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Posts tagged with “body”

Blinded by Our Diet Culture? How to Stop Hating Your Body

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“Don’t change your body to get respect from society. Instead let’s change society to respect our bodies.” ~Golda Poretsky

Age thirteen—that was when my eating disorder kicked into full gear because our diet culture had its tentacles wrapped around me tightly. All I thought about all day was how I was going to control and restrict my food, then how I was going to burn it off.

I sought to burn off every calorie I ate. I couldn’t go to sleep at night unless I’d burned off most of what I’d consumed. I was obsessed with exercise and trying to …

3 Healing Practices to Connect with Yourself and Release Your Pain

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“Our practice rather than being about killing the ego is about simply discovering our true nature.” ~Sharon Salzberg

One of the symptoms of living in today’s fast-paced world is the underlying feeling of loneliness, overwhelm, and disconnection. Chronically stressed and under financial and familial pressures, we often feel alone in the world, out of touch with others, overwhelmed by our emotions, and disconnected from our own bodies and ourselves.

Our world is ego-driven. We constantly compare ourselves to others, judge our performance (usually harshly), define our worth by our financial and career achievements, and criticize ourselves for failure.

This ego-based …

How I Healed from an Eating Disorder and Stopped Hating Myself and My Body

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“Quiet the voice telling you to do more and be more, and trust that in this moment, who you are, where you are at, and what you are doing is enough. You will get to where you need to be in your own time. Until then, breathe. Breathe and be patient with yourself and your process. You are doing the best you can to cope and survive amid your struggles, and that’s all you can ask of yourself. It’s enough. You are enough.” ~Daniell Koepke

I remember looking at the nutrition information on the bag of jujubes I had just …

What Helped Me Love and Accept My Imperfect Body

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“You are imperfect, permanently and inevitably flawed. And you are beautiful.” ~Amy Bloom

“Just look at yourself!”

“That chubby face, those massive hips and thighs. The stumpy legs.”

“No wonder he doesn’t love you anymore. No wonder he left you for her! She is so much prettier than you are.”

I stood in front of the mirror. Tears streamed down my face. My body was shaking uncontrollably as I stared at it in disgust.

Resentment and anger accumulated in my chest. Heavy, dark, and painful, the all-consuming emotions tried to crush me. My throat felt tight, I couldn’t breathe, my …

5 Signs You Don’t Know What Your Body Needs

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“The body is a multilingual being. It speaks through its color and its temperature, the flush of recognition, the glow of love, the ash of pain, the heat of arousal, the coldness of nonconviction. It speaks through its constant tiny dance, sometimes swaying, sometimes a-jitter, sometimes trembling. It speaks through the leaping of the heart, the falling of the spirit, the pit at the center, and rising hope.” ~Clarissa Pinkola Estés, Women Who Run With the Wolves

We read about all these things we “should” be doing for self-care, so we add them to our to-do list and rarely, if …

The Wisdom of Our Body: Slow Down and Tune In to Take Care of Yourself

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“There is more wisdom in your body than in your deepest philosophies.” ~Friedrich Nietzche

Parked in a dimly lit garage in the middle of the city at around 7pm, I sat in the driver’s seat, seatbelt still on, texting two different male acquaintances who had expressed sexual interest in me.

“What are you up to tonight?” Waiting for a response back, I checked my phone every few minutes. The resounding emptiness in me that craved to be filled felt like it was growing deeper. After some time of getting immersed in social media, I receive a response back: an invitation …

How to Move Through Feelings of Body Shame

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“Only when we are brave enough to explore the darkness will we discover the infinite power of our light.” ~Brené Brown

My husband’s legs are smaller than mine.

I wish I could tell you that when I first realized this (when we were dating) I wasn’t emotionally triggered. And that I didn’t care.

But, I can’t.

Instead, I can tell you that I walked right up next to him, planted my thigh next to his, and awkwardly declared, “Ha! My legs are bigger than yours!”

I can still see him looking right back at me, saying, “So? I love …

Overcoming a Negative Body Image: 4 Things to Remember

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TRIGGER WARNING: This post deals with an account of anorexia and may be triggering to some people.

“You will never be free until you free yourself from the prison of your own false thoughts.” ~Philip Arnold

I really don’t remember my life before anorexia. I think back to my early teenage years when I ate peanut butter sandwiches and drank hot chocolate without a single thought of how many calories I had consumed. There was no guilt, no worry, no need for perfection. How I wish I could get those carefree moments back.

A few years ago anorexia completely …

How to Start Liking Your Body More (Just as It Is)

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“Body love is more than acceptance of self or the acceptance of the body. Body love is about self-worth in general. It’s more than our physical appearance.” ~Mary Lambert

This past week, I got married.

For me, this symbolized not only a new chapter in my life with a partner, but also a new chapter in life with myself.

Here, in this new chapter, I officially left behind the woman who was constantly trying to mold herself into whatever she needed to be to (hopefully) be accepted and loved by a partner.

And instead, I found the woman who was …

6 Toxic Thoughts That Keep You Battling with Food

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“Eating is not a crime. It’s not a moral issue. It’s normal. It’s enjoyable. It just is.” ~Carrie Arnold

Like many women, I was introduced to diet “tricks” and “hacks” at a young age. In my case, that was around twelve to thirteen years old.

I consumed magazines and movies that constantly reminded me about the importance of dieting, losing weight, and looking skinny.

As a self-conscious teenager, I began to compare myself to the women in music videos with flat bellies, the slim actresses in movies, and models in magazines with their perfect “beach bodies.”

This self-consciousness only grew …

How to Rise Above Negative Comments About Your Body & What You Eat

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“It’s also helpful to realize that this very body that we have, that’s sitting right here right now … with its aches and its pleasures … is exactly what we need to be fully human, fully awake, fully alive.” ~Pema Chodron

I took a photograph with my mom last night. She sighed when she saw the photo, saying she looked “so big.” My heart sank.

A few weeks ago, I was picking up sushi from the local supermarket with her, and she looked down at the to-go pack I was picking up and asked, “You’re really going to eat that? …

30 Trillion Reasons to Be Grateful: An Ode to the Awesome Human Body

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“What spirit is so empty and blind, that it cannot recognize the fact that the foot is more noble than the shoe, and skin more beautiful than the garment with which it is clothed?” ~Michelangelo

“Stop hunching! Stand up straight!” This is what I heard as a young child.

A running commentary on my appearance continued throughout my childhood. It was well intended, but not entirely helpful.

I grew self-conscious. If you’ve ever decided you’re too tall or too short or too fat or too thin, or that some parts of your body look unsatisfactory, you’ll understand.

Then I went …

Get Out of Your Head: The Life-Changing Power of Embodying Your Body

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“The modern individual is committed to being successful, not to being a person. He belongs rightly to the ‘action generation’ whose motto is ‘do more but feel less.’” ~Alexander Lowen

I’ve always been a little bit scared of my body. And when you’re scared of something, you tend to avoid it at all costs. So that’s what I did for most of my childhood and teenage years.

I avoided it in lots of different ways, and most dangerously, I avoided it unconsciously.

I was bought up doing a lot of physical activity—gymnastics, dance, basketball, and horseback riding. Although this wasn’t …

Yo-Yo Dieting: How to Free Yourself From the Struggle

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“Your body is a temple, but only if you treat it as one.” ~Astrid Alauda

Have you ever guiltily reached for second helpings of a tempting dish or dessert while justifying it with something along the lines of, “It’s okay, I’m going on a diet/detox after this”?

Or, do you ever find yourself eating really healthy one week, then the minute you cave in and eat something unhealthy, your eating habits suddenly take a turn for the worst?

Are you really hard on yourself when you don’t feel comfortable in clothes you want to wear and suddenly regret all …

How to Transform Your Body by Coming from Love Instead of Fear

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“Fear is the opposite of everything you are, and so has an effect of opposition to your mental and physical health.” ~Neale Donald Walsch

My initial foray into health and fitness started from a deep place of fear.

I feared my weight and my appearance, always wondering what new trend I’d encounter in a magazine or on social media that would point out the latest way I was inadequate.

I feared the big health scares that we’re told could kill us at any moment if we aren’t careful. Diabetes. High blood pressure. Cancer.

Many of us have all been on …

How to Release the Painful Memories and Emotions Stored in Your Body

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“The cure for the pain is in the pain.” ~Rumi

Your body keeps a physical memory of all of your experiences.

You have lots of memories stored in your brain that you can recount at any given moment. You can recall names, faces, where the event took place, what it smelled like. But over time, these memories fade or change as time passes and we mature. However, even when the memory begins to fade from your brain, it lives on in your body in the form of physical sensations and behavior patterns.

The body doesn’t forget.

The events of our …

Everything Heals

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Source: Sun Gazing

Why Dieting Never Works: 4 Reasons to Stop

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“Your body is precious. It is your vehicle for awakening. Treat it with care.” ~Buddha

Diets are extremely seductive.

We get lured in by the promises they make:

The temptation of a smaller jeans size.

The possibility of having a beach-ready body.

The idea that everything would be better if you just weighed ten (or fifteen, or twenty…) pounds less.

When you’ve overloaded yourself with sweets and feel horrible about your body, it’s easy to get sucked into attempting a diet as a quick-fix to your weight issues.

In my own life, I struggled with gaining and losing the same …

5 Ways to Feel Better in Your Body

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“Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.” ~Maya Angelou

We’re bombarded by advertisements that tell us if we’re thin, we’ll love ourselves. If we suddenly look a certain way, all our worries will vanish.

I’ve always been thin without really having to work at it—well, in my younger days at least.

Yes, I was skinny, but that didn’t mean I was happy. I was suffering from depression, had terrible skin, and just felt awful in my body.

Being a “perfect” size is not what will make you happy, because …

A Simple Practice to Appreciate Our Bodies, Flaws and All

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“Who does not thank for little does not thank for much.” ~Estonian Proverb

I remember the moment so well: I had been seeing a new guy for a few months and I was staying the night for the first time. Up until that point he hadn’t seen me without heavy makeup, as I was careful to always look completely put together while with him.

That night I had to make a decision.

I could fall asleep with my makeup still on, or I could remove it first. Did I feel comfortable enough to let him see me without foundation, eyeliner, …