Step 1b Mental Obsession
Hitting bottom means sensing my mental obsession and physical craving feed each other. Only I can diagnosis myself, so I compare my thinking and drinking/using experiences to Bill's Story. I follow his progression from habitual to dependance, then into chronic use.
- Did I drink/use alone?, “I was very lonely and again turned to
alcohol.” (Pg.1,¶1,L9).
- Could I ignore blackouts?, “Ominous warning, which I failed to heed.” (Pg.1,¶3,L20).
- Did I fantasize about important responsibilities?, “My talent for leadership, I imagined, would place me at the head of vast enterprises” (Pg.1,¶5,L24).
- a). Was I driven towards success?, “I’d prove to the world that I was important” (Pg.2,¶1,L2). b). Did I drink/use instead of study?, “I was too drunk to think or write” (Pg.2,¶1,L9). c) Did I rationalize drinking/using?, “men of genius conceived their best projects when drunk/high” (Pg.2,¶1,L12).
- Did I dream and scheme while drunk/high?, “I decided to go anyway. I had developed a theory...” (Pg.2,¶2,L26). b). “friends thought a lunacy commission should be appointed” (Pg.3,Top¶.L1).
- Did success glorify my drinking/using?, “For the next few years fortune threw money and applause my way. I had arrived” (Pg.3,¶1,L12).
- Did financial security permit more? “drinking/using assumed more serious proportions, continuing all day and almost every night” (Pg.3,¶2,L20).
- Did conflicts with friends cause me isolate, “become a lone wolf?” (Pg.3,¶2,L22).
- Do I self medicate?, “I began to be jittery in the morning?” (Pg.3,¶3,L30)
- Do I drink/use for courage?, “I went back to the bar... Tomorrow was another day. As I drank, the old fierce determination to win came back” (Pg.4,¶1,L15)
- Did I underestimate problems?, “I was to have no real employment for five years, or hardly draw a sober breath” (Pg.4,¶3,L28)
- Will I always remember when, “Liquor/drugs ceased to be a luxury and became a necessity?” (Pg.5,¶1,L2)
- Have I resolved problems with promises to quit?, “I could not take so much as one drink. I was through forever.” (Pg.5,¶4,L21).
- Have I questioned my sanity?, “I came home drunk. There had been no fight. Where had been my high resolve… It hadn’t even come to mind ...Was I crazy? (Pg.5,¶5,L25)
- Did I relapse then rationalize, “I would manage better next time, but I might as well get good and drunk/high?” (Pg.6,Top¶,L5).
- Do suicidal thoughts lead to blackouts?, “Should I kill myself? No—not now. ...two bottles, and oblivion” (Pg.6,¶1,L17).
- Was I taught alcoholism/addiction is a disease, so watch for triggers?, “Surely this was the answer, self-knowledge. But it was not, for the frightful day came when I drank once more” (Pg.7,¶2,L19).
- Did? “Fear sober me for a bit. Then came the insidious insanity of that first drink/hit?” (Pg.8,¶2-3.L10)
- Do I acccept the 2-fold problem, “the main problem of the alcoholic/addict centres in my mind, (Mental Obsession), rather than in my body?” (Physical Allergy). (Pg.23,¶1,L5).
- Have I reached that, “certain point in the drinking of every alcoholic …where the most powerful desire to stop drinking is of absolutely no avail?” (Pg.24,Top¶,L1).
My unaided willpower fails and I relapse because I’ve lost choice and control around alcohol/drugs. I know my drinking/using is fatal but my mind lies to me. Abstinence only prevents my allergy, so I also require a Psychic Change of mind. “Once more: The alcoholic at certain times has no effective mental defence against the first drink.” (Pg.43,¶3,L24)
Step 1b Mental Obsession