The issue now is to me is one, you don’t care to comment on these issues because you will end up putting your foot in your mouth.

You, in my opinion are like the character in the movie Amadues. The composer who spent all his life in a jealous rage of Mozart. Bill Wilson is your Mozart. Now I never accused you of being any kind of racial extremist/paranoid nut, but I simply wanted to give you a snapshot of the crazy theorys and real fears of reality. Now I’m not a paranoid Jew like the depictions the very funny Woody Allen created. But at the same time, what in Gods name are you creating. What wierd pseudo religion are you promoting, reading between the lines. How can you criticize Bill W. for promoting a Higher Power according to your understanding, when even within the Christian faith that is what each sect, denomination, individual is doing anyway. For example Some white rascist Christians believe that slavery is from the bible. Sick, but true. While on the other hand the very devout Black Christians do not adhere to that at all, (and with good sense)

So I ask you what is wrong with a higher power according to our understanding. If you know the correct higher power, I suggest you start marketing your personal idea to One The UN, The Vatican etc…

But all this insanity that I am spelling out could have all been avoided if you had kept your sinful nature in check.

The sin- Envy Thank You for your time,Julian Paioff

Julian,

You didn’t move along, so I’ll assume you’re interested in Rational Recovery for personal reasons. Fine.

AVRT-based recovery is based upon each addicted person’s native beliefs and values, which for the most part are based upon one’s original family values, whatever they may be. AVRT® is just a working model of the human, moral conscience, the foundation of free will found in most of the great religions.
This article, Code of the Beast, merely points out that addicted people are incapable of conceiving of God because their thought processes are fully contained within the idiom of the Addictive Voice. Instead, they create a god in the image of their addictions, based upon the distorted perceptions of addiction, and according to the survival logic of the Addictive Voice. This God-as-you-understand-him (the Beast) demands total loyalty, first before family, before self, before any deity of one’s ancestral heritage. The Beast is truly a jealous god.
Bill W was a failed Christian still seeking salvation when he reached conscious contact with his own Addictive Voice, which appeared to him as the voice of God. It gave Bill W’s eloquence to his own addictive mandate, setting forth a simple, religious-sounding creed that is literally the Code of the Beast. The 12-step program is the doctrinal form of the Addictive Voice, transforming problem drinking into chronic, lifetime addiction in one sitting.

Whatever God a tentatively sober person may create, it will be infinitely tolerant of the act of self-intoxication, and absolve any guilt or regrets stemming from that vile act. A.A.’s “loving God,” which it claims as its only source of guidance is none other than the Beast of addiction occupying the throne of human consciousness. Addicted people are extremely susceptible to 12-step social cultism because the 12-step program speaks directly to the Beast, issuing a reprieve a the very moment when newcomers attend their first meeting.

Let’s face it — until one quits drinking/using and forsakes the option to resume, that next drink/fix will cast a shadow over each day until it is taken. One-day-at-a-time “sobriety” is the curse of AA, the sweet venom that paralyzes one’s natural defense against fatal self-indulgence — one’s own moral judgment that naturally condemns self-intoxication as immoral conduct. 

All addicted people have the intuition that eventually they’ll have to quit getting high altogether, but not just now. Finally, when nothing they do is working, they follow society’s collective advice, “Get help!” meaning go to AA. They go to AA expecting to learn how to quit drinking/using, but are met with bewildering steptalk about addictive disease and they are admonished against summarily quitting. After facing the dreaded moral injunction, “I will never drink again,” AA’s one-day-at-a-time sobriety is experienced by the newcomer’s Beast as a reprieve from death row. Thus, the grateful, recovering alcoholic.

Newcomers are responding to a breakdown of their Addictive Voice. When they fall into the bad company of AA, the Addictive Voice is repaired and fortified by a highly sophisticated version, somewhat like getting a software upgrade. The 12-step program is an example of evil, i.e., a persistent, predictable source of harm, suffering, and death. While religions based upon free will, especially Judeo-Christian religions, are quite useful in defeating addictions, the false religion of AA, which is based upon false science, is worse than worthless. More lives and families are destroyed by 12-step recoveryism than by addiction itself, yet it remains as the de facto state religion of the United States of America.

Jack Trimpey

Julian,

I suggest you study AVRT® first, and, if it seems fitting, apply it to yourself. Then, you should decide whether your worst assumptions about me are yours or the perceptions of your Beast.

If you’re not looking for a solution to addiction, you can just assume the worst about me and move along.

Jack Trimpey

Serenity,

I’m  glad you disclosed your AA membership, because most people who send me objections to Rational Recovery pretend to be normal people with objective opinions. However, you do share their hope that I am a miserable person, or someone who is depraved or an egomaniac with a following of drug-crazed zombies.

I  think you’ve attended too many meetings, and the 12-steps have turned your brain to pudding. Your view from inside the bubble of addiction is jaded and distorted by the beliefs and values of addicted people who have no intention of ever quitting their addictions. In effect, you are trapped in a social ghetto where extreme self-involvment is considered normal, where thoughts of leaving are believed to be disease symptoms, where normal people are considered unenlightened, and where the worlds great religions are viewed with condescension. All of your fellow groupers are experts on recovery, yet none of them have resolved their own addictions.

Now you’ve come here, where prompt, total recovery is based upon universal family values rather than the occult spiritism of necromancer, Bill W. You are offended at what you see here because addiction is anti-family at its core, and the mentality of addiction is hostile to the family. You speak of sitting in meetings, feeling happiness and charm usually found at home in the evenings, during time spent with one’s own flesh and blood rather than in public buildings where you join together in fellowship with the local riff-raff and low-life.

You now pay homage to AA for life itself, and seek group counsel on all of your personal affairs, completely forgetting that your original family is the cradle of life itself, and that your ancestral heritage is abundant with beliefs and values and traditions that are entirely sufficient to solve any addiction. You throw paint upstream in your gene pool, claiming an inherited disease that exempts you from common decency and moral standards. You’ve accepted the addict-identity and replaced your original name with the the last name of your new family, “Imanalcoholic.”
After all the trouble you’ve already caused your family, you will not guarantee them you’ll never drink/use again. You reserve the privilege of getting loaded any time you really, really feel like having a yummy relapse, expecting them to live under the cloud of uncertainty surrounding your one-day-at-a-time sobriety.

Why not guarantee your family you’ll never drink again? Better yet, why not guarantee yourself, and that God-as-you-understand-him, that you’ll never drink again? Would He doubt your word? Would you? Do you know right from wrong? Can you choose between good and evil?

Just imagine, if you guarantee everyone you’ll never drink again, then you can finally apologize for the one, vile act that put you in AA in the first place, self-intoxication. Ever notice that the fearless moral inventories exclude the one, vile act that is responsible for you being in recovery in the first place?

How would your family feel about such a guarantee? Or such an apology? Goodness, it might even make all the difference in the world in how you feel.

I hope this didn’t disappoint you, after hardly being able to wait for my reply.

Jack Trimpey

How many times have you been to a meeting, and at the halfway point 75% of the room runs outside for a quick smoke and a cup of joe? The irony in this is inescapable.

I too struggled with “the program” and especially step 1 where you give up your personal power and free will. Isn’t that the goal of interrogaters and cultists everywhere? Break down the core beliefs and personality so the subject can become dependent on the group/cult/system/whatever? It is so frustrating to go to a “professional” for help and know more about addiction and how to get well than they do. “How many meetings have you been to” seems to be all many of them are interested in. I have been to hundreds, probably thousands of meetings and I don’t think any of it helped me at all. The last couple of years when I was going to meetings, I used to suggest things like “free will” or “self responsibility” as a topic just for a laugh. Or I would introduce myself and say “Hi my name is Dee and I am an idiot” The dirty looks I got…. The tenacity with which people hold on to the program is quite fierce. I used to attribute it to the fact that they were commited to staying sober and this was the only way they knew how, but I think it’s more likely that the fear mongering tactics used on “the newcomer” is to blame. Thats another thing that drives me nuts. Who wants to be singled out as a “newcomer” when they are feeling fragile and vulnerable in the first few days of being clean and sober? That almost guarantees dishonesty and confusion right from the get-go.

If anything helpful can be gleaned from the “program” I would love to hear about it. “The triangle of self obsession” is a pretty good pamphlet, seems to hold some water, but by and large the “program” as well intentioned as it is, does nothing to encourage people to stay clean, and in fact does encourage them to hang onto their addiction or whatever they think is bothering them, and leave the open ended possibilty of getting blasted looming front and centre.

Bah humbug to Bill W. and friends. At least be open to debate and the possibility that there might be another way, eh? Thats the only way to adapt and survive and thrive.

Love and respect from the True North Strong and Free

Damian,

Your experience with AA is very common, where you take what your Beast likes, leaving you with the rest of the silliness. I hope you abandon your addiction, including your addict-identity, which is inherent in 12-step recoveryism.

As you might expect, I take issue with the pamphlet, The Triangle of Self-Obsession, you spoke of, which is an example of the distorted, self-serving beliefs of 12-step recoveryism.

The self-obsession, or self-centeredness of addiction is merely a euphemism for the obsession with addictive pleasures, coupled with the addictive mandate, which itself is a perverted, pleasure-driven survival drive not unlike the sex drive. The essential difference between addicts and the vast majority of substance abusers who see the dangers and quit, is that addicts don’t expect anything better of themselves than one-day-at-a-time sobriety. 

In other words, addicted people are highly suggestible to the doctrinal form of the Addictive Voice, which says that they are inherently different from others and thereby exempted from common standards of decency and morality. AA/NA is a fellowship of addiction that changes one’s identity from normal person to addict, and thereby converts problem drinking/using into chronic, sober-one-day-at-a-time addiction. In recovery groups, addiction is forever, while recovery is one-day-at-a-time. In reality, addiction is one-day-at-a-time, while recovery is forever, i.e., “I will never drink/use again.”

Nice comments, though. I hope you are securely and permanently abstinent and living a life of your own choosing.

Jack Trimpey  

I’m back after a month now, read your book and feel more empowered than ever! I honestly can’t believe this. It’s like a veil has been lifted and everything’s so clear… so simple. I’m a bit concerned as I’ve quit meetings cold turkey and must admit that my Beast has hinted that I should return to “check in”. I’ve resisted that as I now know my addiction is a private, personal matter… between me and Beast.

Excellent, excellent work! A thousand thank you’s!!!

Keith,

Any time you get the idea of going to an AA meeting, call your Rational Recovery sponsor!

Cheers, Jack Trimpey

I mentioned your site to one of the guys in a book study and you would have thought I said, “Hey, let’s go boozing!” He looked at me with equal parts distain and contempt. These “friendships” I thought I had developed obviously come with a big string attached. I thought I might get a “Sure, Keith, keep in touch… explore all avenues… we know you can do it!” Uh,.. no.

Looking forward continuing my sobriety happy, joyous and free from AA!!!

Harry,

When a mosquito lands on my arm, an urgent sensation tells to brush it off immediately. When I’m called, “friend,” by people with and occult agenda, my skin crawls similarly, as though I’m in contact with a parasite. I gained this reflex during my many years in AA, by attending many more meetings than you have.
Resisting the urge to brush you off, I completed reading your message, confirming my suspicions beyond any doubt. No, this blog will not become a fair and balanced platform where the truth is offset by steptalk. Readers will have to click out to satisfy their desire for steptalk.
Jack Trimpey

I am a recovered alcoholic.AA helped me recover because i chose to recover. The key word is CHOSE.

I have browsed thru just a few comments on the article-and i find it typical of aa members.You either agree with the majority or u r branded anti aa.

My take on aa is as follows
It is a place that can be used to recover and then get away from it. Do not get addicted to aa.The aa addcition is dangerous
The shepherds of aa-and there r many keep the folks in aa sick and scared so that the herd does not stray.Anyone who questions them is anti aa.aa IS NOW IN THE HANDS OF SICK CONTROL FREAKS WHO ARE IN DENAIL.
AA now passes on the message thats says-U WILL BE SICK FOR LIFE AND U WILL GET SICKER.SO STICK TO AA AND MAKE MEETINGS ELSE U WILL DRINK AGAIN AND BE MISERABLE.
I have personally experienced many in aa who are not drinking but they sure do have many other problems for which medical help is required but they arent seeking that help.Many in aa are a dangerous lot.
AA is used to try and get free sex, swindle fellow members off some cash or swing deals.Besides this, aa is used or should I say abused to keep folks sick and get them sicker. How can aa pass on a message that helpes newcomers when the old members exude sickness themselves.
The 12 steps of AA are talked about but hardly walked by most in AA.
There are a minority in AA like me who use it to recover and then scram so that the sickness in the meeting rooms does not engulf us.But then these folks are anti aa-because they beleive we will not be sick for life.
This is the sad truth about aa.The AA 12 steps are talked by all and practised by a rare few.

Friends use AA to recover-DO NOT LET THE AA SICKOS USE AND ABUSE U.

WE CAN ALL QUIT DRINKING AND STAY QUIT AND BE WELL-AA IS NOT THE ONLY ANSWER-IT MAYBE A GOOD PLACE TO START BUT DONT STAY STUCK IN THERE.AA CAN GET U TERRIBLY SICK IF U GET ADDICTED TO AA.

When I land up at an aa meeting and am asked to share-which is very rare, I introduce myself as a RECOVERED ALCOHOLIC.And beleive me the folks in there do not like it.

Cheers,

AN EX ALKY

ExAlky,

“Whatever works,” is a silly 12-step slogan that tries to hide A.A.’s core belief that only AA works. AA has made outrageous claims of exclusivity and universality since its beginning last century. The occasional apology doesn’t change AA’s this-way-or-die character.

Whatever doesn’t work, anyhow. The only way to quit drinking is to quit drinking.

Jack Trimpey