Ladies!! We need to STOP the insanity. In my last Body Image Blog I showed you photos of when I thought I was fat and clearly I wasn’t in ANY of those photos. How about these RAD Show photos, am I fat in any of these?
The answer is HELL NO I wasn’t fat in any of these either. Back then I had poor body image and I truly thought I had weight to lose in each and every one of those photos. This is why I’ve shown you these photos because I’m pretty sure that most of you are beautiful right now with the size you are. And instead of learning to love yourself for you, your mind, soul, heart the person you are and not the size you are, you are instead torturing yourself with some kind of absurd standard. You are allowing society to tell you what size you should be, instead of learning to love yourself and your body and telling society to fuck off.
We NEED TO STOP THE INSANITY. Seriously girls we are wasting precious time in our lives by thinking we are fat when we clearly AREN’T. We obsess, we are CONSTANLTY on some kind of diet, we over exercise, we surf the web for everything fitness and weight loss, we kill ourselves trying to lose those last 5 or 10 pounds…come on really what the hell are we doing to ourselves, life is precious and this is NO way to live life. We compare our bodies to our friends, family, strangers. We don’t attend a party or meet up with friends because we think we are fat and don’t want them to see us if it’s been awhile, or we don’t go because we can’t find an outfit to hide how fat we think we are or we go and the whole time we are there we are judging ourselves, being uncomfortable and missing out on truly having a good time.
When I weighed 125 I beat myself up that I wasn’t 120. When I was 135 I beat myself up that I wasn’t back to 125. When I was 150 I thought you know what I need to be is 135 if I get back to that I will be happy…that was not only insanity it was ridiculous. I was perfectly healthy at all those weights and I was perfectly healthy at 160 and 170. I know this now because now I have a positive body image. Currently I weigh over 200 pounds, (not sure exactly because I don’t obsess with the numbers anymore!!) and I love me! I am comfortable in my skin because I’ve learned over MANY MANY years to have a positive body image. Size and weight are just a number, not something that has power over me and controls my life.
Two very important things, I NO longer judge me for my size and other people’s views on my size NO LONGER defines me or bothers me, remember it’s their problem if they don’t like your size, quit making other people’s problems with your size your problem. Love you for you, and if there is truly a weight issue you will resolve it on YOUR terms or not, it’s up to you. I know this journey takes a while, it took me a VERY long time to get to this point.. but I am trying to save you from all the time I wasted.
Remember when you place too much value on people liking the way you look, than that means when they don’t like the way you look it will bother you. Why do you want to give other people so much power over you? Take your power back.
Do you really want to be in your 30’s, 40’s, 50’s, 60’s and beyond still worrying about your weight and size, still defining yourself by what you look like as opposed to the person you are? Of course you don’t, dear god that would be exhausting. Each time we obsess about our size or weight time is lost, time you will never get back. Wouldn’t you rather spend some of your time learning to love yourself and have positive body image? Of course you would.
The time you have been spending freaking out, crying, feeling awful, hiding, trying the latest diet and workout program spend that time instead on learning how to have positive body image. That comes FIRST. Once you accomplish a healthy view of yourself, then reevaluate your HEALTH, NOT your weight or size your HEALTH. Maybe you just don’t feel as strong as you used to, maybe you get winded walking or jogging, maybe you have aches and pains, maybe you don’t have any energy. Maybe your soul feels like it needs some nurturing. These are all healthy beautiful things to work on that are not based on how you look or what size you are and the intention isn’t to be a certain number when it comes to weight and size, it’s to be stronger, less winded, no aches or pains, to have more energy and to feed your soul with positivity.
I get it, society puts so much value on what size a women’s body is, but that doesn’t mean you have to be a prisoner of society’s stupid views on OUR bodies. You are not amazing because you have a good body, society would disagree but we have already established that society is stupid. You are amazing because of your character, because of your personality, because of the amazing talents you have that help this world to be a better place. It’s the person you are that makes you amazing not the size of your body.
I know you would rather get to living your life instead of being held captive with poor body image issues, you can conquer this I know you can! Here are a few book suggestions that may help you along the way…
Beautiful You: A Daily Guide to Radical Self-Acceptance by Rosie Molinary
embody: Learning to Love Your Unique Body (and quiet that critical voice!) by Connie Sobczak
Body of Truth: How Science, History, and Culture Drive Our Obsession with Weight–and What We Can Do about It by Harriet Brown
I wish you love, peace and patience as you journey your way to a healthy body image! XOXO
