A few months ago, my therapist posed a scenario to me that blew my mind:
Let’s say you knew that your body was going to remain exactly the way it is right now, in this moment, for the rest of your life and there’s nothing you could do to change it.
How would that change...
how you eat?
how you exercise?
how you take care of it?
I kind of just sat there. Then my throat tightened.
Let me tell you what imagining that scenario would have felt like for me 4 years ago:
absolute panic.
denial.
resistance.
grief.
& I would have preferred to not exist than consider a life stuck in my current body.
It’s been 4 years. My throat still tightens imagining that scenario, but not for the same reasons. This time around, it felt like:
freedom.
relief.
like a weight lifted off my shoulders.
like the battle I had fought since age 15 would finally be over and I could finally rest.
It was really, really interesting to think about.
If something on my “can control” list suddenly moved to my “can’t control” list... what happens next?
Let’s explore this together for a moment. If you knew your body wouldn’t change an inch or an ounce for the rest of your life... how would you feel?
If going to the gym produced zero aesthetic results, would you still go for other reasons? How would you choose to move your body?
If drinking green smoothies or eating Chick fil A waffle fries had zero effect on the flatness of your belly, for what other reasons would you eat them? What other foods would you choose and why? Would you have any reason to feel guilt or shame about eating?
And before you say “I’d just go ham and eat whatever the heck–-”... hold up. Alright, how long would that last? Would your body eventually crave more variety than the those “bad” foods you’re thinking of?
(news flash: yes, yes it would.)
If there was absolutely nothing you could do to manipulate the size or shape of your body... what’s left?
*This is the part where we cue diet culture SCREAMING at the thought of this imaginary world of forced body acceptance in which their entire multi-billion dollar industry would be brought down instantaneously.
Think about it. If we were all forced to accept our bodies as they are... what’s left?
Interestingly enough, my body is virtually the same as it was 4 years ago.
Same body.
One girl was miserable, obsessively fixated, resolutely convinced that she would never achieve anything in life: happiness, success, or love, until she was thinner.
The other... is fully engaging in her life and mindfully, compassionately investing in her long-term relationship with her body.
Same body.
Body image has very little to do with our bodies and everything to do with our brains.
As long as we believe that it’s a body issue, there’s a $70 billion dollar diet industry profiting off that desperate, disordered belief system.
Once we realize that it’s actually not a body issue at all, we can re-wire, we can heal, and we can be free.
So let’s say I woke up one day and was frozen in time in this body... it might be uncomfortable at first. I might resist the idea and at the very least, I would grieve.
But after the dust has settled, what’s left?
I guess my only option would be to...
accept her
listen to her
take care of her
honor her
befriend her
and maybe...
come home to
this body.
“You can never truly feel at home in a body that you view as temporary.”
- Krista Murias
