Rational Recovery

I’ve only taken a relatively brief study of AR (I recommend Wickipedia for that) but I find it’s consistent with ideas I’ve been writing in my journal. It focuses on the strong power of the “Addictive Voice” (I call it My Addiction) and developing a capability to ignore it or weaken that power over us. That voice is the real problem, not an “underlying” personality, emotional or neurotic issue.

An advantage is I really focus on fighting the nagging voice of My Addiction, rather than getting waylaid trying to figure out all kinds of other mental or emotional aspects of myself. Those attributes are extremely complicated, and I actually believe addiction, ironically, is actually fairly simple in comparison. That may sound crazy to some, but I have a reason for that and, like all the things here, everyone has their own way of thinking. I address that aspect in my journal, so won’t get into all of it here.

My point is you can arm yourself against the addictive voice and keep that very focused in your mind and spirit. And you can do that constantly and consistently, which brings my to my final thought.

RR takes a very different approach from AA, and I can see why. An exception on that for me is “One day at a time.” It’s a motto for AA, but RR would say that’s short sighted and that an addict needs to believe in a long term fight and lifelong freedom. I totally agree with the latter half of that statement, but I use “One day at a time” as my motto because it helps keep me focused on being in the moment and knowing I can fight my addiction right then and there. That’s what gives me power. I make the decision in the moment I am living in. That’s actually not complicated. I think in that sense the motto is consistent with the RR philosophy of being armed and equipped with the ability to vanquish the “addictive voice” whenever it speaks to us.