Ep 33- Listen When Having a Bad Body Image Day

September 19, 2024

Having a bad body image day?

These moments happen to everyone now and then.

It’s okay to not love your body 24/7, but we can learn how to respect ourselves through body image thoughts.

Listen today for a loving pep-talk to help get you out of the negative body thoughts and self criticism.

  Hello, my beautiful, confident eaters. Today I am giving you a little pep talk, but it's a very loving pep talk with a lot of amazing reminders in it, and this is for whenever you're having a bad body image day. We have all been here, and whether you are having a bad body image day right now or a moment right now or you have had one anytime before in your past, this is an episode you're going to want to listen to and make sure you save it for later so you have it accessible when these moments do come up and you just need a loving talk out of it.

I myself actually had a not so great body image weekend and that's why I wanted to talk to you about this today because to be vulnerable I am not immune from bad body image moments where I just don't feel that great about myself, because unfortunately, no matter who you are in this world, we have been socially conditioned to believe we need to look a certain way at all times, to believe our body must be as small as it possibly can be, as toned as it can possibly be, and just have these really unrealistic expectations on what the Our body is supposed to look like at all times, 24 7.

So even though I've done a ton of body image work, and I work with my clients a ton on body image in my ConfidEater program, this is still something that's probably going to come up for you at one time or another. And what matters is not whether or not you have bad body image days, but how you respond to them when you get them.

So first, what I mean when I say we're having a bad body image day is the way we're perceiving our body does not feel good. Now it's really important to notice this word of perceiving because it is not necessarily true that our body doesn't look good or that our body is making us feel bad.

It is simply the way you are looking at your body and perceiving it in that moment. Because our body does not actually change that much day to day, or even month to month. We will feel good about our body one day, and then the next day we won't feel good about it. But that's not really because we gain 10 pounds overnight.

It's simply because our thoughts are changing. Sometimes we do get a little more bloated if we're on our cycle or approaching it. Or just so many other factors, you know, eating salt that can make us feel a little puffier or bloatier Or maybe even look that way, but the truth is you didn't necessarily gain fat overnight From how you felt the day before.

So just know that one bad body image days happen to everyone and it doesn't mean there's anything wrong with you. It's okay to not feel 110 percent about the way you look 24 7 all the time. It's okay to have your feelings ebb and flow about your body, but we want to come from a place of acceptance and kindness when these moments happen.

However you're feeling right now is temporary. This feeling will pass. I promise you, you do not feel this way about your body every single day, forever and ever.

Emotions are naturally temporary in nature. They come and they go, and then they come back, and then they go. However you're feeling right now, just know sometimes it's only gonna last a few hours, maybe a few days max, and then it will change. You'll forget you even have a body, you'll just be living your life, and you'll resume how you normally feel.

Now just because you're having thoughts about your body right now does not mean those thoughts are true. We get an estimated 60, 000 thoughts every single day and I can promise you we do not give value to all of those. We do not listen to all of them So you get to decide whether or not you want to believe the thoughts that are coming into your head because all those thoughts are really irrelevant to so much of your life and to so many things.

How you are perceiving your body shape today has nothing to do with how lovable or worthy you are. Those are things that are inherent to never change. You cannot change your worthiness, especially just because you feel differently about your body one day to the next. So reminding yourself that No matter how you feel today, who you are as a person is still 100 percent beautiful and worthy and Capable of love from yourself and from others.

No one else is ever looking at your body and noticing it the same way that you are. Other people aren't noticing that you're a tad bit more bloated today than yesterday. Other people are not trying to gauge if you gained a pound this last month or not. They really do not care about your body, and it's not the most important thing about you. What your body looks like is the least important thing about you. There's so many other qualities that make you you, and very little of it has to do with how your body looks.

Think of all the amazing things your body does for you and allows you to do each and every day. Like if you are listening to this podcast right now, you are alive. You woke up today. Your body kept you alive. Like how freaking amazing is that? You are Functioning. You are able to show up. You have ears to listen.

I'm assuming you have two arms and two legs. So you have all these amazing things that not everyone is so lucky to have. Not everyone is so lucky to have woken up today. Not everyone has The same physical abilities that you're able to do to go out and go for a run or a hike easily and effortlessly. So really appreciating your body for always doing everything in its power to keep you healthy.

Our body's innate goal is to be healthy. Our body is not trying to make us unhealthy. It's not trying to ruin our goals or sabotage us. We literally have hundreds of thousands of mini processes that are happening in our body at any given time that are all trying to get us towards health. So we need to be thankful for our body for how much it does for us every single day.

Now, finally, I want you to think of some loving actions you can take towards yourself today. What we don't want to do is get stuck in the shame spiral of beating ourself up. We need to be kind to ourself. The biggest thing I love to do when I'm in a bad body image moment Is to start to shift my energy.

So I like to go for a walk, do a fun workout, listen to music, dance, doing something to kind of shift the energy state I'm in so I can get a new perspective on things, you know, when you go outside on a sunny day and the sun hits your face and you are just like. Oh my gosh, life is beautiful. That is the moment I want you to be having. So go outside. Do something fun to kind of remind you that it's not all about you and your body. That there's so much more to life than just how you're feeling in this moment.

Then I want you to nourish yourself. So I know it can be easy to want to go into what no eating today. We have to be super good. We have to be super healthy. We're gonna cut out all carbs and sugar and go into these really extreme rules when we're not feeling good about our body But that's only going to perpetuate the cycle of binge eating and make everything so much worse.

Feeling bad about your body today does not mean you need less food to fuel yourself. Okay, just because you're not feeling so great about yourself does not mean you automatically need like 500 less calories today Okay, your body still needs fuel to function to nourish.

You still need calories and Nutrition in order to be a happy healthy human today. So make sure you give yourself food. You are still deserving of food. You are still deserving to eat. You are still deserving of nourishment and love no matter what your body looks like or what you ate today.

Now I also want you to think about not going to the other side where this is not an opportunity to say screw it and allow your lower brain give you an excuse to binge. Sometimes your brain will go into, you know, I already feel bad about myself. I already I don't like how I look, so I'm just gonna binge anyways, but not binging and healing from binge eating is about so much more than just how you look in your body. It is about going through your day feeling proud of yourself.

It is about feeling energized and light. And not sluggish and way down. It's about showing yourself that you matter, that you're important. It's about reaching your goals because it's something that's important to you. You want to be someone who's a natural eater. So just because you're not feeling good about your body today, that's not an excuse to say, I give up and I'm just going to binge now.

This is the time to show yourself even more love, and a way we can show ourself love is by giving ourself the proper amount of food, not too little, not too much, because when we nourish our body that way, it is an act of self care. We give our body exactly what it needs and we don't overload it with extra food that it has to process. We want our body to be processing food at the rate it needs to process.

Finally, I want to make sure you're saying very kind, encouraging words to yourself today. Just like if a best friend came to you and said, you know, I'm not feeling so great about my body today. My outfits weren't really feeling, I might've gained weight, I kind of overate a bit yesterday. You want to tell her, yeah, you should really lose weight.

You're really not looking great. You know, that would be a horrible way to speak to our friend. We would tell them, oh, yeah, I get it. It's hard. Sometimes those days happen and we're gonna have so much fun at the party tonight still, like, not to worry. Let's find something that you do feel good in. Maybe we can go out shopping and get something that feels more comfortable for you.

They would be very encouraging, supportive, understanding, kind, and that's how you want to be to yourself today. Just like you were talking to a friend or a small child. How would you encourage them through these hard feelings that they're having?

You wouldn't beat them down and tell themselves they should get it together and figure it out. They should probably just lose weight anyways. You would really help them go forward in that encouraging way. Now, the irony is when we are kind to ourself during those times, these are actually the moments when we change and we become the person we want to be. I think we often think that if we Beat herself up and we say mean things to ourself that will help us change and lose weight.

And then we'll finally start eating the way we want to eat. But in my experience and so many of my other clients, when we act mean and harsh to ourself, that's when we want to sit on the couch all day and eat lots of snacks and do nothing. That is not the time where we gently go for a walk and make ourself a nourishing meal.

So the nicer you can be to yourself today, the better you are going to feel and the more you're going to heal your relationship with food and your body. I am sending you so much love during this day and a big virtual hug. You deserve all the love and care and support in the world from yourself and for others, giving yourself grace and compassion during this time, knowing it will pass.

Again, this is temporary. You're not going to feel this way forever. And if you ever need some support, you're having a hard time day with your body, just You can always send me a message in my DMs on Instagram. If you're not following me there, it's the confident eater. I would love to hear from you. I'd love to support you.

And I'd love to just be there for you as a friend who gets it. Who's been in your shoes, who understands the pressures that sometimes we face in our bodies. All right. Have a good week. Talk to you later.