I recently read Alissa Rumsey’s fantastic book Unapologetic Eating. She was the guest of last week’s podcast episode, which you can listen to here.
There are so many ideas that she touches on in the book that I couldn’t possibly get to them all in our conversation.
But there is a section in the book that we didn’t get to cover, that I’ve been wanting to write about for a while now. It comes up so often in conversations with clients and is an idea that they struggle with.
It’s the concept of laziness.
Just thinking of the word can trigger a strong emotional response. And to think that someone would use that word to describe them, can be shame-inducing.
Laziness is defined as “unwilling to work or use energy”. And someone is lazy if “they do not want to work or make any effort to do anything.”
Other words that also come up during conversations around laziness are gluttony, apathy, weakness and slothfulness. So laziness also takes on all the feelings and beliefs about these other words too.
And given the moral panic over the “obesity epidemic,” laziness has become intimately connected to stereotypes about what a body should “look like” and therefore the habits one should keep up to avoid appearing “lazy” (such as exercise and eating “healthy”).
There are several reasons why you may fear laziness. Some of these are ideas that come directly from Unapologetic Eating and others are ones that have been mentioned to me by clients.
The fear of what other people will think – this is possibly the biggest fear, that other people will see them as less than. We fear judgements of all kinds by other people, but for those perusing weight loss and “wellness” or those trapped in disordered eating or an eating disorder, their body can take on a bigger source of identity than for someone who is not in this mindset.
This can also be connected to a longstanding feeling that you’re not enough and doing less is going to demonstrate to the world that this is the case. So, busyness and productivity, the opposite of laziness, is the armour to prevent the world from seeing this.
That if I take a break, I’ll never get up again – this is a huge fear, particularly in the area of exercise or movement: that if I stop now, I’ll never start again. Or with food: that if I stop eating vegetables, I’ll never eat them again. This can at least show a level of self-awareness, that someone can recognise just how tired and exhausted they really are or how much they aren’t enjoying what they are eating. But it’s not the whole story and is more of a reflection of the state that they’re in.
I’ll be left behind – This fear feels like it has got worse in the last decade and is synonymous with hustle culture and the pressure to always be thinking about the future. In this blog post, I made reference to statistics showing the sharp increase in anxiety among college students. I think this is in part because of the fear of being left behind. That if I take more time off, everyone will get ahead and I’ll never catch up.
That I’m giving up – this can connect to the first option, in that someone fears they’ll be seen by friends, family and society at large as giving up. But often, it’s very much an internal struggle. That someone feels like they are giving up on themselves.
And this is typically connected to the fact that they have worked so hard to get to where they are now. So, it’s not just deciding to do something different, it means that all the pain and suffering that they’ve put themselves through for these months, years or decades, is something they’re now walking away from.
The thing that connects all of these fears is that living with an eating disorder significantly amplifies them.
As I talk about in this podcast episode with Tabitha Farrar, one of the theories of anorexia is the migration theory, proposed by Shan Guisinger.
Guisinger explains. “When nomadic foragers were starving, it wouldn’t make sense to hunker down and just not eat. If you’re starving it means that there’s no food there, and so you should move on.”
Or you can think about the migration of birds in the winter. Survival is predicated on being able to fly for very long distances with limited stops for food.
The theory is that when someone with susceptible genetics enters into a low energy state, adaptions are turned on so that there is a desire to move. And moving here can be both physical movement like exercise or walking, as well as more psychological movement, feeling like they constantly have to be busy and productive.
And in this state, the fear of laziness looms large and all of the fears I mentioned above become exponentially more salient and important.
Our fear of laziness is no small thing and the problems it creates are devastating.
If I were to ask you, what is a bigger problem in childhood, type 2 diabetes or eating disorders, what would you say?
Given how many news articles are written about the “obesity epidemic,” the dangers of sugar consumption, that kids are getting less movement than they used to, the sharp increase in kids’ screen time and how children are no longer getting outside, I believe that most people would answer that type 2 diabetes is the bigger concern. That it’s happening much more frequently than eating disorders.
But this is not the case.
Let me include a quote from Unapologetic Eating to truly put this in perspective.
“A child is 242 times more likely to have an eating disorder than they are to have type 2 diabetes. If you took a sample of 100,000 children, only 12 would have type 2 diabetes, whereas 2,900 would meet the criteria for an eating disorder.”
While there are obviously many factors that go into both creating and maintaining an eating disorder, the fear of laziness is definitely a part of it.
As I’ve already mentioned, the concept of laziness is something I talk about regularly with clients because it can be such a huge block to recovery. And while there are many ways to deal with this, let me share one of them here.
For most clients, when I ask them what is the opposite of laziness, they say it’s productivity.
Productivity is another rather dubious word because of how warped its meaning has become. Productivity too often means increased efficiency, to-do lists, highlighter pens and Inbox Zero. But mostly, these supposed “productivity hacks,” don’t lead to anything more than busyness and increased anxiety.
In a recent podcast, I mentioned my love of Oliver Burkeman’s Four Thousand Weeks. Burkeman had written for over a decade for The Guardian as an efficiency and productivity expert before he realised that all of his methods were leading to a worse quality of life.
He writes about what it means to have a meaningful life and how to make the most of our finite time on this planet. Which often means, doing less, not more.
When productivity is seen through this lens, it shifts our focus from busyness and always being in motion to asking “what would a truly productive life look like?”
And when I have this conversation with clients, things fairly quickly start to become clear. They see that what they are currently doing isn’t actually productive.
Exercising in the manner they are isn’t enhancing their life or their energy levels.
Eating in the way that they are isn’t helping them to function at work, in their studies or their relationships.
Spending time tracking their calories, fat/protein grams or steps isn’t leading to them being a more productive human.
So, while they fear laziness, they see that what they are currently doing isn’t helping and it isn’t actually productive. It’s busyness, anxiety, an inability to stop and a harsh inner critic masquerading as productivity.
Now, just noticing this doesn’t automatically eliminate the fear. But what we can start to explore is what would it truly mean to be productive? What would a productive life look like?
And for the clients I work with getting over an eating disorder (or disordered eating or chronic dieting) is the true obstacle to a productive life. It keeps them trapped and fixated on ideas and beliefs that reduce their productivity. It keeps them busy, while the more important aspects fall by the wayside or get ignored.
So, what would have to happen to overcome this? What are the kinds of things that would make a difference?
These are all ideas explored in detail in Unapologetic Eating. And I can’t think of a more productive way of spending your time than working on the above; this is the antithesis of laziness.
As I said earlier, laziness is a huge trigger for many people. It’s what can make recovery so difficult because you feel like you’re giving up and will become everything the eating disorder is trying to warn you about.
But this is a lie. A truly meaningful and productive life awaits you on the other side. One that is much more in line with who you are and what you value, not simply a reaction to fear.
If you want help getting started with recovery or you’ve been doing it for a while but are stuck, I’d love to help.
I’m a leading expert and advocate for full recovery. I’ve been working with clients for over 15 years and understand what needs to happen to recover.
I truly believe that you can reach a place where the eating disorder is a thing of the past and I want to help you get there. If you want to fully recover and drastically increase the quality of your life, I’d love to help.
Want to get a FREE online course created specifically for those wanting full recovery? Discover the first 5 steps to take in your eating disorder recovery. This course shows you how to take action and the exact step-by-step process. To get instant access, click the button below.
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