I often catch myself taking lessons, quotes, anecdotes, etc, and drawing analogies to EDs/ED recovery. I'm not sure if that's a good or a bad thing, but I think it's probably a pretty normal thing, considering I'm working on recovery with a treatment team and that topic is running in the background of my mind quite a bit.
Anyway, I read a book this weekend (Bounce, by Matthew Syed) that explored the "innate vs acquired skill" issue, mostly in regards to highly performance-oriented activities, such as sports and music. The author's main argument was that skill actually matters very little, and that top athletes, music "prodigies" and the like are actually most likely the results of two overwhelmingly large factors: 1) hard, progress-oriented practice and 2) external environmental advantages (having access to coaches, being in a supportive family, being born in a country/generation where your race/gender is given enough rights to participate in an activity, etc).
In the book Outliers, author Malcolm Gladwell popularized the idea that one needs about 10,000 hours of practice to really achieve professional expertise at an endeavor, although work by Anders Ericsson in the '90s was really the first development of the theory. For example, Tiger Woods is often seen as the ultra golf guru and/or child prodigy, but in reality his father started him off when he could barely walk, and he had racked up thousands and thousands of hours of practice by the time he hit adolescence and the magic 10,000 by his mid-teens. Not to say he had no talent, of course, but if he hadn't worked so incredibly intensely to develop his skills, he wouldn't have been able to perform to such a level as to warrant becoming a sports legend.
One thing that is emphasized, however, is that not just any "practice" counts. If you go out and run the same laps around a track for an hour 10,000 times, you are not really "practicing" in a progress oriented way. You're just repeating a routine (sounds like my life as an overexerciser, actually). What all of the psychologists emphasize is that if you're actually going to improve and build skill, you have to engage in focused practice that tests your limits and pushes you to go beyond your current capacity. It's often painful, and frustrating, and exhausting, but it pays off. One of my favorite quotes from Bounce: "Research across domains shows that it is only by working at what you can't do that you turn into the expert you want to become."
And it goes much deeper than just pushing yourself through the motions, as author/table tennis Olympian Syed points out (emphasis in original): "Sure, clocking up thousands of hours of purposeful practice ultimately determines how far we make it along the path to excellence: but it is only those who care about the destination, whose motivation...is 'internalized,' who are ever going to get there."
All of this seems directly analogous to ED recovery, as I have experienced it at least. It's one thing to go therapy, claim to be in recovery, make certain incremental changes to get you to a point where you're not in acute danger of needing medical hospitalization. Coasting along in sub-clinical complacency is a really common issue for people in recovery, especially since ED sufferers are often highly successful in other areas of their life, making it seem like the status quo with their disease is acceptable.
And yet...actually tackling the core of the ED--and its control over your thoughts and actions--is a whole different ball game. It takes "purposeful practice" that will push you, make you uncomfortable, but also take you beyond what initially seemed possible. It seems like common sense, of course, but making it happen while you're still caught in a disordered quagmire is actually incredibly difficult. And you have to have that 'internalized motivation' to make the changes meaningful enough to stick.
Anyway, as I'm really starting to get serious about the exercise challenges I've set with D., all of this was extremely thought provoking for me. I pride myself in being a hard worker and high achiever in other areas of my life, but when it comes to breaking down ED patterns, I am very prone to just give myself the easy way out, not push myself beyond my comfort zone, and basically roll over and invite the ED to keep kicking my ass. I cut myself slack that I would never tolerate in my professional life.
And I really, really can't keep making excuses for that.
I did a back-of-the envelope calculation, and I'm fairly confident that I've logged over 10,000 hours of exercise since my ED first developed. Of all the things I could be an expert in, being a disordered person was never on my list of goals.
Onwards and upwards, right?
What about you? Have you struggled with complacency or spinning your wheels in recovery? Care to share what finally lit a fire under you to challenge yourself and make progress? I'd love to hear some comments about it.
6 comments:
I thought that this was a really good post! I've certainly found complacency hard to overcome, and like you I'd never allow myself complacency in other areas (like my degree work). Maybe the difference is that schoolwork has always come quite easily to me. I might *look* as though I'm pushing myself to other people (my current housemates think I'm crazy for the amount of time I spend in the library!) but it's not really such a hardship- this is all I've ever been good at, and I love my subject. There are plenty of other areas that they can beat me hands-down. I'm terrible at video games, for example, because I simply don't have the co-ordination or the patience to learn. And I've never bothered to push myself in other areas (e.g. team sports) because I know I don't have a hope.
Changing engrained eating habits, though, seems far harder (at least to start with). I still find the idea of eating certain foods or at certain times a million times scarier than studying! I think that having quite a detailed plan of action helps (vague resolutions along the lines of 'I'm going to eat more and lighten up about exercise' are much easier to forget about then strict goals about how much food and how much exercise). And sometimes it seems that something just 'clicks'- and I don't think anyone knows where that comes from or why it happens when it does.
It sounds like you're making good progress at the moment though. Onwards and upwards is definitely the way to go. :D
random points:
1) great post!!
2) I think the hard part about giving up disordered behavior is that being hard/kind to ourselves in our society could be really confusing. I KNOW overexercising is not healthy, not fun, not sexy, not productive, not social, not making me better in any way and still- I have hard time to not feeling like a loser when I am not doing it. I think on some level I unfortunately still believe it makes me somehow "better" (please don't take me wrong- I don't mean superior or better person. It is hard to define it. It is individual better in my distorted view, because I'd never ever judge another person according to fitness or even appearance. On the contrary.) I strongly believe in anorexia-predisposing-genes, but it'd be bit easier to change the perspective if overexercising was as stigmatized as substance abuse or violence.
3) Plans, lists, baby steps is my mantra that works and (as you wrote) it should be: plans, list, baby steps, but don't forget to care about the bigger picture, the reason, the destination, the healthy reality beyond all these recovery tools.
4) You're lucky you can separate your professional and "ED"-life (I am sorry if it sounds weird, but I hope you know how I mean it!). I think I am actually more passionate about my work much more that about my stupid muscles, but it is so hard to step out of the anxiety in my workplace and so easy to compensate for feeling like an idiot in work with ED habits:(
5) I haven't done the count, but the number of hours spent with useless exercising (and even worse: the hours of planning it, stressing about particular schedule, punishing myself for not being able to do what I planned etc.) is embarrassing.
6) I hope this was not to much triggering. I am really doing much better with exercise compared to some years in the past, but the thinking part is still not there...
7) Good luck wit your exercise challenges and other things. I hope your 2012 has started well and continues in the good direction!
xx ola
Hey!
Such an amazing post C, what you've written is so accurate and it's a really important concept to recognize. I agree with you on all of it. What humans do best is stay within the confines of their own, predetermined comfort zone. When you have people like you and I, where we like control and have our "issues" with body image and anxiety, that comfort zone becomes so small it's not even recognizable. We do a fantastic job of pretending that we're changing, when really we're not. Moving outside that comfort zone is the ONLY way to break it down, and re-train the brain to think differently. Way easier said than done though right?!
What helped me about a year ago was the realization that if things didn't change, and if I didn't suck it up and re-prioritize and decide what was TRULY important in life, I could potentially lose my career and my friends and I would spend the rest of my life regretting it. And for what, to "look nice" because a magazine said I had to be a skeleton to have any sense of self-worth? How about looking at it like this: I'll be important if I have osteoporosis, brittle hair and nails, yellow flaky skin, a heart with no power, muscles with no life, no feminine features, no sex life, no babies, no social life....
The minute you realize that ANYONE who judges you by how you look, what you wear, how you eat, the car you drive, what you do etc. is the person with the REAL problem, you can re-frame your thinking.
Measure yourself by who you are, and how you treat others! Your inner monologue should be this: I am brilliant, I am an amazing person, I am kind, I am gentle, I am better than ED, I am worth FAR MORE than the size of my clothing, and I will NOT be controlled by this.
It's always easier said than done, but perhaps that gives you a little insight into how I now think. It takes time friend, lots of it, and the more you can find enjoyment in the little things you do each day, and the marvels of all the things we take for granted, the better it will get. Try to put things in perspective, and often. What is truly important to you? :)
I had lots of issues with complacency/ambivalence/downright lack of motivation regarding my eating disorder. What lit a fire under my butt was a moment almost three years ago when I suddenly considered the idea that *this* would be the rest of my life if I didn't act. I was in a different position to you because I've never been able to function when ill, I get too sucked in too quickly, so I was completely disabled and had no life at all, no work or school or friendships. I just realised that no one was going to make me eat, so I could either seriously start fighting back or give up and die. Harsh, but in my case true. It took twelve years, but I think I just finally got to the point where things staying the same became more scary than changing. I wasn't really all that scared of dying, but I was scared of being anorexic for the rest of my life. It felt like a monumental waste.
Of course that's not the whole issue, because if motivation alone was enough for recovery no one would stay sick for long. I don't really know why I got better. But that was a big part of the beginning :)
I remember hearing the magic "10,000 hours of practice" concept applied to learning a musical instrument, and I scoffed at it because "practice" take so much more than just putting in the time. Three hours of good, focused practicing are immeasurably more valuable than thirty hours of merely going through the motions. In fact, "bad practicing" (doing something over and over incorrectly) does more harm than not practicing at all because it reinforces the bad habits, creates bad muscle memory, and prevents you from learning to do something the right way.
This is interesting to look at in terms of EDs because I think so much of recovery is learning good habits and putting them into practice day in and day out. You can have the best intentions in the world of recovering, but it means nothing if you refuse to "practice" eating.
Ooh, great question. I think that working hard and pushing yourself in school and professional settings is rewarding. While I don't do it for the grades (more for the pride, my work ethic, and the opportunities that come with working hard) there ARE those little "good job"s and "this paid off" and "I improved"s that make you feel better.
For pushing myself in recovery, I found that the best motivators were:
-wanting to travel someday and knowing that I needed to be fully healthy to do that
-wanting to be present in all of my relationships and bring the best "me" to them--I thought it was unfair otherwise
and
-wanting to be able to help others and bring my best self to them so I could be most useful.
Finding out my bone scan results in 2008 (right before I got married) was the final "push" that I needed to say "ENOUGH. As much as recovery hurts, I cannot go back." I did not want to bring a feeble, weak, person who was going to basically be disabled/immobile/unable to do things in older age into my active husband's life. He deserved better. I knew on some level that I did too. I decided at that point that I could not go back to an eating disorder, then or ever, and I would do whatever it took to stay on track with recovery even when it was hard.
I think reflecting on what you have to lose and what you ARE LOSING EVERY DAY (emphasis not to be mean/scary...just to emphasize! haha) is a good practice. I've never been a "scare tactics" person, but for me, this really made reality and my options clear.
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