oakwood

[QUOTE=failedtaper;3137054] (insert DOC where appropriate)

/QUOTE]

What does this mean?

FT

If your question is about the dog quote, it comes from Mark Twain, who wrote:

"It's not the size of the dog in the fight, it's the size of the fight in the dog."

FT

oakwood

No, I wondered what "Insert DOC where appropriate" meant. What is DOC?

Terminally Unique

DOC = Drug of Choice

oakwood

Ok. Thanks. Newby, for sure...

FT

Ha! There's a lot of them there letters in that there oration!

Thx TU.

FT

kanamit

On re-reading the RR book I found a point that resonated with me. In the early part of Part II (The Action on page 121) he mentions that you may be in a supermarket and see some strawberries and think to yourself, I'll take that without paying for it, but you don't.

This makes good sense to me and shows that we actually use AVRT many times in that we recognise and ignore the pleasure/survival drive all the time. In this case, the Beast wanted the immediate pleasure of the strawberry but morally this was wrong so the the individual recognised the thought, ignored it and took no action. So long as you find shoplifting morally objectionable there is no way you would get into a should you/shouldn't you debate as to whether you should steal.

I can say with 100% certainty I will never shoplift, and I will never change my mind. I need to view drinking as the same.

Looking at my pet cats, I can see how fitting it is to call it the Beast brain. They don't plan ahead; they think of nothing but now. Everything they do is linked to their own survival. Eating, sleeping, etc.

I don't wish to sound like a broken record but thanks again for this thread, it has been so helpeful. If anyone has yet to buy the book, please order it now. It must have saved me hundreds of pounds in alcohol already.

newby1961

Thanks so much TU for the explanation and the patience & tolerance you practiced by saying it or writing it as the case may be.

I indeed have been a member of two different fellowships but I am still searching for something that seems to be missing that I haven't seemed to find in any rooms or books yet.

I will take your advice and read that book by Jack Trimpey

kanamit

Add thanks to this post if you think TU is a legend for all his time and efforts in explaining AVRT!

I'm sure Jack Trimpey would regard TU as his protege if they ever met.

onlythetruth

I understand that AVRT is more or less an attempt to describe what real people really do to stop engaging in an addiction, and I just want to say that even though I did not formally use AVRT to quit drinking, I absolutely used AVRT-type thinking. Specifically:

1. I decided I was never going to drink again, no matter what (although I thought this secretly, inside my own head, since strangely enough voicing this sentiment was taboo in the recovery program I was in).
2. I viewed my AV as something separate from myself--a junkie living in my head and constantly wanting to take over. (I could tell he was quite stupid, though--some of the stuff he used to say to me was really funny in retrospect!)
3. I actively spoke to, and laughed at, my AV when it tried to get me to drink ("nice try, no cigar" I used to say).

Anyway, I can definitely say that of all the things I did to leave my addiction behind, the single most critical action was the decision never to drink again no matter what. I had "wanted to" quit for years, but never made that simple, basic commitment and never was able to stop for more than a short time. But once the option was off the table, it suddenly became very simple, and the rest is history.

FT

Absolutely. I did the same thing over 20 years ago. You and I are among some of the people who might have been studied as part of the AVRT research.

I tried to quit drinking for many years before I actually stopped. The difference? I mouthed the words many times, but until I made the DECISION that I was no longer a drinker, I was doomed to fail.

FT

oakwood

I didn't drink yesterday. I can't remember the last time I didn't drink.

It was quiet most of the day, sitting in the background watching me, wondering just how determined I am. At 3 pm on the dot (my usual witching hour), I looked at the clock and It said to me, "You usually have a drink by now, you know. What do you think?" I said, "Yeah, I know, but I don't drink now." "We'll see." It said. Ignored.

My Big Plan includes both drinking and smoking. While I was successful on the drinking part yesterday, I wasn't with the smoking. I'll continue to work on that, too.

Anyway, just wanted to let you know AVRT really helped yesterday.

Terminally Unique

Mine does as well, but if you are still smoking, you might want to separate the two. In other words, have a separate plan for smoking. The reason I say this is because if you include smoking with drinking, you can bet that your AV will eventually say "So, oakwood, you broke your Big Plan by smoking, huh? In that case, why not drink, then?"

Terminally Unique

Yes, we do. Think about how your sex drive works. If we were to act on every impulse our body generates, we'd probably end up in jail. In recovery culture, there is a lot of emphasis placed on "desire," wanting the desire for alcohol removed, the absence or presence of desire, etc. I always laugh when I see those brain scans showing an addict's brain light up like a Christmas tree when they see their favorite stuff, as if it were a revelation.

Wanting the desire for alcohol to be removed is like wanting to be castrated because you have "bad" thoughts whenever you see a pretty girl walk by. I certainly wouldn't want that brain scan machine hooked up to me when that happens. With AVRT, you abstain in spite of desire, and the phrase "I have no desire to drink" naturally begs the question: "What if you did? What then?"

If you can add drinking to the small list of things that you know you will never do, you'll find that you recognize the Addictive Voice almost without effort.

oakwood

It already did say that this morning! So I thought about it. That's just asking for trouble, isn't it? I've done exactly as you suggested and scaled my plan back. I never drink now. That's my focus. I'll deal with smoking a bit later.

FT

"When the only tool you have is a hammer you tend to see every problem as a nail." Abraham Maslow

I used the above quote to my benefit in my early days of being a non-drinker. I had to realize that what I was doing with alcohol was more than just a conditioned response for me, although it certainly had become that.

Someone on another forum wanted to know why "everyone" seemed to be "suffering" if "just say no" worked. I tried to explain the difference between "mouthing the words" proclaiming abstinence, as opposed to redefining oneself as someone who just does not drink.

Removing alcohol from your "toolbox" necessarily requires replacing it with something else, and it just takes practice. I didn't just jump from using my old IBM Selectric typewriter that I thought was so technically advanced in the 70's, to the computer I use now. But they are both just tools. It took some adjusting along the way.

Of course, jumping off alcohol is far more abrupt, but you can adjust. By far the hardest part of quitting drinking for me was that my AV told me HE held all the tools. Well, not any more!

FT

Terminally Unique

That's it precisely. Once you remove the option of any further self-intoxication, you will be forced to do something else instead, unless you want to stare at the ceiling all day. If anything, the horrible boredom itself will usually force a change in your routine.

AprilMay1895

Figured I better take my question back over to this thread to avoid complications with the Alcoholism thread.

If AVRT works so well and is so easy, then why is it so under-practiced? You always hear people say "I've been sober for X number of years in AA or X number of years with SMART" but other than on this website have I ever heard anyone say it about AVRT...or even say that they "just quit" on their own. If this were really the cure-all for addiction, why are so many people still addicted? Wouldn't this spread like wildfire?

And yes, I know this is my addictive voice. My Beast doesn't like 1-step solutions. But humor me...other than Trimpey coming off a smidge looney and highly accusational against AA, why is this method not headlining on the news?

FT

This is just my opinion, but I don't think "AVRT" is under-practiced at all!

The reason you don't notice it is that people who quit drinking alcohol on their own do so pretty silently, no fuss, no muss, no fanfare. No group.

Coming on here is as "out there" as I ever get. I may sound loud and opinionated here, but you'll never see me out in public or at group gatherings proclaiming my sobriety.

Just my opinion, but I don't think I'm alone.

FT

onlythetruth

I agree with failedtaper: I think that people ARE using AVRT every day, all the time, without knowing that they are doing so. After all, Trimpey says himself that all AVRT really is, is a description of how real people really quit, and the majority of people who quit don't avail themselves of treatment or any particular "program" whatsoever.

In fact, even though I am a veteran of both AA and SMART, after learning more about AVRT I am realizing more and more that I did use the technique when I quit drinking, without knowing it. So much of it is just common sense: you make the decision, you stick to it no matter what, you learn to deal with life without alcohol, you move on.