Choose to Love your body
After some recent contemplation I came up with a scary reality….I have NEVER been happy with my body.
I’m not here to moan about feeling ‘fat’ or to talk about loosing weight, instead I want to discuss how to have the best body you can have, and be happy within your own skin. This is something I often talk about when I am teaching yoga, something I tell my friends to be and something I hope to instil in my daughter, but am I a walking, talking hypocrite if I can’t feel it within myself?
A little history….when I was a group fitness instructor (right up until I gave birth to my darling girl) I would teach anywhere from 8-15 classes a week in RPM and BodyPump, and spend my ‘spare time’ running my little heart out. I was fit and lean, so lean in fact it took me over a year to fall pregnant. But I was never happy, I always thought I needed to loose a couple more kilos. Now days I have slowed down a lot, I still love to move, I practice yoga for at least an hour most days and run a few times a week, I eat cleaner and healthier than I ever have, but I’m still not happy. Is there a running theme here?!
Don’t get me wrong I am happy in general, but not in my body, not in this skin that I am in. But looking back I realise I have never been content and confident, I have always felt I could be fitter, stronger, faster, tighter and slimmer, so when does it end? Will it take me until I am 80 to look back and think ‘hey that body wasn’t actually so bad after all’ well I sure hope not, in fact this is the reason behind this post. It stops HERE. Who’s with me? I know so many woman and girls (from a scarily young age) out there feel this way, there are many differing opinions of why this is becoming more prevalent but I’m not here to point fingers, lay blame or discuss the problems of our society, I’m here to offer the start of a simple solution. Let’s choose to accept ourselves, number on the scale included.
The key word in this message is, choose. I choose to be happy, and you should too. Rather than wasting time, and your life, wishing you looked better, thinner, more toned, had bigger boobs or a smaller bum, instead why not be content with what you have? Have you ever seen those girls who are curvy and gorgeous, they show off the lines of their body proudly, revealing flesh like it is their birth right and oozing sexy. We can all be like this if we choose to.
We choose the exercise we do to keep fit and strong so choose something you love, rather than something you feel you ought to do. This way you will do it forever, and you will forever be fit and fabulous.
We choose what food we put in our mouths, so choose healthy, fresh, vibrant living foods that make you feel good rather than eating crap and regretting it the next day. And if you really want to have some ____(insert favourite treat here)_____ then go ahead, have it, choose to savour and enjoy it.
We choose how we view ourselves so choose to love your body. I know it can be a daunting concept to actually LOVE your body, believe me I am just coming to terms with it and am not quite there yet myself, but we need to understand our bodies are ageing and one day we may just look back at ourselves and think ‘Wow I actually looked damn good back then!’ Don’t leave it until it’s too late, you have an amazing body that can do mind blowing things so learn to appreciate it and if you have a moment when you feel unhappy with the reflection in the mirror breathe, smile and know that it will pass.
There are 4 comments on this post
Love this, a great article!!!! So much to learn and so much to be great full for.a hard thing to accept but something we need to strive for each day so we can be confident in the bod we have, after all its the only one we will have! And we need to cherish it. We put so much pressure on ourselves yet the old saying beauty is only skin deep is so true. So we need to keep fit, eat well, look after our minds and body it’s all we can do and we owe it to ourselves. Certainly made me think!!!!!! A challenge for sure xo
You never cease to amaze and inspire me.
I recall a wise woman telling me to “own my own decisions”, I find I always return to this advice when I question a particular direction or choice and have found it helpful beyond measure for personal clarification. Love, great article x
Great article! I remember my friends used to say to me when I was younger and way to skinny. “Jade who are you doing this for?” Ha and I never could answer and I still can’t answer it??
xxx