Boleo

I used to know an Addictionologist who worked at a large rehab facility. He never spoke at an AA meeting (he was in recovery himself) but he did go out to a restaurant after the meetings with my sponsor and I. He said 100% of the thousands of patients that he had seen, "had a blown insight circuit", when it came to seeing the truth about their affliction.

Plus, I trust the teachings of Nisargadatta more than I trust anyone in recovery.

freshstart57

Surely, Boleo is referring to all the addicts of which he has direct personal experience. Namely Boleo. And there is nothing wrong with that.

soberlicious

Oh, one addictionologist said so. Ok, I see now.

Dee74

if they need to be uttered at all, personal asides and potshots are best via PM.


Thanks

Dee
Moderator
SR

Gottalife

I believe this discussion is in the context of the Big Book and the particular type of alcoholic who identifies with it.

p103; "We are careful never to show intolerance or hatred of drinking as an institution. Experience shows that such an attitude is not helpful to anyone. Every new alcoholic looks for this spirit among us and is immensely relieved when he finds we are not witch burners. A spirit of intolerance might repel alcoholics whose lives could have been saved, had it not been for such stupidity. We would not even do the cause of temperate drinking any good, for not one drinker in a thousand likes to be told anything about alcohol by one who hates it.

Some day we hope that Alcoholics Anonymous will help the public to a better realization of the gravity of the alcoholic problem, but we shall be of little use if our attitude is one of bitterness or hostility. Drinkers will not stand for it."

This seems to show reasons why the suggestive approach was adopted.

soberlicious

Let me rephrase then. Boleo, I asked if you could provide something other than personal anecdotal stories to back up your assertion that all addicted people in the world share this same mysterious affliction.

jdooner

A Jew, Christian, Muslim and an Atheist walk into a cafe together to discuss their own ideation of the origin of life. I am thinking the conversation that follows is similar to this thread.

We are all passionate about the programs we have found, particular for those of us who believe it was life or death in terms of sobriety. This passion comes through in sharing our experiences with the relative newcomer (I do consider myself one).

I have chosen AA and identify with much of what is in the BB but I did not at first. In fact, I thought it was a cult and tried several other approaches including my own hybrid program, lol, because I knew more than AA. Now I find myself trying to work and live the steps and it is helping. However, for me my sickness went much deeper than just the drink so its no surprise that my solution, AA's solution, needed to go much deeper too.

As an aside, I don't believe any of the other experiences have diminished my AA experience at all. I continue to use a psychologist weekly specializing in addiction, I made a Big Plan in RR, I use SR regularly too. I find all of this has enhanced my journey, which has gotten me to the point I am at today and the program I am using today (AA's 12 steps).

Boleo

Let me rephrase that: Why would anyone do something as harmful as alcohol abuse, over and over again, expecting different results?

Do you yourself think you were not delusional at the height of your addiction? If not, how delusional is that?

Boleo

For those that think delusion thinking has nothing to do with alcoholism, count the number of times "self-deception" and "self-delusion" appear in this article.

http://silkworth.net/pdfBillW/This-M...Y-Aug-1961.pdf

dsmaxis10

AA spiritual kindygarden says so in the big book. they say remember we relies we only know a little and they do AA recovery rate lower then spontaneous recovery according to AA poster boy Bob Darrel.

desypete

i had to protect myself in the same way as you by not going to aa meetings when my son died as i didnt want to be around people who believed they had been saved from drink by a miracle of god,
it opened its own can of worms for me

how can i get down on my hands and knees and be grateful to a god for having the power to remove my drink problem yet can not remove a cancer from and young lad ? he would if he was sought i keep hearing
well we all prayed for my sons life and my son begged to live just like many say they did over a drink problem
my son couldnt even drink to forget his cancer he couldnt escape it at all and at 16 he was more of a man than i will ever be

but thats the problem i have to deal with and i have to a point as i flatly refuse to believe in a god that has the power to remove anything
but i do believe in the aa program as a program of change and working with a sponsor to show up the person i am and not the person i thought i was

armed with new knowledge about me and a willingness to work hard at trying different things, like asking people how they are and taking an interest rather than waiting for people to ask me how i am and if no one is interested then stuff them etc

so when i read the book and read about the god stuff the one thing that is missing is the ones who prayed to god and didnt get saved so its a one sided slant in my eyes

for sure there are a lot of things in the book that are bang on the button but the god side of things really is were i draw the line as i know i can live a good life without neediing a god just so long as i do good in this world and try not to hurt anyone i can rest my head on my pilow at night without it going on and on with all that mad worry i once had

soberlicious

So this from wiki on delusional thinking...
So there's actually a framework within which something can accurately be called "delusional". If I say "I can fly" and I proceed to jump from a bridge, it will soon be proven that I am suffering from a delusion. On the other hand, if I am continuing to drink despite harmful consequences, even drinking despite wanting to quit, I am in the state of being addicted, that is different from the state of being delusional. If I decide in a moment of clarity that I'm effing up my life and I'm going to quit, that's not outside of the realm of possibility. People do it every day.

The use of substances can cause delusions for sure, but to say that every addicted person does not recognize the situation they are in is not quite accurate. Continuing a behavior despite wanting to stop that behavior is exactly what it means to be addicted. I knew for a long time that I was in deep sh*t. There were no delusions there.

So I can throw around the word delusional if I want to. Like the random at the grocery store that asks for my phone number...I can say "dude, you're delusional", but really I'd be speaking metaphorically. My opinion of him involves a value judgement. I can't really prove that he suffers from true clinical delusions.

Gottalife

I could be wrong, I frequently am, but I think you just made Boleo's case.

"Furthermore, when a false belief involves a value judgment it is only considered as a delusion if it is so extreme that it cannot be, or never can be proven true."

The chronic alcoholic believes he does not have a problem inspite of overwhelming evidence, is suffering from an extreme delusion which can never be proven true. Many die trying, many are locked up in institutions under mental health legislation (certified) precisely because of their delusional thinking.

The big book discusses the view that many of them might have been able to stop on their own power had they realised in time what was happening. But they think it unlikely as early stage problems were not suficiently dramatic. That would not be so much delusional as it would be inability to see the future.

Eddiebuckle

Delusion: a persistent false belief maintained despite ample evidence to the contrary.

It would be interesting to be able to look back and count the number of times I said to myself "never again." For twenty five years of my life "never" was usually less than 48 hours. And by the second or third drink, it was like the past never happened at all, though it inevitably led me a little bit further past the previous "never again."

Most delusional of all was the last time. I honestly saw sobriety as the end of my life, because it was all I knew and trusted.

sydpet18

ABSOLUTELY !! Enough questions ... now some answers : no, the Big Book is not perfect. It was written by fallible human beings. Our troubles are of our own making : in my view, this does NOT mean that we deserve those problems. Please read page 45 of the Big Book : its main object is problem-solving. When you have worked all the Twelve Steps and read all of the Big Book ... the black bits, then you will be in a better position to judge its value. Meanwhile, read on ! Good luck and best wishes.
Peter G.

soberlicious

This is just not true. On any given day you can read hundreds of posts here of people in the throes of addiction...knowing deep down there is something gravely wrong because they know they have a serious problem, yet seem unable to stop. To say that every "chronic alcoholic" does not believe he or she has a problem is wrong.

A truly dangerous delusion that an addicted person might suffer from is this: I am defective, and therefore not capable of ending this addiction.

Boleo

A truly dangerous delusion that an addicted person might suffer from is this: I am not defective, and therefore fully capable of ending this addiction all by myself.

I myself had no clue as to just how delusional I was until;

1. I listened to hundreds of others just like myself.
2. Got a sponsor.
3. Made a thorough inventory of myself
4. Discussed my secrets with another human being.
5. Made amends to those who could clearly see how delusional I had been.
6. Tried to help others who were just like me.


"The Maya is so clever that it can easily fool even the smartest man."
(Sri Nisagadatta Mahar****)

desypete

that list of steps you put up is the first time i have seen exaclty how i have done mine and how i live my life today

1. I listened to hundreds of others just like myself.
this proved to me i was like them and i made my mind up i was alcholic

2. Got a sponsor.
took me 2 years and many many aa meetings before i took this step

3. Made a thorough inventory of myself

wow it was the first time i could see myself for how others would of seen me before that i though i was an ok guy and it was the rest of the world that was wrong

4. Discussed my secrets with another human being.
this was the step i never wanted to do and it was proberly the main reason it took me so long to do the steps as i didnt want anyone else to know my secrets
when i did this i did so with all my past harms i had done i never left anything out
it nearly sent me back to the drink when i took this step as i really hated myself and i hated aa i would go around the meetings calling them all cruel for having such a step
but one thing stuck in my mind and it was how when i finished saying all my secrets, i was told to rip them all up and from today onwards dont do them again this i could agree to with ease and somehow i ended up months later starting to feel good and free. it was the start of me learning to forgive myself

5. Made amends to those who could clearly see how delusional I had been.

i continue to make my amends to people as my life keeps going forward and i keep making mistakes and people can get hurt by me at times but pain shows me when i have done this and i soon put it right

6. Tried to help others who were just like me.

this was the step that made all the others show me what its all about
i have to change and trying to help others is the hardest change of all for an alcoholic to make

today i spend a lot of my life listening out for pain in others lives, if there in pain and need a friend i will try to be there for them

it sound simple but to practise is hard work, when your in the middle of a good tv program and someone might need a chat or a visit you have to put things on hold for a while
i am not doing that would be my cry until i tried it just once and wow how good did i feel about me
its the only action i can take today that will push away my own pain in life and help me get out of myself

call it whatever you want but it works for me

and those steps work for me but not with the god side of things and people just dont understand how it can be done without one but it can

FT

Yes, ".... it's been said."

RobbyRobot

Both quotes above work for me. I've found myself on both sides of such delusions while drinking and in early sobriety. I can't speak for others. For me it would have been delusional to believe one over the other as neither alone gives a sufficient window of analysis into my experiences rather both interpretations are required.

I'm not sure why either side of this discussion seems adamant to be the "correct interpretation" when both clearly are equally possible. Surely I'm not the only guy here who can speak of experiencing both of the above delusions?