develop more than one throughout their lives. AVRT is definitely the simplest and if it works well for someone, I think it's quite lucky. Still, many of us go through tons of much more complicated "seeking" before arriving to an effective and relatively simple solution, including myself... we can say all that is AV, or just human nature.
For example (and this will be a message for Dustyfox and others re using recovery communities), I've recently read those old AVRT threads here in the Secular section from around 2015 and I really wondered where I had been at the time? Why I never read and participated in those - me, who signed up in 2010 and started posting a lot in 2014, not shy of engaging and expressing myself at all? Me, who always likes interesting and intellectually-fueled discussions, even debates? Why I largely dismissed (maybe more procrastinated using) the very recovery tools that could really make a difference for me, such as SMART and AVRT, until last year? Instead, I participated in countless long and complex discussions here on SR, many of which had little to do with getting sober and recovery directly, it was more looking for a social venue with some qualities I like, but not focused on recovery. It is so obvious now and easy to answer: I was never ready, never really wanted to stay sober long, never had any true commitment to it until the last few months, when I basically just took these things out of the closet and finally started using them quite easily. But all those years of participation in SR - what was that about? Learning, for sure, but also tons of distraction from what I would have needed to do if I had wanted to use this resource primarily for its intended purpose. I repeatedly, habitually engaged in ways that were not only unproductive for me but turned into another behavior that interfered with my more worthwhile goals, and was very addiction-like by itself. Engaged more deeply with some of the wrong individuals even, in ways that did not have perspective and merely provided yet another form of instant gratification via mental stimulation, never even lasting beyond a few weeks max.
I talked about this on various threads and do again here now, because I think it relates to the question about the usefulness of recovery communities. I would never blame my unproductive years on the nature or administration of recovery culture/communities though, it was my own choice alone, even if driven by certain kinds of predispositions. These resources can definitely be useful in many ways, but it's good to keep an eye on how we use them and be honest about our motives before it turns into another issue, mired with ambivalence, that has to be tackled and resolved, like in my case. Many people don't have any similar issue as far as I can see and don't experience these things as distractions, and if that's truly the case, it's great. But I like to share this because I was so blind to it for a while, and it interfered with giving a real chance for recovery to myself. Now I try to question every day when I am on here: is this really useful? Does it serve my goal? Still often find myself playing with red herrings, but the awareness and not letting what I feel as distractions progress far help a lot, it's much more balanced and goal-oriented now.