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Addictive Voice Recognition Technique (AVRT) Discussion — Part 5



Addictive Voice Recognition Technique (AVRT) Discussion — Part 5

Old 02-02-2015, 12:20 PM
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I think we can choose to be a victim. That would be the AV.

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Old 02-02-2015, 12:23 PM
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Originally Posted by brynn View Post
The problem with trying to define ourselves as alcoholics( or addicts) in the future is that it tickles our AV because we are making assumptions that IF we drink again THEN...(fill in the blank).
I don't have the same reaction to calling myself an alcoholic. Or an alcohol addict. I find no AV tickle in it. It doesn't make me want to drink. It doesn't make me feel powerless against the urge to drink.

I don't have to make any future assumptions about drinking. I know good and well what will happen if I drink. That's why I chose to live a sober life. My AV will forever attempt to convince me that things might be different if I drink again. My AV lies. That's why it isn't in charge any more.

In the end we all gotta do what works for us.
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Old 02-02-2015, 12:33 PM
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Originally Posted by brynn View Post
The problem with trying to define ourselves as alcoholics( or addicts) in the future is that it tickles our AV because we are making assumptions that IF we drink again THEN...(fill in the blank).
To refer to or identify oneself as alcoholic isn't necessarily to define oneself as an alcoholic. I wouldn't think so, anyway.

And I don't assume that if I drink, then...

I know without a doubt that if I drink I'll eventually get drunk, and that I'll eventually become that drunk again. There's no assuming going on.
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Old 02-02-2015, 12:46 PM
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Originally Posted by RobbyRobot View Post
We always have choices, and my being an alcoholic doesn't change my responsibilities in any way.
Well said, Robby. I think I agree.

At least, I see this whole arena of addiction through the lenses of possibilities and choices, kind of in the same way I see life in general.

What I do with the experience and knowledge I've gained through being an addict is hinged on my human responsibility of the power of choice. While it's out of my realm of control that I ended up being an addict, what I do upon discovery or illumination of the fact that I am (or was) indeed that addict... that's what counts, in my opinion.
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Old 02-02-2015, 01:22 PM
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Y'all are a wealth of knowledge for this relative newcomer and I appreciate your insights!

I didn't word that sentence about future assumptions correctly...to clarify, i was trying to say that any thought about drinking again, now or in the future ( which is where the IF comes in) is my AV, according to AVRT. Still can't quite get out what I mean...suffice it to say I know exactly what happens when I drink which is why I don't.

Robbyrobot...i like a lot of what you've said and it gives me a little different perspective, thanks. I'm curious, when you say that alcoholism is an illness are you saying it's a mental illness or physical illness or both?
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Old 02-02-2015, 02:07 PM
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Originally Posted by brynn View Post
Robbyrobot...i like a lot of what you've said and it gives me a little different perspective, thanks. I'm curious, when you say that alcoholism is an illness are you saying it's a mental illness or physical illness or both?
Unfortunately, it's both. I don't know how RR will answer this tho...

It has been proven to affect the brain in the physical sense which in turn affects the psychology of the person involved =====>>>> BOTH

The point I was trying to make for myself, is that it just does not matter how or why. I just can't drink no matter what, ever again. This I know.

I believe what some are suggesting is that because it 'IS' considered an illness, some will use that as an excuse to go back to drinking OR moreover will be destined or predetermined to drink again, relapse or whatever you wish to call it. The, "It's not my fault, I have a disease." excuse.

On my last day of rehab the group stands around in a big circle - about 80 inmates/clients. The head honcho tells everyone to look to their left and right and around the room. Then they proceed to inform us that only 3% of us are going to remain sober when we leave there. How effin fantastic is that? They already put it in the minds of the 'clients' that they don't stand a chance. It's no wonder so many people relapse coming from the 12 thing rehab program, being told they have a snowball's chance in Iraq to succeed.
And if they don't go to so many in so many days and follow the program...
They are already setup for failure.

sorry, I got a little off track...
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Old 02-02-2015, 02:25 PM
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We were told a similar percentage would relapse, LBrain. I remember that day. It had a rather chilling effect on us, or on me anyway. I can't really speak for the others in the group. I remember gasps and jaws dropping. Anyway, I determined that I would be in that small minority. I remember thinking that I would be successful. I am not sure what the intended effect was, but I'm presuming it was to educate and to motivate. Addicts aren't brimming with self-confidence and so I can't imagine it being an inspiration for some of those people. It was startling for me though, and so far, I've kept my word to myself that I wouldn't fail.
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Old 02-02-2015, 02:37 PM
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This is a very interesting discussion, not so much for me from an objective understanding of who is or isn't an alcoholic, what is or isn't the AV and so on... BUT from a curious observation of our narratives in the addiction/recovery world.
For a while now I have been listening to a Podcast called "unbelievable", it is a christian podcast that discusses some of the big points surrounding christianity and it often invites non-christians and atheists on to debate certain subjects, But it also often has Christians from different sects, denominations, and cultures debating each other on the meaning of Christianity and interpretations of the Bible. I find these Podcasts the most fascinating, not because I am looking to be convinced about anything being spoken (I don't believe any of it) but seeing well educated, well spoken very smart people expressing different interpretations of things and calling it TRUTH tells me a lot about myself and human nature. Each person often expresses polite suggestions that the other is just a bit off center in their understanding, and each person holds a strong belief they hold the TRUTH in their interpretation. What appears to be happening is people hold onto their own unmovable dogma, deep values that (even-though are expressed as unimportant to the big picture) are deeply important to the christian narrative of the individual.

These Narratives are also strongly found in our addiction/recovery discussions, the only difference for me from observing the people on "unbelievable" is I am part of the discussion (not an observer) and YES I too have my recovery/addiction script to throw into the mix. My fascination in regards to these discussions is about cognitive dissonance and confirmation bias.
If we break down our motivations and need to call ourselves certain things to reinforce our narrative we can find some interesting similarities. The person who uses the Alcoholic tag with definite personal conviction (usually to re-inforce a certain narrative) is not all that different from the person who uses the non-alcoholic tag with equal personal conviction, in some ways we could consider these attitudes as two sides of the same coin. When a person is strongly suggestive that the future possibility of drinking is not extinguished (with a statement of "I will never drink again) any language that takes the foot of this "Big Plan" pedal can be seen as AV, but if I hold onto other narratives Its easy to argue that imagining your future non drinking self is also a backdoor version of the AV why? Because there is a narrative of the present where relapse will occur in the Now, there are ideas that we are most vulnerable when we proclaim an absolute we cannot possibly know. Most of us don't really express these two views with extreme language However they do remain under the surface and seem to emerge when push comes to shove.
I personally think both views are problematic and I actually direct my contemplation to other deeper underlying principles that may require Skepticism, including the validity of reference to an AV, what we mean by the AV and the fallback towards dualistic and pluralistic States. It fascinates me to listen to my own stories, to show how my sex, age, culture, genetics, drug of choice, extent of problems associated my addiction and many other things govern my Values in recovery, that for the most part I am attracted to things that verify my values and dismiss things that don't. Mindfully seeing my biases, seeing my cognitive processes, seeing my confident statements based on flimsy evidence, seeing my pseudo scientific interpretations.
How interesting it is to see how we claim we follow the evidence in working out our sobriety, yet we probably find ways that validate our deeper values (in other words we make the evidence fit our beliefs) we cherry pick the supporting views and dismiss the opposing views. Some of us make claims to having science on our side, Yet any descent evaluation of the Science of addiction will demonstrate that scientists are only just scratching the surface of understanding addiction and are even less closer to having solutions. Yet many of us make confident claims that science back up our beliefs.

OK, OK let me stop ranting here..... At the end of the day my only real motivation in coming into SR and discussing issues as found in this POST is to encourage others to think about things, to develop positive skepticism and ask questions, to investigate your own claims and that of others, to see past biases and absolutes, I cant make any great claim that Skepticism will = sobriety, but what I can say is sobriety for me is much more stable on platform of mindful, curious, rich and robust inquiry and the integrity found in searching for what is real.
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Old 02-02-2015, 04:20 PM
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Originally Posted by brynn View Post

Robbyrobot...i like a lot of what you've said and it gives me a little different perspective, thanks. I'm curious, when you say that alcoholism is an illness are you saying it's a mental illness or physical illness or both?
Hello Brynn

I'm sure we can all agree its unhelpful for any of us to generalize our personal experiences with alcohol as a kind of definitive proof so as to naysay or promote any actual bona fide definition. We all have our experiences, and we all have our personal understandings drawn from such and from the related experiences of others, and everything in between.

With that said, my personal experience is alcoholism is an endurable, incurable illness of mind, body, and spirit, specific to chronic alcohol addiction. This is to say without alcohol, the addiction is dead. The illness however is the damage already done, and not the addiction proper. The damage done didn't just end with my abstinence. My mind was entirely alcoholic-minded ie I mentally craved opportunities for drinking alcohol and became obsessed with fulfilling such cravings. This was my AV, no less. I successfully separated myself from my alcoholic thinking in 1981, years before AVRT was publically formalized as knowledge.

My body too has a specific reaction to alcohol which disallows my being able to "just enjoy a drink" as drinking to a blackout was common in my drinking days. As well, having even small amounts of alcohol the drug in my body always created a physical craving for more alcohol and damn the consequences.

Spiritually speaking, my personal inner desire and want to live while drunk was almost obliterated at my deepest core levels. Drinking became an instrument of suicide more than anything else, and even with this self-destructive knowledge in hand and realized, I couldn't summon myself to want to be sober, alive, and happy. The best I could do was to attempt to not die from drinking even though I was in fact dying nonetheless. I drank in a serious manner from age 12 to age 24. I knew I was undone by 15. I wanted to absolutely quit by age 18. It wasn't until age 24 I actually successfully quit. I've stayed quit ever since.

My alcoholism is not progressing. It is in permanent remission. I'm recovered inasmuch as my sober life has long ago eclipsed or otherwise managed practical solutions to the damage done. I'm still living with certain consequences of my chronic alcoholism, and these same responsibilities will follow me to my end of days. I'm okay with all that and no worries as my sober life is a complete revolutionary change of mind, body, and spirit. I'll never drink again. And I'll never change my mind.

Hope that helps on some level satisfy your curiosity. Thanks for having a relevant question Brynn.
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Old 02-02-2015, 04:49 PM
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Originally Posted by LBrain View Post

On my last day of rehab the group stands around in a big circle - about 80 inmates/clients. The head honcho tells everyone to look to their left and right and around the room. Then they proceed to inform us that only 3% of us are going to remain sober when we leave there. How effin fantastic is that? They already put it in the minds of the 'clients' that they don't stand a chance. It's no wonder so many people relapse coming from the 12 thing rehab program, being told they have a snowball's chance in Iraq to succeed.
And if they don't go to so many in so many days and follow the program...
They are already setup for failure.

sorry, I got a little off track...
As some here already know, following being a client myself, I worked in a residential rehab early in my career as a counselor for street level addicts for several years, and eventually to a level of program director (back in the '80's). I can confirm such threats were commonly given to clients from many such same establishments. I myself didn't resort to such base tactics as threats, but nonetheless, its also true not everybody recovers. It is useless by way of using potential consequences to scare a client into recovery. In fact, my opinion is often enough such tactics just make recovery even more challenging. Bullying comes to mind. Unfortunately, certain establishments did more harm than anything else. In fact, my own experiences working in a rehab ended with my refusal to follow the whacked status quo of certain of my colleagues which effectively eventually ended my career. I've never regretted my refusal to toe-the-line even though it eventually caused me extensive consequences I made the right choice.

I respect your experiences LBrain.
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Old 02-02-2015, 07:30 PM
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Thank y'all so much for sharing your perspectives, insights, and experiences.

This might sound simplistic and I'm sure it is, but the bottom line for me is that I'm just so happy that I've finally found my way to permanent abstinence. The questions I ask are not to solidify my commitment to sobriety (that was done with my Big Plan) but because I'm curious and interested in others points of view. I certainly don't have all the answers...and my sobriety doesn't hinge on having all the answers. It only hinges on never drinking again and never changing my mind. That's the only absolute that is required.
I've been reading some old threads of sams and RobbyRobots and even LBrain and I have enjoyed all of it...so much wisdom here and a wealth of experience.

I think one of the reasons I get kind of hung up on the theory that alcoholism is a disease is that I have MS. I have a disease that I didn't choose. Im recovering from a flare up right now...doctors call an MS flare up a relapse. I'm an avid runner, and before this flare up I was training for a half marathon. This flare up left me unable to walk....I'm getting my mobility back and I'm hoping for no permanent damage, but I won't be running any time soon. This is one reason the theory of alcoholism as a disease doesn't sit well with me. ( and I'm sure y'all will be able to shoot huge holes in this, just please be gentle. I'm only speaking from my very limited experience). My alcoholism was perpetrated by me drinking alcohol, becoming addicted to it, and my body becoming dependent on it. It ended when I stopped pouring booze down my throat.
However, Robby...I understand the illness you talk about better than the disease theory.
Thank you so much for the explanation! Incredibly helpful!

It's interesting (frightening might be a better word) the percentages the mainstream rehab industry throws around. It's even more interesting that with numbers like that people keep going back time and time again to something that obviously has an extremely low success rate. I wonder what percentage of people who use AVRT ever drink again? I guess there'd be no way to ever really know since by it's nature it is self recovery, so no groups or rehabs to keep track of these statistics.
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Old 02-02-2015, 08:36 PM
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Thumbs up

Brynn, I'm sorry to hear about the MS. It is my hope you're soon back to your physical best asap. Like you're saying for yourself with MS, my own experiences with polio as a proper example of an infectious disease caused by a virus leaves me little inclination to appreciate alcoholism as a proper disease. Illness as I described my alcoholism as damage done fits with me much more easily. That said, I have no serious difficulty with those who do or don't classify alcoholism as an illness or as a disease as long as they are being honest with themselves and not simply being rhetorical to suit their own purposes. A staged debate is unhelpful. An open discussion of different experiences is always helpful, and I've appreciated ours. Thank you.

Congratulations on your ongoing successes with abstinence and sobriety Brynn!!
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Old 02-03-2015, 01:57 AM
  # 473 (permalink)  
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Addictive Voice Recognition Technique on Posts and Institutionalized Recoveryism

This great and super long thread, that started years ago, sooner or later, always seems to digress back to the simplicity of Addictive Voice Recognition Technique.
One way that can happen is when the Addictive Voice becomes Recognized in previous posts where it went unnoticed before.


copyright Rational Recovery

The capacity to apply AVRT to old posts is a sort of corollary Technique of AVR specific to SR. I think that's a useful part of having this record on SR. We can do it with our own old posts and with others' old posts.

Also, the Technique of Recognizing the "Institutionalized" Addictive Voice is also an exercise that can be done prolifically here on SR because there are so many readers and posters devoted to being forever in recovery to various degrees.
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Old 02-03-2015, 03:48 AM
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The way I see it:

Alcoholism is a disease = the cure is not drinking
Alcoholism is not a disease = the solution is not drinking

The outcome of the debate is irrelevant to what I need to do.
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Old 02-03-2015, 05:08 AM
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Brynn sorry to hear to have MS. My sister has it too. It's just such an incredibly tough break. ******* life ain't fair. It's why I also don't buy that alcoholism is a disease, it's an addiction like any other. Can a person be genetically predisposed to be at greater risk of becoming one? I believe they can. But only if they participate in the behaviour and use the substance. Is it progressive like a disease? Absolutely, but again a person has to continue to use. There is so much personal choice, unlike other diseases where they will progress no matter how well you take care of yourself or what medical treatments you use. For me to even try to compare being an alcoholic to having something like MS is just laughable in my opinion. And I'm sure quite offensive to folks who have actual diseases.

I hope you are back to running soon And I hope you complete your half marathon But most of all I hope you stay in remission for a good long time!
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Old 02-03-2015, 05:49 AM
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sorry to hear about your MS and recent bout Brynn. Hope you can get back to running soon.
I'm also honored that you read 'even' my posts...

The bottom line is that we as individuals must come to the final conclusion that no matter what we decide to call it (our alcohol thing), we must recognize the only way to "cure" it is to not drink.
And for me, myself and I, me, myself and I are the only ones who can make that happen.
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Old 02-03-2015, 08:26 AM
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LBrain...yes, I 'even' got so desperate I read your posts!! Ha (please note obvious sarcasm!)

Jazz...here, here! Love the way you put it...bottom line is don't drink! How simple is that?!?

And I always love it when GerandTwine uses that chart! "Institutionalized" AV...what a succinct way to put the idea of never ending recovery.

Robby...I'm sorry to hear about your bout with polio and I so appreciate you sharing your experiences!

Thanks for the well wishes y'all!
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Old 02-03-2015, 09:54 AM
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Hey, guys! Haven't been on this thread for a few days, good to see all the action here.

Just wanted to say it's been 18 days (not really counting, but every so often I do look at my calendar to see my quit date), which is longer than I've gone since joining this site. Since reading RR I really haven't had any "bad" days. The AV pops up once in a while but it's more like a passing thought, then it's gone. No worries about what I'm going to do on my days off. No obsessing over NOT DRINKING, don't feel like I'm "white knuckling" this. I just don't drink.

So glad I found AVRT and this thread. This really does work! Thanks, you guys!
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Old 02-03-2015, 10:00 AM
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Brynn, sorry to hear about the MS.

I see it as addiction and not "disease" the same as some of you. Addiction is its own phenomenon, I think. Though you could say that the resulting effect or conundrum is a sort of dis-ease. Disorder, disease, addiction, dysfunction. Regardless, it's just that the word addiction seems more pragmatic and fitting, more appropriate.
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Old 02-04-2015, 02:20 AM
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Finally finished reading this thread but STILL waiting for the book!
Hope it's ok to post this here, I have copied it from the substance abuse forum
Originally Posted by CelticZebra View Post
I feel the same Always thought I was invincible. Been told I have an addictive personality 15 years ago. Haven't touched class A drugs on a regular basis for as long but, and it's a big BUT I thought I'd be alright with alcohol as a replacement for the 'missing highs' I spent years thinking I was ok, my drinking was normal, I quit alcohol, using AVRT, when I CHOSE to quit, I had such a HUGE natural HIGH I've been happily not drinking or drugging since then. I miss the highs, I miss the chemically induced 'freedom' yet I'm not keen on spending the rest of my life looking for something that only exists in my head. It's my life and I'm wasting it, not getting any younger, constantly thinking this life is too hard without those occasional 'freedoms' problem for me; I've made my life a prison cell in my head, so much doubt about my ability to make the right choices. Wishing YOU the very best choices for YOU and LIFE.
I DO NOT like my addiction, it's all the same thing and I feel so down on myself, having a hard time with my beast, it's got such a big voice in my head, like the dog barking baring it's teeth and my confidence is so LOW it's scaring me. I'll never drink again but I just had a cancer stick

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