Goals, Changes...Commitment-phobe Actually Commits?

I've been thinking more and more about the last few days. It felt good to actually write about the conflict I have going on- I think it's important to acknowledge that there is a very real pull towards my eating disorder, because otherwise it festers silently.

I've talked a lot about what "normal" is, and this has been at the forefront of my thoughts lately. What entails recovery, normality. I have come to the conclusion that "normality" doesn't exist. Normal for ME won't be normal for somebody else. What makes me happy might not make somebody else happy. What works for me and my recovery might not work for someone else.

I want to shift the focus of my blog a bit- from constantly questioning and analyzing the right/wrong way to recover/live, onto a more personal level about MY journey. That was the original intention and I feel like I've lost focus lately amidst everything going on.

I've been thinking about goals again- short term, medium term and long term, Using "S.M.A.R.T." principles (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, Timely) which has been the only thing I have ever used from when I qualified as a life coach a few years ago, I came up with these:

So, some of my goals...

• get back on track with some sort of balanced and varied meal plan (ongoing- has been recently, but kicking things up a notch)
• start voluntary work (tomorrow)
• continue working with my therapist to build up the hours of volunteering I do (seeing her weekly to review how I am managing things)
• work towards being stable enough to ENJOY my trip to New York (now in October- I want to have a GOOD TIME not an anorexia-infused trip)

They are a work in progress and likely to change over time as I learn and grow and discover more about myself as ELLIE, not "Ellie with her sidekick, Anorexia".

One of my longer term goals is to move back to New York so all the smaller goals I have set are with that in mind- if I stumble or start to struggle, I might need reminded to keep the bigger picture in mind! :)

I've said before that this isn't a food blog, but I want to change that a little too. It's been helping me a lot to post photos in terms of branching out/trying new things so there will be more of that. I will NOT be posting entire days worth of food because I don't see that as beneficial to me at this point. I'm going to be making gradual changes so a lot of my meals are pretty repetitive but I am aiming to do at least a couple photos a day whilst I work on building a healthier relationship with food/my body.

I am pretty certain that the path that anorexia leads down is not one I am willing to devote any more time/attention to. I know I'm going to struggle with this. I know I'll have thoughts/urges/moments of despair/days when I want to throw it all in and revert back to what is familiar. But what's scarier to me at this point than a life WITHOUT anorexia is the thought of a life WITH anorexia (now there's an oxymoron if I ever heard one!).

Maybe I should add one more thing to my goals...

• to use my blog to vent about frustrations/fears/life rather than instinctively running back into the arms of my eating disorder