How is it physically possible to make a permanent future decision ?
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I try pretty darn hard to do Alcoholic Voice Recognition Technique. Five and a half months sober now. I’m getting better with each hurdle I jump over. I don’t have a Big Plan, though. I wish I did, I just can’t believe in it. Plans (in my mind) can change, so I can’t hold confidently to a BP.
That said, no one can stop me from stopping to recognize my alcoholic voice.
It’s a technique I am trying to employ, despite what anyone else tells me.
Okay...clearly AVRT/RR purists disagree with this. To them, I’d say, I totally respect your belief in a BP. And, I respect Tatsy’s belief in a line-in-the-sand with AVRT.
I think we always have to be open to others’ methods/tools/etc. We are not all the same person. That’s why patients with cancer take different amounts of chemo and some don’t go that route at all. We’re different. So I’m okay with us considering things differently. I never want to shut down what someone’s brain is telling them will save them.
AA used to lecture how antidepressants were wrong...but not anymore. Boy we’re they off on their understanding of Mental Health. So, I’m thinking Jack Trimpy (he’s not god) might’ve been wrong on something he built in the early 1990s.
SMART recovery apparently has a thing similar to AVRT, but called something else. Perhaps AVRT purists would prefer Tatsy (and I) use that term. I don’t think it’s the term that matters, though.
just my thoughts.
That said, no one can stop me from stopping to recognize my alcoholic voice.
It’s a technique I am trying to employ, despite what anyone else tells me. Okay...clearly AVRT/RR purists disagree with this. To them, I’d say, I totally respect your belief in a BP. And, I respect Tatsy’s belief in a line-in-the-sand with AVRT.
I think we always have to be open to others’ methods/tools/etc. We are not all the same person. That’s why patients with cancer take different amounts of chemo and some don’t go that route at all. We’re different. So I’m okay with us considering things differently. I never want to shut down what someone’s brain is telling them will save them.
AA used to lecture how antidepressants were wrong...but not anymore. Boy we’re they off on their understanding of Mental Health. So, I’m thinking Jack Trimpy (he’s not god
) might’ve been wrong on something he built in the early 1990s. SMART recovery apparently has a thing similar to AVRT, but called something else. Perhaps AVRT purists would prefer Tatsy (and I) use that term. I don’t think it’s the term that matters, though.
just my thoughts.
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Originally Posted by dwtbd 
Through the lens of AVRT , the Beast is /was always powerless. Drinking occurs when you decide to drink, a desire qua desire can not facilitate 'its' own indulgence.
Planned permanent unconditional abstinence , a BP, is the mechanism that isolates that particular desire. One either feeds the desire or starves it, the desire is not to be feared , it has no motive power, the power is an illusion, a BP illuminates the false dichotomy.
It isn't true that one drinks because the powerful beast overwhelms and one becomes at its mercy. Drinking occurs when one decides to indulge the desire for more booze.
Anyone and everyone has the ability to quit for good, denying that reality is higher brain absolving and option leaving.
Cultural, collective and cliquish AV writ large will argue against that, individuals should be wary .
Planned permanent unconditional abstinence , a BP, is the mechanism that isolates that particular desire. One either feeds the desire or starves it, the desire is not to be feared , it has no motive power, the power is an illusion, a BP illuminates the false dichotomy.
It isn't true that one drinks because the powerful beast overwhelms and one becomes at its mercy. Drinking occurs when one decides to indulge the desire for more booze.
Anyone and everyone has the ability to quit for good, denying that reality is higher brain absolving and option leaving.
Cultural, collective and cliquish AV writ large will argue against that, individuals should be wary .
Originally Posted by Tatsy
No, dwtbd, it just means I’m hugely concerned that someone here in the spirit of RRWS Inc., made such a statement. I’m incredulous, actually. I’m certainly not going to carry out GTs dictate. As I said many posts ago, I reserve my right to practice AVRT without a BP. But don’t you think it’s unbelievable on a Sober Recovery forum, for s/he to make such a statement to me?
I think you know it was not a “dictate”. It is a simple statement of a critical part of how using the AVRT Manual works to achieve permanent abstinence.
I was a binge drinker, and was good at it. You were a 24/7 maintenance drinker, and you were good at that. I couldn’t have been a maintenance drinker because I usually drank too much booze at one time to establish any kind of ongoing drunken equilibrium. I bring this up because in late July, you decided to come back on SR because you were back to maintenance drinking and didn’t want to be there any more.
The following timeline may not be completely accurate, but it doesn’t need to be to make its point. You spent three weeks tapering off alcohol while at the same time using lots of AVRT terms in your posts. The Technique of AVR CANNOT be done to any degree AT ALL while under the influence. To use Wholesome’s term it becomes inverted. Your Addictive Voice was (and to some degree still is) having a grand ole time making everything your going through read like histrionics, at least that’s how it reads to me. I chose not to indulge in that thread next door because in AVRT terms it was all Addictive Voice. I believe you became somewhat habituated and seduced by that month or so of drinking and posting with AVRT terms and are carrying that inverted logic over into your present unintoxicated thinking. But I also believe you will allow that inverted thinking to fade.
You received hundreds of posts from others that you reacted to in various ways. Then you stopped drinking - for a week. Then you drank some more for a week. Then you stopped drinking again, hopefully for the last time.
Well, here’s how I’m going to leave it in my mind with your now being abstinent.
On August 26th at 11:12am Pacific Time you actually did make the correct Big Plan and posted it in your long thread next door. I believe you made it a few days after what I believe was your last drink.
Check out post number 359 on page 18 of “I drank after ...”
Congratulations Tatsy.
GT
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Tatsy ~
I think whatever irrevocable term/metaphor you want to use to identify your Booze Urge is all good. It is your Sobriety, after all. To me, this bit of Mind Gaming is a bit like a Mnenomic Device. It's all about identifying in a way that's convenient, persistent, and meaningful to you.
I quit a few Months before finding SR, and stayed quit permanently. This was all outside the AVRT/RR Construct. Subsequently, AVRT/RR put a useful form around what I called my Big Quit Decision. One thing I've come to realize is that such an *Inner Quit* - unshakable resolve - is the key to whatever Sobriety Method is used. For me, this Truth resonates through innumerable SR Sobriety stories.
A subtlety I've come to accept is that it's useful to not push back against anything. Me, I don't push back against the assumption that I'm supposed to drink 'Socially'. And, thus resent that cultural presumption. I don't push back on the concept that I'm 'missing something' by not drinking. And, so on. All this 'push back' requires energy, and could lead me to collapsing my Sobriety in some sort of hissy fit when times are really bad. I could overshoot my intended target of remaining sober. Not unlike the Sumo Wrestling Match I've mentioned where one Gent simply stepped aside to let the larger Gent charge right past him, and out of the Ring. Match over.
In what I believe is a like manner, pushing back against your 'Beast' - and the last Relapse such a former Construct now represents - is now not useful. I get that. I just flow through such Sobriety challenges w/o forcing my way through them. No energy-wasting push back required. It's a practice I call 'Buddhism Lite'. Any energy-wasting *fight* is long gone. I've moved on to modify AVRT/RR Principles in subtle ways that work for this Introvert while retaining Core Principles.
If such a useful Tool for you consists of a metaphorical line in Concrete, I'm all for it! This puts the non-drinking Entity outside your real Self, and I think that's a critical variable to your continued success. That which helps you succeed is far more important than any Program or Process conformance.
Tatsy ~
I think whatever irrevocable term/metaphor you want to use to identify your Booze Urge is all good. It is your Sobriety, after all. To me, this bit of Mind Gaming is a bit like a Mnenomic Device. It's all about identifying in a way that's convenient, persistent, and meaningful to you.
I quit a few Months before finding SR, and stayed quit permanently. This was all outside the AVRT/RR Construct. Subsequently, AVRT/RR put a useful form around what I called my Big Quit Decision. One thing I've come to realize is that such an *Inner Quit* - unshakable resolve - is the key to whatever Sobriety Method is used. For me, this Truth resonates through innumerable SR Sobriety stories.
A subtlety I've come to accept is that it's useful to not push back against anything. Me, I don't push back against the assumption that I'm supposed to drink 'Socially'. And, thus resent that cultural presumption. I don't push back on the concept that I'm 'missing something' by not drinking. And, so on. All this 'push back' requires energy, and could lead me to collapsing my Sobriety in some sort of hissy fit when times are really bad. I could overshoot my intended target of remaining sober. Not unlike the Sumo Wrestling Match I've mentioned where one Gent simply stepped aside to let the larger Gent charge right past him, and out of the Ring. Match over.
In what I believe is a like manner, pushing back against your 'Beast' - and the last Relapse such a former Construct now represents - is now not useful. I get that. I just flow through such Sobriety challenges w/o forcing my way through them. No energy-wasting push back required. It's a practice I call 'Buddhism Lite'. Any energy-wasting *fight* is long gone. I've moved on to modify AVRT/RR Principles in subtle ways that work for this Introvert while retaining Core Principles.
If such a useful Tool for you consists of a metaphorical line in Concrete, I'm all for it! This puts the non-drinking Entity outside your real Self, and I think that's a critical variable to your continued success. That which helps you succeed is far more important than any Program or Process conformance.
One thing I've come to realize is that such an *Inner Quit* - unshakable resolve - is the key to whatever Sobriety Method is used. For me, this Truth resonates through innumerable SR Sobriety stories.
D
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Originally Posted by MesaMan
.
If such a useful Tool for you consists of a metaphorical line in Concrete, I'm all for it! This puts the non-drinking Entity outside your real Self, and I think that's a critical variable to your continued success. That which helps you succeed is far more important than any Program or Process conformance.
If such a useful Tool for you consists of a metaphorical line in Concrete, I'm all for it! This puts the non-drinking Entity outside your real Self, and I think that's a critical variable to your continued success. That which helps you succeed is far more important than any Program or Process conformance.
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Ah GerandTwine, you did a deft side-step of my question, consequently, I take it as a given that I can use AVRT without a Big Plan.
I’d like to put the record straight:
You wrote, GerandTwine: On August 26th at 11:12am Pacific Time you actually did make the correct Big Plan and posted it in your long thread next door. I believe you made it a few days after what I believe was your last drink.
Check out post number 359 on page 18 of “I drank after ...”
For the accurate record, here’s that post:
So, as MesaMan says, I don’t kick my dog, and I don’t drink. Line drawn in the sand. Stepping over. I will step into the best version of Tatsy, which can only be achieved, alcohol free.
It remains, that I’ve since updated the ‘line in the sand’ , figuratively, to a ‘line drawn in concrete’: which for me, is more permanent, outside myself, and concrete.
You made me chuckle with your reference to my being ‘histrionic’ in my thread. My posts weren’t histrionics, I only spoke my, then, truth. Thankfully, for which I’m ever indebted, the good people on SR stepped forwards and posted and PMd me. I was surprised you did not, GT, having previously interacted with me.
Were it not for the support of those SR correspondents, when I was at the lowest point in my life, I probably wouldn’t have ‘made it back’. Had I simply picked up and read the Rational Recovery book, and related threads on SR, instead of interacting with the people on SR, I shudder to think where I’d be now, but I know the likelihood is, I’d still be drinking.
There’s a place for fanaticism, but I don’t think it’s here.
I’d like to put the record straight:
You wrote, GerandTwine: On August 26th at 11:12am Pacific Time you actually did make the correct Big Plan and posted it in your long thread next door. I believe you made it a few days after what I believe was your last drink.
Check out post number 359 on page 18 of “I drank after ...”
For the accurate record, here’s that post:
So, as MesaMan says, I don’t kick my dog, and I don’t drink. Line drawn in the sand. Stepping over. I will step into the best version of Tatsy, which can only be achieved, alcohol free.
It remains, that I’ve since updated the ‘line in the sand’ , figuratively, to a ‘line drawn in concrete’: which for me, is more permanent, outside myself, and concrete.
You made me chuckle with your reference to my being ‘histrionic’ in my thread. My posts weren’t histrionics, I only spoke my, then, truth. Thankfully, for which I’m ever indebted, the good people on SR stepped forwards and posted and PMd me. I was surprised you did not, GT, having previously interacted with me.
Were it not for the support of those SR correspondents, when I was at the lowest point in my life, I probably wouldn’t have ‘made it back’. Had I simply picked up and read the Rational Recovery book, and related threads on SR, instead of interacting with the people on SR, I shudder to think where I’d be now, but I know the likelihood is, I’d still be drinking.
There’s a place for fanaticism, but I don’t think it’s here.
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Originally Posted by fini
"This final time: I’ll never drink again: NO MATTER WHAT. Unconditional."
from your post 359
from your post 359
It remains, that I shall continue to successfully practice AVRT without a Big Plan. And I simply refuse to comply with what GT wrote: “and draws a line directly to the simple binary choice of make a Big Plan or set the practice of AVRT aside until that plan is made.”
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Originally Posted by MesaMan
.
I've moved on to modify AVRT/RR Principles in subtle ways that work for this Introvert while retaining Core Principles.
If such a useful Tool for you consists of a metaphorical line in Concrete, I'm all for it! This puts the non-drinking Entity outside your real Self, and I think that's a critical variable to your continued success. That which helps you succeed is far more important than any Program or Process conformance.
I've moved on to modify AVRT/RR Principles in subtle ways that work for this Introvert while retaining Core Principles.
If such a useful Tool for you consists of a metaphorical line in Concrete, I'm all for it! This puts the non-drinking Entity outside your real Self, and I think that's a critical variable to your continued success. That which helps you succeed is far more important than any Program or Process conformance.
Plus, your reference to an ‘Inner Quit” - Unshakeable Resolve”, that’s a truly AWESOME phrase MesaMan 🤗.
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Originally Posted by Tatsy
Oh my 😔 I’m feeling so saddened that nobody understands my perspective, and how I’m empowering myself to stop drinking once more. Particularly given my horrendous alcohol addiction background, and my terrible recent lengthy relapse.
youve been facing a lot of underlying issues and that is awesome!
AND doing it without drinking-
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Originally Posted by Tatsy
Eh? That isn’t a Big Plan. I didn’t make a Big Plan. I drew a line in the sand, now altered to a line set in concrete. The differentiation matters to me. I would NEVER make another Big Plan, because I broke/reversed the original Big Plan. Why would I set up and repeat a failure? I fail to understand why some people don’t understand, why I make this clear distinction.
It remains, that I shall continue to successfully practice AVRT without a Big Plan. And I simply refuse to comply with what GT wrote: “and draws a line directly to the simple binary choice of make a Big Plan or set the practice of AVRT aside until that plan is made.”
It remains, that I shall continue to successfully practice AVRT without a Big Plan. And I simply refuse to comply with what GT wrote: “and draws a line directly to the simple binary choice of make a Big Plan or set the practice of AVRT aside until that plan is made.”
clearly, though, i do not understand something, as it sounds exactly like the BP to me.
whatever the line, whatever the plan, i’m glad you drew it, made it, are enacting it.
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Here is my first post on SR:
Originally Posted by msl999
shakeel, your OP is dripping with AV. It looks like separating the AV from your own thoughts is an issue. I hope I’m not offending you, it just sounds a lot like I used to talk before I made a real Big Plan.
Have you bought the book & read it twice all the way through? Have you read all 6 parts of the AVRT threads on this site? That may be a good place to get back on track.
Also, please don’t be afraid. You have the all power inside you to quit for good, right now. You are strong, and it shows because you keep coming back trying to get this thing right.
I know this is my first post, so I’ll say that I quit for good over two years ago reading these AVRT threads & Trimpey’s book...and that’s it, nothing else. It saved my life, and I only regret not doing it sooner.
I’ll be here shakeel, and so will the others. You got this!!!
Have you bought the book & read it twice all the way through? Have you read all 6 parts of the AVRT threads on this site? That may be a good place to get back on track.
Also, please don’t be afraid. You have the all power inside you to quit for good, right now. You are strong, and it shows because you keep coming back trying to get this thing right.
I know this is my first post, so I’ll say that I quit for good over two years ago reading these AVRT threads & Trimpey’s book...and that’s it, nothing else. It saved my life, and I only regret not doing it sooner.
I’ll be here shakeel, and so will the others. You got this!!!
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Yay! By GerandTwine’s silence (knowing he’s read the updated thread by ‘liking’ very recent posts) and failure to respond to me: I take it I’m allowed by GerandTwine to utilise AVRT without making another, ‘real’ Big Plan. Relief indeed.
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Originally Posted by Tatsy
Yay! By GerandTwine’s silence (knowing he’s read the updated thread by ‘liking’ very recent posts) and failure to respond to me: I take it I’m allowed by GerandTwine to utilise AVRT without making another, ‘real’ Big Plan. Relief indeed.
I’m so glad you are back on the sobriety wagon and refusing to ever drive over that line in the cement ever again. Terrific. What a GIFT you’ve given yourself. (I think you should change it to a cement wall
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Wow! There ended up being a lot more comments on here then I realised. I’m very interested in reading through the discussion.
I am the original poster. So just an update.
I just passed a year sober. One difference between myself now and when I posted this originally is that I don’t really expend much mental energy debating the kinds of questions I’d ask myself back then.
I just know alcohol is bad for me, and I don’t want to drink it. I’ve found simpler is better for me at least.
I am the original poster. So just an update.
I just passed a year sober. One difference between myself now and when I posted this originally is that I don’t really expend much mental energy debating the kinds of questions I’d ask myself back then.
I just know alcohol is bad for me, and I don’t want to drink it. I’ve found simpler is better for me at least.
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