Hope, Intention and Action
Quite often I hear a client say “ I hope I will not binge tonight…” The first time I heard this in an evening check-out group, I felt the space between the floating hope and the ground. Hope had no feet. It was a fluffy little cloud that hovered in space, a wispy presence. And it occured to me that while hope is nice, it needed some help to touch the ground. What the client was not accounting for was her own self. Her intention and what action she could take.
When a person finally decides to risk treatment after many years of trying to do it themselves and struggling with the idea of giving up the one resource that has never failed them - the Eating Disorder - they arrive with hope and not much else. They are feeling fairly powerless against the force of their well-practised behaviours and are teetering on the fine line of hope and hopelessness. They scrutinize the therapist’s face for any sign that tells them that they are a lost cause. Am I the one person who might be “too difficult” to fix and perhaps it is not even worth trying? The first few meetings or weeks in a treatment centre are carried by hope. Hope is somewhat magical. In its floaty way, hope expects that “something will happen somehow”. “The therapist or the treatment team will tell me what to do, I will do it and somehow things will change.”
A few weeks into treatment, it starts becoming obvious that more is required. The idea of recovery is a glorious mystery. It has floated along with hope. However, ideas are timeless, wispy clouds too. As we start discussing steps and stages, the person realizes that we require the clouds to grow feet. I cannot achieve freedom from my current way of life hoping that the solution will come from the outside. A very structured program can keep me safe while I am in it but I am with myself when I leave.
The seed of recovery lies within each person. As a therapist, I am simply bringing attention to that part of a person that brought them into my office. The tired, frustrated, hopeful part. We need this tiny part. Eating disorders arrive into a person’s life during teenage. When the person is still too young to have acquired a consolidated sense of self i.e. agency, that contributes to a feeling of capacity. It is within my capacity to make change. In isolation , the eating disorder behaviours are all-consuming and the person’s experience is one of ongoing powerlessness that contributes to concentric circles of hopelessness. Asking for help is the first opening of that tight circle. The collaboration with an external force is the door that keeps the air from going back to the staleness of isolation where nothing is new and hope dies. But - there is a new challenge. The treatment team brings attention to the fragile self of the client. The part that lives in a sense of inadequacy, self-blaming and self-shaming. There is a huge pull to go back to the coccoon of isolation so nobody needs to see my incapable self. In the stagnation of my ED, years have gone by and I have become 32 years old. “I should be able to do this myself by now!” Recovery cannot be achieved by dis - counting oneself. Not counting oneself because one has only known oneself through this shame and helplessness. Shame that has been reinforced by the disappointment on the faces of others, or the disappointment I think I see. Comments that others might have made - “Why are you not gaining weight? Are you still in therapy?”. Sometimes these are caring comments that just sound wrong.
As the person learns to account for themselves - MY hopes, recovery for MYself - we realize the companions of Hope are Intention and Action.
In the daily grind of recovery, small everyday intentions anchor hope to action. Intention and action can bring clarity to the wispyness of hope. “In my intention to recover, I intend to eat my lunch today”. Following it with the action of eating my lunch ( without cutting corners or compensating) takes me one step closer to the possibility of recovery. It keeps my hope alive. We can acknowledge that breaking patterns that have been long-practised is difficult and feels like suffering. Everyday a person doubts the possibility of recovery. Everyday the person doubts themselves. This is why we have , and need, the team. Like learning to ride a bicycle with training wheels. Till one day the training wheels can fall off and they are not needed anymore. Change happens the same as everything else we have done - like we learned to walk and talk and swim and play piano. Anything once practised can only improve. The eating disorder was once well-practised. It will always remain as a memory in the system but with enough new practice, a new way of being gets established and the old way becomes irrelevant.
In the endeavour to recover, Hope, Intention & Action do well together. They support and need each other. They do not do very well apart.
A word about ‘frustration’:
Frustration is an energy that tells us the space we are in is too small. Frustration is an energy that invites action. Adult children who live in their parent’s basement start getting very “frustrated” with their parent’s ways. Because the parent’s basement is too small for the emerging adult to spread their wings. It is time to move out. The frustration one feels when confined in the coccoon of the ED which was once very cozy starts taking its toll, as the person grows older. That coccoon has no space for relationships or delight or the whimsy of new things. Much time in therapy can be spent venting this frustration by complaining about others. Complaining is not action, it is simply a steam-valve. It releases the pressure of frustration temporarily without changing anything. It is a caution to therapists and clients alike to not spend too much time in complaining and validation that holds Action hostage. It will simply waste the energy of frustration that could be transformed into something new.
Frustration is an invitation to Action. We can use it well.
