Notice how base brain plays on the emotions. It tries to play me like a violin, using the whole spectrum of emotions:

• NOSTALGIA:
  • Let's just have one for old times' sake.
  • Ah, for the good old days, when we could just kick back, and put our feet up, and do whatever we wanted to do.
  • Ah yes, for the good old days, when we were young and wild and crazy, and didn't give a damn.
  • Ah yes, the good old days, back before we started this insane routine of self-denial that they are calling recovery.
  • It's time to return to normalcy, and be just like everybody else.
    Translation: Go back to drinking just like everybody else. (I shouldn't have to abstain when they don't.)
  • You smoked and drank when you were young, so you can return to the glory days of your youth by smoking and drinking again.
  • I just want one more big party, like in the good old days.
  • Don't you want to come home, to the good times again?
  • The best times were when we were smoking and drinking. We should go back there again. The best writing was while you were smoking.

• ANGER, HOSTILITY, RESENTMENT, FRUSTRATION, AND REBELLIOUSNESS:
  • Screw those people who are trying to keep us from having fun. Who are they to try to run our lives, anyway?
  • Have a drink just to spite those A.A. assholes and show that you can do it.
  • I wanna be free. I wanna get away from here and get to a place where nobody is telling me what to do anymore. I just wanna get to a place where I can do what I wanna to do.
  • Fuck it! Just fuck it! I just want to get high!
  • Now that I'm retired, I don't have to do what anybody else says. I don't have to care what anybody else thinks. I can drink all I want.
  • Okay, so I'm an alcoholic. So what? Might as well have a good time anyway.

• SELF-PITY:
  • I shouldn't be having these cravings. I shouldn't have to suffer from cravings like this. So let's put a stop to them, right now.
  • It's just so unfair that other people can have a good time, and I can't. So I'm going to make things fair.
  • We deserve to have a good time. We've worked so hard for so long, and put up with so much suffering and hardship, we richly deserve some of life's little pleasures right now.
  • It's all so depressing. I don't even feel like life is worth living. Might as well just get stoned and forget the whole thing.
  • Heck, your parents messed you up so bad emotionally that you'll never be right, so there isn't much you can do except get stoned.
  • The system is rigged against us. The rich write the rules so that they stay rich and we stay poor. So all we can do is enjoy life however we can.
  • Life has passed me by, so there is no point in not having a good time now. I've got no future. I've got nothing left to lose.

• SELF-DOUBT AND DEFEATIST ATTITUDES:
  • Aren't you tired of torturing yourself? Why do you persist in denying yourself life's little pleasures? Why do you persist in putting yourself through all of this pain and all of these cravings? You know you will relapse sooner or later anyway, so why not make it right now, so you can feel good right now?
  • I can't really loosen up and have a good time without a little bit of something...

• SELF-CONFIDENCE:
  • It's been so long since I've had one, I have it under control now.
  • I can do just one; it will be okay.
  • We've been doing so good for so long, totally abstaining without any cheating whatsoever, it's time to celebrate.
  • We've got it under control now. I don't have any cravings any more. I don't even think about drinking any more. That's why it's okay to have one, right now.
  • Okay, we've succeeded. We've got a year of sobriety. We don't have anything left to prove to anybody. Might as well relax and have one now.
  • I can do a few now without getting readdicted. It will never again have a hold over me like it used to.
  • We can do it (party and get high for one night) because we are strong and smart and we can handle it.

• GRANDIOSE, BOMBASTIC, HEROIC ROMANTICISM:
  • Heck, we're all going to die eventually. In the end, all you'll have to look back on is how much fun you had, or didn't have because you missed out on all of it. So let's have some fun and go out in a blaze of glory.
  • Workers of the world, unite! It's Miller Time!
  • Ah, for just one grand blow-out, just for tonight...
  • Ah yes, for the good old days, when we were young and wild and crazy, and didn't give a damn.
  • I know, I'll be a wandering Zen monk, a free spirit, detached from it all, free to do anything. I'll be above and beyond the problem.
  • You only live once...

• BOREDOM:
  • This evening is so boring, might as well have a beer.

• PLEASURE, LOVE, AND ECSTASY:
  • God! Would a cigarette feel good right now!
  • God! Would a tall cold one feel good right now!
  • It's Friday night (or Saturday night), and look at all of those pretty girls out on the street, looking for a party and love in all of the wrong places (and in all of the right places too). If I went and partied with them, I could get laid.
  • I can do just a little bit, it won't hurt anything, and it will feel great.
  • I just want one relaxing evening, just like in the good old days.
  • I just wanna get totally righteously ripped, just one more time.

• PARANOIA, INSECURITY, AND FEAR:
  • The other guys might think there is something weird about me if I don't have one with them.
  • Things aren't really as bad as the doctor was saying. I know he was exaggerating, just trying to scare me into quitting, that's all...
  • I could go across the river, over to the other side of town, where no one knows me, and get drunk over there, and nobody over here would ever know.
  • I don't want to insult this guy by not drinking with him. If I only drink with him, then it will be okay. I can't get readdicted that way.
  • I should have a drink with these people. If I refuse to drink, and tell them that I'm an alcoholic, they will all think that I'm weird.
  • I can do just a little, and no one will ever know, and it will be okay.

• PAIN AND FATIGUE:
  • I'm in a lot of pain. A little to take the edge off of the pain will be okay...
  • I feel so stressed out right now, I just need a little hit to get me on an even keel.
  • I just want a vacation from my pain.
  • I'm so tired of all of this, of fighting this battle. I just want to rest, and relax, for a while.
  • Oh I'm in so much stress right now that I can't stand it. I just need a cigarette and a beer to calm me down.

There just doesn't seem to be a single human emotion that old base brain won't try to use to talk me into using something...

• And then there is a non-emotional thing that I call BRAIN-DAMAGED LOGIC:
  • Even if it does cause a little damage, I've been off of the stuff for so long that I can afford a little damage now.
  • Maybe if I went down to Mexico... I could vacation and drink down there, and it wouldn't have anything to do with what happens up here...
  • Heck, we're in Las Vegas. What happens here, stays here.
  • We're in New Orleans. It's Mardis Gras. You don't imagine that it's appropriate to stay sober all this week, now do you?
  • Oh well, when in Rome, do as the Romans do.
  • This occasion is special. It's okay to drink this one special time. Pass that champagne over here, please.
  • Don't think! Just grab the drink!
  • But it's free! How can you resist when it's free?
  • Look at those people. They seem to be able to drink and smoke all of the time, and it isn't killing them. So I should be able to do it too...
  • Slips are okay. A little slipping won't hurt. It'll be fun. If everybody else is slipping and lapsing, then why shouldn't we?
  • Just Christmas and New Years. If I only drink at Christmas and New Years, then I can't get into trouble with that. That'll be okay.
  • Oh heck, it's Friday.
  • All that talk about the bad things that will happen if we relapse is long-term stuff. It isn't relevant for the short term, so we can indulge just for tonight and it will be okay.
  • All of this obsession with "your sobriety", and your being clean and sober, is just selfishness. You are just concerned about yourself. If you were really selfless, you would go down to the bar and have one with the boys to cheer them up.
  • Oh heck, we deserve to relax once in a while...
  • I need a little inspiration. This is a big, important job, and I need to come up with a creative, original concept. So I need a little liquid inspiration to help get the creative juices flowing. It's a tool, after all...
    (That also smacks of "I am entitled to drink because I have so much responsibility resting on my shoulders.")

From the web page about the Lizard-Brain Addiction Monster,
http://www.orange-papers.org/orange-addmonst.html