Addicted to my to do list
If there was one area of my healing journey that took longer than others, it was my relationship with productivity.
Can someone turn rest and self-soothing activities into a symbol of productivity? Yes, they can, and that person is me.
Yoga, tick; state of flow with some painting, tick; have I drunk this cup of tea mindfully? Well, yes, tick. Hurrah, I’d congratulate myself; resting and self-care are done for the day; now, back to the to-do list.
Ha. That, my friends, was my idea of rest, something to be intellectualised rather than embodied. I managed to turn the act of self-care into another badge of productivity. I did the doing, but I never did the being. I might have been sitting still, but my mind and body would be thinking, planning, scanning, and waiting for ‘me time’ to end so that I could get that load of laundry out of the dryer.
Eating Disorder Therapist Harriet Frew recently introduced me to Compassion-Focused therapy and the three emotion regulation states. She explained that we need a balance of all three, but commonly, we fall predominately into one or flip between two, as I tended to.
My inability to be present, to immerse my mind and body in the act of rest, meant that I was constantly in one of two emotional states: fight/flight or striving….oh and how addictive is striving? Very, because while fight and flight recruit our stress hormones, striving, or an incentive-driven emotional state, recruits dopamine. To complicate matters, when I didn’t tick everything off my to-do list, I would feel anxious and ping straight back to, you guessed it, fight or flight.
Somewhat unsurprisingly, the emotional regulation state we often need to practice embodying is that of self-soothing. As clinical psychologist Paul Gilbert explains,
When animals aren’t defending themselves against threats and problems and don’t need to achieve or do anything (they have sufficient or enough), they can be content. Contentment is a form of being happy with the way things are and feeling safe, not striving or wanting; it is an inner peacefulness. When people practise meditation and ‘slow down,’ these are the feelings they report: not wanting or striving but feeling calmer inside and connected to others. This is quite a different positive feeling from the hyped-up, excited or ‘striving and succeeding’ feeling of the drive-excitement system. It is also different from just low levels of threat, which can be associated with boredom or emptiness.
Reflecting on my addiction to my to-do list, I realised a profound truth. I could not extend the same loving kindness and compassion to myself that I readily gave to others. This lack of self-compassion was at the root of my struggle, a belief that I didn’t deserve to be soothed.
Furthermore, this imbalance can affect our relationship with food. Spending too much time in threat-focused or incentive-resource-driven circles can act as attunement disruptors, making it difficult to connect with our hunger and fullness cues.
This video explains how attunement disruptors can interfere with cultivating an intuitive and peaceful relationship with food.
In addition, the incentive-resource-driven circle can play to personality traits such as perfectionism or being goal-driven, which we can associate with maintaining our self-esteem, driving us to pursue weight loss or excessive exercise goals. Similarly, the threat-based circle can foster self-criticism, restriction, and binge/purge behaviours.
Practising self-compassion and self-soothing is beneficial and essential in the recovery journey. Cultivating a sense of contentment, safety, acceptance, and rest. Permitting yourself to pause, slow down, and fully embrace the concept of stopping is imperative in building the bridge of trust between body and mind.
So, how do we go about self-soothing? What does it feel like? It's a deeply personal experience unique to each of us. For me, it means returning to childhood moments, hanging upside down off the bed and watching clouds pass by the window, a feeling of contentment and safety at my core. It's a place where my breathing is easy and full, a place where I experience every part of my body surrender to my yoga mat. It's a place where I talk kindly and compassionately to myself. It is moments when I genuinely tune out, turn down the noise, press pause, and, in doing so, make space to reconnect with my innate wisdom and my knowing.
So, let's delve into some self-reflection…
Do you find balance across all three circles, or do you tend to reside more in one than the others?
How can you create more balance?
What does self-soothing feel like for you? Is it easy or difficult to show yourself kindness?
Can you extend the compassion you show others inward to yourself? When you think about pausing, what comes up for you? Is it resistance or relief?
I’d love to know if any of this resonates with you.
In the meantime, I’m off to watch the Spring raindrops race down my office window and slow the freak down for five minutes…
…as always, I am rooting for you,
Rose x
