Reframing Motivation

I believe that in order to recover, you have to want to. I don't believe that you have to want to in every moment of every day, but on the whole, you have to have reasons why you no longer want to have restriction in your life. You have to have some yearning for a life beyond eating as little as possible and the matrix of destructive habits that come along with it, like compulsive movement, or weighing foods. If you feel very little or no desire for recovery at all, then your brain is likely to continue following the restriction urges without question, ambivalence or resistance. Whoever you are, no matter how hard they seem to access, you do have reasons.

Your motivations can be highly specific, based on things you want to accomplish in the near future, such as heading off to further education institutions, starting a new job or enjoying a planned holiday. Or, perhaps, they are more general, like: having space in your brain for moment-to-moment living. Or just simply: being happy. I had a combination of the vague and very specific reasons for recovery that were really helpful to reflect on often to consistently remind me of my Why's. These included the ones I've mentioned above, and also: becoming a better friend, a kinder daughter, being able to have a fulfilling career, having more energy and interest to pursue goals, having more time to travel, appreciating nature, like sunrises, and simply enjoying life more. And each and every one of those IS truly a beautiful reason to want to get unconditionally better. If you share those, or have your own, that is wonderful.

However, sometimes, and most of the time, even the deepest core values I had — even my greatest motivations for stopping restricting — were simply not enough to stop the action of restriction. All of my beautiful reasons for recovery were not impenetrable. My greatest yearnings for seeing a beautiful sunrise on an ED-free holiday seemed entirely irrelevant compared to any *threat* that was placed in front of me. Once I was in my parasympathetic nervous system (my fight, flight or freeze response due to fear) there was very little, if any, rational line of thought that could infiltrate. It felt like my brain was screaming: " Sunrise?? You want me to care about a fucking sunrise right now?? Who fucking cares about the holiday happening next year?? Get the hell out of the danger right here, right now. Forget the sunrise. Forget the holiday. Focus on the threat Han". So that's exactly what I did. I listened to the urges to escape the in-the-moment *threat* and momentarily disregarded any inspirational long-term goal.

However, this evaporation of motivation upon a threat stimulus isn't exactly what I wanted to talk about today. This post is about how recovery is often easy (or easier), when life is easy (easier). It's easier when there's no external stresses or complications going on. When all of your energy can be geared towards healing. When life is flowing smoothly and the planets feel aligned. So, what happens when life isn't easy? What happens when you have days where you can’t seem to find anything positive about your life? What happens when the planets all seem to be gearirng their powers against you?

Again, if you are similar to how I was, this can lead this awful sensation of hopelessness. When it feels like things in your life are falling apart, your motivation for recovery feels like it’s falling apart as well too. You may have an urge to restrict (because that’s what your brain has been conditioned to think you need, regardless of what’s going on in your life), and then comes along those same old bullshit excuses and thoughts for delaying getting better...

“You’ll never achieve your goals, so what’s the point of even trying to recover?"

 “Life is so hard anyway, even without restriction, so you might as well restrict”

“You wanted to recover so that you could enjoy life, and life sucks, so there is no reason to dismiss this urge to restrict.”

You can of course try your absolute best to observe and dismiss all of those restrict-encouraging thoughts as neurological junk by avoiding giving them any attention or value, however, this is easier said than done. So, what else might help?

An additional technique that helped me was reframing how I thought about my motivation to recover–in order to make those type of thoughts seem even less logical.

What I mean by this is adjusting how you think about your reasons for recovery, so that those reasons are not only about things going well in your life. Life will not always be smooth and flawless and therefore depending on changeable variables can be risky. Instead, I encourage that your core motivation for recovery be this:  Freedom.

Now, I know that sounds cliché. I know it sounds obvious. I know you want freedom from your eating disorder. But in my experience, viewing freedom as my fundamental motivation provided protection against my reasons for recovery falling apart when I had difficult days or shitty life stuff came up.

When I was in the depths of restriction, I thought of freedom as a vehicle for achieving my other motivations for recovery: Freedom from restricting and over-exercising was how I was going to become a better friend, sister, daughter. I thought freedom was how I’d be able to get a job that I loved and how I’d finally be able to enjoy my life. But, as it turned out freedom was the goal in itself. Freedom gave me the agency to do well, do badly, thrive, mess up - and not even consider using food or exercise as an automatic anxiety relief technique. Freedom was autonomy. Freedom was free reign over my life. And perhaps most importantly, freedom was safe.

Once I was free from restriction and the horrible ED-OCD behaviours that came with it, I could even be a shitty friend, or daughter. I could not accomplish goals. I could have a boring summer job. I could be locked down in my house for a global pandemic and not able to travel. There could be no sunrises at all AND still, I would not feel tempted by thoughts saying “you might as well restrict or go exert yourself a run.”  

I realize that may sound a little odd, because of course, life being a bit rubbish is not the thought of an optimist. And snapping at my parents occasionally, getting a little pissed off at my pals or living through a pandemic were not actually goals of mine, but there were (and still are) days when I did not even come close to the expectations I had for my 'ideal' self. And I realize and fully accept that this is because I am only human. I get tired, I snap at my parents. My friends get on my nerves. I make mistakes at work. And even when the reasons I wanted to recover didn’t even begin to materialize each and every day, and I wasn't this super perfect human, I was still free.  

I was free to make mistakes, and not worry that I would restrict as a result.  I was free to have bad mood day days, and not restrict because I knew that this was never truly a way to cope.  I had the freedom to pick myself back up when the sunrise I longed to see didn't happen, or when, generally, life didn’t go as planned.

Desiring freedom, for me, was about desiring the opportunity to experience all of what is means to be human, even the bad parts, without restriction getting in the way. Freedom does not hinge on your accomplishments, or what’s going on around you, or your success in relationships, or your own happiness. The other motivations that you have are wonderful, don’t get me wrong, but when freedom provides the foundation, you always have a reason to recover.

Using freedom as motivation is also helpful if you can’t find many reasons to recover in the first place.  If restriction and other ED behaviours have been clouding your life for a long time, you may not be able to fully see what your life could be like after recovery.  But, no matter what life brings, the opportunity to have freedom from food issues is invaluable.  You’ll be free from mental torment, the hunger, the guilt, the hopelessness, the physical discomfort, and the feeling of being out of control of your own life. If you can experience even a moment of freedom from the consequences of restriction, and get excited about it, it can solidify your desire to keep recovering, despite your uncertainty about what your life will be like afterward.

Freedom, in and of itself, is worth the effort you are putting into stop restricting. I encourage you to keep focusing on all of your motivations to recover, but remember that underneath those reasons lies a desire to be free to live the whole of your life – the good and the bad – without the pain of restricting, compensating, battling your own mind and holding your body at a place it is not happy.

Commit to freedom.

Sending love,

Han