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Strong Like an Elephant
Living life as a BADASS, recovering, Jesus loving woman.

All for 15 minutes

There are lots of reasons that we as humans do things. My psychology background tells me that these reasons are called motivators, and that these are determined by your loci (although I really want to say locuses) of control. But it’s been more than 4 years since I was in school and with a seemingly unrelated graduate degree completed during that time, that’s about as far as I’m going to go with that descriptor. For the sake of this post, let’s leave it with the simple line that motivation determines what you do, and that you do it because of a result of internal or external motivators. When it comes to big R Recovery, I truly believe that my internal motivators must be real high. But for each little tiny step, however small, I typically need a little more motivation. And for the last few weeks, that external motivator has been completely focused on just 15 minutes.

15 minutes of running, or perhaps more accurately, jogging and walking while trying to catch my breath, that is! And that is a huge, gigantic, unbelievably big deal. I can hear the judgments running through my brain as I write this, as I assume that those reading this are having the same thoughts.

15 minutes is nothing… You’re nearly 26 years why is someone telling you how much you can run…You used to be an athlete…You’re so lazy for getting in this bad of shape.

So much judgment, right? But that’s the crap that runs through my head when even thinking about this, let alone when actually putting it out in the universe, and honestly being embarrassed by how pathetic this feeble attempt at a run seems. So given these thoughts and feelings, how did this 15 minutes motivate me to, for the first time in 4 months, go for 2 weeks behavior free and at 100% of my meal plan?

I’ve thought about this question for a long time and, at different moments, have had different answers. On reflection I realize that it is a combination of many of these motivators that led me to keep on keeping on, all for 15 minutes:

  1. I am an athlete. And I will always be an athlete. As I’ve stumbled through the land of life in recovery I have spent much time doubting this identity. Saying that it is a thing of the past- I used to be great, I used to be a baller, I used to be something to be proud of. But here’s the deal. I may not be the athlete I used to be, in fact I may never be her again, but I am still an athlete. And being an athlete is an important part of my life, and at this point, getting back to that comes 15 minutes at a time.
  2. I hate guilt and shame. And every time I have run in the last year and a half, barring the 15 minutes this week, I was left with a degree of guilt or shame because I knew that I wasn’t allowed to be doing it, per my treatment team and recovery. But I believed that I was worthy of that shitty feeling, and my urge and need to run was too great to work to avoid these things. (Though to be clear I did try and get permission to run in every way I possibly could with every single person whose been a part of my team!) This weekend I ran without guilt for the first time. I would be lying if I said the run was devoid of shame due to the judgments I had towards myself for reaching this point or for the kind of shape I was in. But I didn’t have to confess to running or lie about it. And if that means 15 minutes once a week for the time being, that should be more than sufficient motivation!
  3. I want to trust. In my life worth living, according to my values and faith, I trust others, particularly those who care about me. I am trying really hard to do this trust thing with my team, and for once, think I may be getting somewhere. It’s not without breakdowns and moments where everything I am doing to fight towards recovery seems worthless, leading to fighting with my team, and not my eating disorder. But my dietitian and therapist swear up and down that even though I think these limits are incredibly unfair, that they are actually just fair enough, even though they do suck… a lot. So I am trusting that 15 minutes at a time, will lead me to a life of mindful movement.
  4. I want to honor my body. To be blunt, I hate my body. I always have, and without this intervention that we call treatment, I would probably always hate my body. Cognitively, I get it. I know I’m not overweight. And I know that being overweight isn’t bad. I know all the things my body does for me and how miraculous that is. And I can tell this to anyone. But I don’t believe it for me. I am scared to write 3 sentences about my body, let alone talk about it, which my therapist will tell you, I flat out refuse to do. But I want to honor my body. Just 15 minutes, motivates me to do that. To honor my body by moving it, something I am unable to do when in the the throws of my eating disorder. And to not overuse it by pushing it too hard. If anything, 15 minutes is a motivator to maybe, just maybe, acknowledge something positive about my body.
  5. I AM A BADASS. And badasses get back up when they fall down, by doing the hard things over and over again. A badass would run for 15 minutes because that’s the first step in getting back up. And as I’m badass Emma, you best believe 15 minutes is motivation enough.

So last week, with a huge grin on my face I walked out of the doors of the Center with a pair of running shoes in hand. You see, over the last seven months, my team has been so graciously holding things that tempt me to break my good old movement plan. After a successful Friday evening at basketball tryouts (more about that in a later post) I went to get tacos and margaritas with my fellow coaches. It was there that I hit y 14 days at meal plan, and there was no better way to do it than surrounded by friends and with a drink in hand! With the weather at 60 degrees on Sunday afternoon, 2 days later, I strapped on my running shoes, set a timer on my phone, and let my best friend know I would be at her place in 15 minutes. And I ran. And jogged. And walked. And lost my breath. And ultimately made it to her place in 15 minutes, out of breath but all kinds of proud of myself.

I know that in the long run (no pun intended!), 15 minutes won’t be enough. And I don’t mean in terms of running. A God honoring life worth living is my ultimate goal for recovery. And this will be composed of many, many 15 minute motivators. My hope is that in the very near future it won’t all be for just 15 minutes, but I also want to acknowledge that if it is, that’s ok too. Even if it does make me mad! For this week it is all for 15 more minutes, because recovery comes just one (or 15 minutes worth) of steps at a time!