Is your body image hurting your marriage?
Have you gained your Covid-19lbs? I know I’m up a few!
In times of stress, our brains seek comfort. Comfort comes in the form of dopamine and dopamine often comes from eating something delicious, that lights up those pleasure sensors in our brains.
Isn’t that interesting?
When we over-indulge in self soothing this way, we take in more energy than our bodies can use and they save it for later.
That’s all that’s happening here.
It’s important to understand your brain because when we don’t, we can be HARD on ourselves.
And when we are HARD on ourselves, we feel bad, and then we seek comfort (dopamine), and we keep creating a vicious cycle.
I was coaching a client last week that is really struggling to love herself.
Her body has a stronger gravitational pull on the earth than it once did, and she is making those numbers on the scale mean all sorts of things that just aren’t true.
Things like,
“I’m not lovable.
I’m not attractive.
I’m disgusting.
I’m not good enough.
I’m not strong enough.
I don’t deserve….”
When I look at this beautiful client of mine, I see NONE of that.
Sisters, the way we talk to ourselves is so important!
Have you trained your brain to see only your flaws?
When you look in the mirror, where do your eyes go?
Do you automatically look at your most hated “trouble spot,”, or do you see your beautiful eyes?
What do you say to yourself as you are eating? Are you giving yourself an internal beating?
You can’t hate yourself enough to change.
Love is the only thing that can inspire improvement.
My sweet sister has stage 4 cancer. She is a warrior. She has suffered more in her lifetime than most could ever imagine. She has lost her hair and her body isn’t looking the way she would like, because her chemo and meds have made it a little bloated.
She is absolutely beautiful.
She is not her body.
You are not your body.
Your body is the physical gift that houses your spirit.
Your personality, your character, your integrity, your sense of humor, your love for others, your talents and abilities… that is YOU.
There is NOTHING that can lower your worth.
You are 100% whole and complete and loveable, just the way you are.
Loving yourself, the REAL you, is the most important thing you can do.
When you truly love yourself, you want what is best for you.
You want what’s best for your body.
If you want to change the outside, you must always start on the inside.
Beginning today, draw a line in the sand.
Refuse to speak unkindly to yourself ever again.
Let your brain know, YOU are in charge and that’s no longer tolerated here.
Love makes you feel better naturally and decreases your need for that dopamine hit that comes from Pizza or Ben and Jerry’s.
And the best part of all is that when you love yourself just as you are, you will allow others to love you that way too.
