It’s hard to find anyone that loves everything about how they look, but it’s extremely easy to find people who hate everything. That poor body image is a deterrent to getting fit. While you might think it drives you to do better, it’s really counterproductive. Feeling bad about how you look affects your elf-confidence and often detours progress in all areas, including fitness. Having a good attitude toward your body will drive you harder to treat it right, eating healthy and exercise. Finding ways to improve your body image is important to successfully improving your body.
Start with loving what you see.
Nobody and no body is perfect. Those pictures of models in magazines and online are often airbrushed and photoshopped to appear that way, but they aren’t. You are beautiful or handsome, whether you’re 120 pounds or 300 pounds and you have been given a body that’s meant to be healthy for decades. Treat it with care. Treat it the way you would anything, human, animal or inanimate object you appreciate or love.
Eating healthy is one way to show love to your body.
Seriously, people often treat their cars better than they do their body. They make sure it gets the right fuel, check the fluids and clean it with love. You should at least make sure you’re getting the right fuel. That can happen when you care about yourself. The amazing thing is that when you treat your body better, it starts to look healthier. Regular exercise is important to a healthy body, so adding that should be part of your focus.
Avoid comparing yourself to others.
Avoiding not only comparing yourself to others, but also negative talk about yourself or another person’s body is one way to improve your body image. That’s right! Whether you compare yourself to someone you feel looks worse than you or someone that you feel looks better, it’s all defeating. There’s always someone that looks better than you and someone that looks worse. It’s not important. Body negativity, whether it’s about you or someone else, sets the focus on appearance. The brain often doesn’t differentiate whose body you’re talking about, either. Keep your talk always positive and avoid negativity about how people, including yourself, look.
- Send yourself a daily love note. Put sticky notes on the mirror that tell you how great you are or just tell yourself that face to face when you’re looking at yourself.
- Take steps to change your body image, by taking steps to treat yourself in a better manner. Change your eating habits to include healthier foods. Add regular exercise. One study shows that people who start a workout program improve their body image even before they see results.
- Remember it’s not all about you. That may sound harsh, but it isn’t. It helped many self-conscious clients. Focus others and become interested in what they say and who they are. Remember, many they may be self-conscious, too. It takes your focus off your body image.
- Be aware of your negative thoughts and change them. The minute you notice a negative body image thought, replace it with a positive statement.