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Gift Yourself with a Better Body Image

When you wake up on Christmas Day, open your eyes and celebrate the fact that you’re still here to enjoy another day. Then, zip through your list of gratitudes. If you don’t have one, whip out a pen and write down no less than five persons, places or things you are grateful for. Expressing gratitude is a guaranteed way to put you in a positive and uplifting frame of mind. Once you’ve embraced being grateful, how about adding one more item to your list – a better body image.

One of the most frequent themes I deal with as a physician working with men and women who are seeking to live a healthier lifestyle and get into shape, is a terrible body image. Ugly, lumpy, fat, dumpy, matronly, gross – the list is endless. You picked up those voices along your life journey and they’re sticking in your mind. They drag you down and rear their beastly heads just when you’re most vulnerable, leading you to self destruct. Had enough? Good. Put your foot down right now and say “I’m done with this negative-speak” and let’s get the ball rolling to a better body image. Adrienne Ressler, a body image expert, is an integral member of my Peeke Week Retreats team, when I join my participants at Utah’s Red Mountain Spa Resort. She’s helped me compile some great tips and tools to help guide you to a healthier way to love and nurture your body and yourself. Study each one and start practicing your newfound body image today.

  1. Stop calling yourself negative names. Catch yourself whenever you find yourself defining who you are in harsh or critical terms. Say to yourself “That’s not me.” Find a positive label that will replace your old body image label that is so punishing. Make sure the word is one that gives you a “lift” and makes you feel good. You need to begin repeating this NEW word to yourself as many times as you were punishing yourself with the old word.

  2. Give your energy and attention to meaningful life goals no matter what you weigh.

  3. Think of yourself as your own “best friend”. Treat yourself accordingly.

  4. Remind yourself that the images you see in the media are totally unrealistic for the average person to attain. For celebrities, buffing, sculpting and dieting their bodies into submission is their “day” job and they have a whole support staff to help them.

  5. Use the mirror to appreciate, not punish, yourself. Before you look in the mirror, practice letting your eyes relax. Do not narrow your eyes – close them and then open them very wide several times. Feel your eyes relax… Think of “softening”your eyes and only then look at yourself in the mirror. Start with looking yourself in the eye and give yourself a friendly greeting. Next begin to widen your scope of vision to include your entire self. DO NOT focus on any one body part. Conceptualize yourself as a whole person. Do this a few times a day and remind yourself of your new body image word as you do so.

  6. Keep yourself surrounded by people who love and appreciate who you are – not because you have met certain conditions to be worthy of their approval or love. At the same time, reduce your interactions with family members or acquaintances who are negative or critical of you. You DO have control over your environment.

  7. Set appropriate boundaries with people who comment on your weight or your body. Letting others know that you feel hurt by their assessment or that they are violating your personal boundaries is not only okay, but necessary for your survival. Imagine that you have an invisible line around you. Inside the perimeter are all of your good feelings. Make a decision not to let anything critical or demeaning inside of that boundary.

  8. Learn to please yourself. No one can please everyone all of the time so stop trying.

  9. Give up whatever fantasy you have about how your life will be different when you just “lose enough weight”, “fit into the clothes I wore when I was 18″, “look like the models in the advertisements”, etc. Start living your life now. Don’t put off whatever you need to do to make yourself happy. Start living and stop fantasizing.

  10. Make sure you add relaxation breathing and physical movement of any kind to your daily routine. The breathing helps you stay calm and also centers and grounds you in your body. Physical movement also connects you to your body and provides you with a sense of aliveness, energy, and sparkle that will help you love, accept, and nurture yourself.

Now, take this new body image and wrap it with a red ribbon. Place it under the Christmas tree. And, when you open your precious gift, cherish it and commit to living it from this moment on. Happy holidays to all of you!

Ginny / CC BY-SA 2.0

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Labels: body image, positive thinking

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This entry was posted on Saturday, December 19th, 2009 and is filed under Diet Club Consultations. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
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