S2: EP 38- When Did You Start Believing Your Body Was Bad?

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Living Fully Alive Podcast available on Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Spotify, and Youtube

SHOW NOTES

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“One day I decided that I was beautiful and so I carried out my life as if I was a beautiful girl. It doesn’t have anything to do with how the world perceives you. What matters is what you see.”

— GABOUREY SIDIBE

On this episode, join Mary as she takes this topic of body love one step further. When we come into this world we don’t have a concept of what a good body is and what a bad body is. But somewhere along the way we all have a defining moment that begins to change the way we see and judge our bodies. Maybe it came from our family of origin, our friends, or the media. But wherever it came from, someone told us that our bodies weren’t good enough. It is crucial in the process of beginning to cultivate body love that we identify this moment. When we don’t understand our own history, we have no power to update our story or decide if we want to believe the lies we were taught when we were younger. We never get the opportunity to challenge them. When we look at where our body shame originates we finally see that we aren’t broken after all. And we have the power to change how we see ourselves.

A could of weeks ago we talked about our body bully.

Today we want to talk about where that body bully came from.

WE didn’t wake up at 30, 40, 50, 60… and just decide to hate our bodies. This is OLD. Maybe even passed down from generations.

Most of us have an originating body shaming moment. In that moment something happened that created an immediate new awareness that our bodies were flawed and broken. A moment that gets translated into, “Something is wrong with my body.”.

This could be a comment from our mother or our father.

This could be something that happens inside of our peer group.

This could be sexual abuse.

This could be a blanket statement from a tv show.

Something we see in a magazine…

Wherever it came from most of us can trace the beginning of our body stories back to one moment. And then often many more moments that followed.

It’s vital that we understand our body image history so we can start to unravel the web of body shaming lies that control so much of our lives. So that we can see that we aren’t broken after all. That our bodies aren’t our enemies after all. What we don’t realize is that when we don’t understand our own history, we have no power to update our story or decide if we want to believe those lies we were taught when we were little. We never get the opportunity to challenge them. We stay in a reactive state of trying to fix ourselves. So we keep dieting, we keep hating ourselves, we keep believing we are broken, we keep chasing our loveability.

6 Questions to ask to Begin to Identify Where Your Body Shaming Story Began

When was the first time that you remember where you were aware that your body wasn’t good enough?

What happened?

Who was there?

What subconscious messages did you come away with?

What was your reaction to the judgement you received?

2. What were the messages you received about beauty, about being a woman and about your body from your mom?

3. What was the body culture like in your family?

4. Did your family talk about bodies?

5. Did your family talk about food?

6. About diets?

Taking a look at our body image history helps us realize that we aren’t the ones with the problem. When we are able to see that this is not something that we have chosen but rather taught, we can offer ourselves radical compassion. And we can really begin to shift it towards a more loving approach.