Today I am discussing how to truly love yourself more in a two part series starting with body image.
In this episode I discuss how:
Show notes and the transcript can be found here: https://michellekevill.com/bodyimage
Today I am discussing how to truly love yourself more in a two part series starting with body image.
In this episode I discuss how:
Show notes and the transcript can be found here: https://michellekevill.com/bodyimage
[00:00:00] Hello, everyone. I hope you are well. And if not, I got you. At least you are here. Welcome to today's episode on how to love yourself fully. If that's the name that I accept, I always go into these like AM, why don't I keep the title? Am I going to change it? I don't really know. And this episode today is really unscripted. The reason I say that is this episode is just going to be a whole heap about self love on a whole heap of issues that I've recently just gone through. And it is the perfect time today kind of hit the like the top of the hill with this and was like, Yeah, I'm doing an episode on this 100%. So a little bit of story time to give you a little bit of background on what's been going on and some of the solutions I've been putting in place to fall back in love with it. Fall back in love with myself. So, so as you know, I'm all about self compassion, you know, kind of like you could say anti hustle or at least the way society presents it and stuff like that. And I would say in areas of my life I have definitely improved like self compassion when it comes to me making a mistake at work 100%. I'm like, really there? And I've definitely improved compared to two years ago. But there are still some areas such as my body and my body image where it's being a little bit weak and it's been hiding under the surface.
[00:01:31] And I realized like it opened up a can of worms for me. I was like, Shit I really don't like. I really don't love myself. Like all parts of me. There's still like some areas that have just popped up that I was like, Wait a minute, if I don't love myself here. And it's kind of led to this whole kind of trail, I'm like, There's a whole part of me that I am not accepting of myself. It's like parts of it I have worked on and other parts it's like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. And self love. It's it should be deep. It should be full and whole acceptance of yourself no matter what's going on or where you're at. So a little bit of story time. I have been feeling quite a bit off for the past couple of months. I have not been able to pick why I assumed, okay, there's lots of things going on. One, I've got a new business and marketing coach and I am feeling a little bit uncomfortable when I'm working to sit with that and I'm learning new things. That's one which makes sense too. I have now become a lot more visible online. As you know, I did an episode, I've talked about it in my stories and the Driven Young podcast.
[00:02:48] It was like a little Tik Tok video that got a lot of views, and I'm actually going to go into this as well as part of the self love episode today. I had a lot of comments on it. Mostly positive. Some negative humans have a negative bias. My brain had a little hissy fit and I was like, Oh, I was like, What's going on? There was a lot of feelings and I'm sitting with that. It's something was still off. And I've just had this underlying sense of just, just really like, if I'm honest, depression, like this underlying low sense. Now I have, you know, I have my own little I guess you can say you can say like a mental health checklist. So yeah, I've actually had to increase some of certain medications for my thyroid and for my mental health. But still something was a little bit off and it all came to a point yesterday. So as you may know on Instagram, like I'm engaged with, my sister is also engaged and she showed me and like the moms like her wedding dress and it was an absolute beautiful day. And we were talking about dresses and, you know, all these people are trying on dresses and I'm really happy for my sister. And my sister was like, something is just a little bit off with you, like, what's wrong? And I said, Well, I don't know.
[00:03:59] I've been feeling like this for months. I can't pinpoint it. And I said, All I can think is, you know, I told her exactly what I was saying to you now and then I said, you know, maybe I'm just not used to, you know, sitting with my feelings, you know, like, as in I've had to do a lot of practice. And now that I've removed a lot of buffering items that I used to use, now I really, really am sitting with my feelings all the time, and maybe that's a lot. And then I came home and I just burst into tears. I was crying all the way home. I was crying. My partner was like, What is going on? Like, Are you okay? I'm like, I don't know. I cannot pinpoint it. I don't know what's going on with me. I'm like, I just feel so isolated and just alone. And as always, like to say this, I am not a psychologist. Of course, if you are feeling like this and you like there is support out there, go get help. In this moment. I knew what I needed. I had a chat with my partner. I decided to have a big cry, sit with my emotions, play some video games just to relax a little bit. And then the weirdest thing happened. It happened. I've been waking up a little bit in the middle of the night, and whenever I wake up, I can kind of remember my dream.
[00:05:16] And it's either about like sometimes I'm literally dreaming of a spreadsheet, like some work stuff. I'm like, not that I'm stressed about it. It's just my brain's probably compartmentalizing it and it's the weirdest thing. 3 a.m. in the morning, my brain goes, What if you're super depressed because you keep forcing yourself to try and lose weight? And I was like, Oh, like it hit me like a ton of bricks. So side note, I have been yeah, I quite a few years ago I lost ten kilos and I had a wardrobe. I was able to fit into all my wardrobe. I bought all these dresses at my size. I'd done some thought work on this and I was comfortable with the fact that, yeah, I want to lose some weight to get back into these, you know, dresses again. I have been punishing myself during this whole time since I decided, right, I'm going to start focusing on my health, which is when I started to feel really depressed and sad, shocking news. And I said I was sitting at 3 a.m. in the morning like, oh my God. Like it finally made sense. I'm like, I've been having subconscious thoughts, so this made complete sense as to why I when I, you know, I see people trying on wedding dresses, I'm looking at wedding dresses. My mom's talking to me about, oh, in the next couple of, you know, next year, we'll look at dresses for you.
[00:06:40] It's bringing up all my body image issues. I have been telling myself that, yes, I want to, you know, slowly lose weight. I want to be healthy. I'm doing it. You know, I've been telling myself I've been doing it more for my thyroid. Deep, deep down in my subconscious, I have been punishing myself and shaming myself. I did a deep thought download and I asked myself, Why do I want to lose weight? Well, I want to fit into my dresses. Why do you want to fit into your dresses? Yadda yadda yadda. I kept going. And here's the interesting pattern that I didn't even realize I was doing. So I have spent money, so I'm doing like a food, you know, just like a healthy food program to just follow meal plans. I've done it before. That's what I did to lose the weight before. So I spent some money to do a, you know, join up with a meal program. You follow the meals they give you. You know, fresh ideas are all like balanced and stuff like that. I spent $200 and the actual idea around it is that if you lose some weight, you get the money back. So I was like, Oh, that makes sense to me. Like, that's fine. Like, go follow this. I'll, you know, you can lose 100 grams even.
[00:07:40] That's totally fine. I realized pretty quickly that I am way more comfortable spending money to lose the weight than I am to buy clothes that fit me right now. Because at the moment, whenever I go into stores, I'm like, Yeah, maybe you want to lose a little bit of weight. And I just didn't even, like, take a second guess at that thought either. I was like, Whoa. And then I did some calculations because I used to do like 45 each week. I've stopped it at the moment because of COVID kind of still around. I have Hashimoto's a whole nother story there. So I stopped it and I worked out. I was like, Hang on a minute. How much I pay a week for that is the equivalent of like if I, you know, totaled that for a year, divide that up by how much a review dress is. And for anyone overseas review, they are the only dresses I really buy. There are like these 1950s style dresses. They're floral, they are absolutely beautiful. I'm in love with them. That is like always be my style, really. Just 1950s dresses that suit. I realized I could just buy ten dresses over like the course of a year. That fit me and my body now. But I'm more willing to spend the money to lose a ton of weight. And I ask myself, why is that? And it's almost like the negative thoughts started to crack.
[00:09:10] Because here's the trick, guys. When it comes to these deep rooted self beliefs, it's so hard to see them. Some of these thoughts that I'm telling you right now, you're probably like, Oh yeah, that is a really toxic or negative thought. I was just like, Oh yeah, I'll get a dress when I lose some weight. Like, Totally fine. Looking at it now, it's like, why am I denying myself clothes that fit me now? What's the reason behind that? You know how much toxic shit came up for me? It's because you're disgusting. You're fat, you're ugly. Your gross. Your stomach is so fat. And I hope that hasn't like kind of triggered anyone here hearing that. And I was like, whoa, I had no idea that this was all sitting under there. I genuinely didn't. Because here's the thing. I'm not looking at my sister in a wedding dress and all these other wedding dresses thinking that consciously. But I'm 110% thinking that subconsciously. Whenever I look at an old photo of myself when I lost the weight, that thought is there in my subconscious. Whenever I don't wake up to work out because I'm exhausted and tired. That subconscious thought is in there. Whenever I try on a dress thinking it might fit and it feels tight to zip up. That subconscious thought is there. Guess what's going to do? Over time, every single day, that thought is sitting there popping up like.
[00:10:37] Just. Just like a button. Your fat, your ugly, whatever. Subconsciously you don't. I don't think it consciously, but I feel it. You know that feeling when you put on a dress and it used to fit you and it's fucking tight. It's almost like a little bit of a fear response as well because I feel almost like this anger and a little bit of this adrenalin rush and that tightness around your chest. It's just like, oh, like that is what the feeling that comes to me. Oh, and you want to know what the it's it's not to the dress, it's to my thoughts about the tightness and all the thoughts are like, you're fat, you're disgusting. All this crap just comes out. And if you are thinking that subconsciously over time, guess how you how that's going to like pop up. You put that into a model, an unintentional model. How is that going to pop up for you? You're going to be pretty fucking depressed. You're going to be pretty angry at yourself. You're going to go dress shopping with your sister for a wedding day, coming home, crying. Why? Because subconsciously I've been attacking myself. I very likely was looking at those dresses being like, when I'm too fat for this, I don't deserve this. You've got to lose some weight if you want to look good in this dress. All these bullshit thoughts.
[00:11:58] And I'm I definitely wasn't thinking it consciously. And here's the thing. When you get to a certain point in thought work. I do think that one, you can rationalize stuff kind of like I did, but obviously it's kind of like my brain is like sneaky. It's like my brain knew, it's like, well, we're not going to consciously say that because Michelle is going to pick up on it, but we are going to subconsciously believe that. And then we're going to rationalize it and be like, Well, we're losing way. Like we lost it ten years ago. We can lose it again just because we just, you know, we just want to fit into our dresses. That's it. It's just we have there's no other stuff attached to it. 100% that I kind of always knew in the deepest recesses of my mind wasn't always true. I'm attaching my self-worth, my value, my self love on how I look. And I'm just using an excuse of, oh, no, it's a logistical thing. You want to have it back into your wardrobe. It's it's totally fine. Don't worry about it. It's just. It's just a literal thing. Why, then, all of a sudden, have I stopped exercising like I used to wake up in the morning and do a workout, and I was doing that consistently. And then suddenly it's just been so exhausting to do that. I actually think my body like my I'm just sick of shaming myself.
[00:13:18] I think when I'm doing it and afterwards I shaved myself as part of this program that I'm following, you have to take a photo of yourself each week and you have to weigh yourself. Now, for me, my weight fluctuates from the whole month when I did this to a couple of years ago. I you know why I honestly think I lost the weight? Because I didn't have any intention of actually losing weight. I actually didn't think it was going to work. I was just like, Yeah, I'll do it. My friend's doing it. We're going to work out together or just be good for your health, whatever. I'll go do it. I did not weigh myself for weeks. I took photos. I just didn't weigh myself. I was like, Nope, not going to do that. And then I was a little bit shocked. I was like, Oh wow. I did genuinely just like, lost some weight. And I think now I'm just putting all this pressure on myself, shaming myself. Why can't I be like I was back then, etc.? At the end of the day, I'm not loving myself for where I'm at right now. I'm not loving who I am right now. I'm trying to change a part of me, my body, to be like, Hey, you're only worthy and lovable in my eyes when you look like that, that is so toxic. And again, not to shame myself for thinking those thoughts.
[00:14:35] It's not nice. Of course I'm not going to want to work out. Of course I'm not going to like of course I'm going to feel so depressed, you know, and feel so low, unexplained, especially when I'm rationalizing it in my head that, no, no, this is fine, you're just losing some weight and stuff. And then I just said to myself. What if I just bought a dress that fit me right now? Do you know how much relief came over me was like? Part of me was like, Oh, thank you. You're like, except me. I was like, Oh, my God. Like, this is why I've been so upset. I've had this low level depression. I've just been treating myself like, subconsciously, like crap. And to anyone who's going out there really resonating with this, like, oh, my God, yes. I want you to know right fucking now, it's just not your thought. One There is a whole heap of internalized misogyny and patriarchy in all of this in basically being taught from a young age. My value as a woman is defined by my weight and how skinny I am, which is complete bullshit. And we do live in a culture where, you know, it's all about health, losing weight, etc., and stuff like that versus like, look, health at any size and health for where you're at right now. It is a little bit of a struggle for me to actually lose any weight.
[00:16:00] And one of the reasons being is I do have a thyroid condition. And guess what? That's fucking okay. I am giving myself permission to accept myself for who I am and love myself right now. Do you know how calm that thought makes me feel? Because all this pressure, all this drama just coming from me. It's coming from no one else. It's coming from me having to fit some sort of mold for, I don't know, whatever reason, because that's just what I've been believed. You know, skinny is good or thin is good or less. Weight is good. That's bullshit. I am totally. And you as well are totally within your fucking right to love yourself where you are at right now. And you know what I'm going to do after this? I'm on organize time with my mom and we are going to go do some shopping and I'm going to buy a really nice floral review dress that is going to fit my body right now. And that's okay. And I'm actually decided I did an intentional model. I was like, I'm accepting of myself. What do I want to do? I'm like, I don't want to be doing hit workouts all the time like I used to. It's actually for me, not good for Hashimoto's and my thyroid. I really just want to be like more active. I just want to walk my dog more in the mornings.
[00:17:23] Like literally I just want to go out, take him for a really long walk and let that be okay. Because I had another belief that no, unless I'm sweating and like really intense and I've got a red face and that that only counts. And it's like all these arbitrary rules that I've made up in my head around this. It's like, this is ridiculous. This is why I'm not happy. I'm just loving how I just realized this right now. I was just like, Oh, okay, this has just been sitting somewhere down there. So I've given you a rather a long spiel of my story. I wanted to, because I think this really resonates with a lot of people. I think this is something that is so common, especially being socialized as a woman that we all go through around our body. And I have just decided that I'm going to love and accept myself. I'm going to buy some dresses at my side. I'm going to move and exercise because it's good for my body. And you know what? I'm not going to put any more pressure on myself to be like losing or weight or make it a big deal. I have to get back into those old dresses. If I do, great. If I don't guess what, I'm gonna fucking sell them. Okay. That's okay too. I can sell the dresses.
[00:18:36] I can find new dresses that fit me now. And that's okay. That's allowed. And it's allowed for you to allow bodies change because I was looking through like I got a memory, like a Facebook memory of me 11 years ago. I was in high school and I'm looking through these photos and these are the same photos that when I just uploaded them, I thought, God, I look so fat. And I'm like, Is this what I want the rest of my fucking life to be? For me to look at old photos every single every few couple of years and think, Why did I think I was fat? Why did I think I was fat? Oh, my God, I'm so skinny. Or do I just want to start loving myself and where I'm at right now? Because I think that's a much more enjoyable life. All right. So some tips how to deal with this. I know I've gone on a big spiel and I'm going to actually turn this into a two part series because there's more to this as well. I'm going to talk probably in the next episode around how to create safety and acceptance for yourself on some other issues that I actually went through with around like the video I was talking about. I've been I've been more, I guess, seen and noticed. I'm hearing differences of opinion and I want to really talk in more detail around that.
[00:19:48] But moving on. So anyone who is listening and this resonates and you're like, give me some tips. How do I help myself get out of this loop right now? The first thing to do is a thought download and start writing out all your thoughts that you have, whether it be on like weight loss, your body, whatever. And key thing is ask yourself why and challenge those thoughts, especially if you get to what I call a little thought loop example. I want to lose weight y to fit into my clothes. Why so I have more clothes y so I don't spend money y. Well, it's useless. I could just lose weight and fit back into the clothes. You know, I just need to lose weight. That I realized was a little bit of a thought error. Like I kept coming back to the part of, Well, I just want to lose weight. Like I was rationalizing it. I'm like, Well, see, it's very logical. I want to lose it. And what I started to notice was I was like, Hang on a minute. I'm okay to spend the money on losing weight, but not clothes. Why? So when you see that, try to challenge yourself, try to pick up on it. And what I picked up on mine was it's like, I don't want to spend money. And it's like, well, I don't want to spend money on this, but I'm okay to spend it on that.
[00:21:02] And I challenged it, and that's where all those deep rooted thoughts started to come in, all those thoughts that have been sitting there subconsciously making me feel like shit. Take some of those thoughts and put it into a model. What is the circumstance? For me, it was the whole losing weight program thing. The thought, real key thought was actually like, I'm disgusting. How does that make you feel? Actually made me really overwhelmed. See, I thought I was going to make you depressed. I felt overwhelmed. The Depression came in response to this model because when I felt overwhelmed, I was judging myself. I was pressuring myself to lose weight. I was looking for like all this evidence. I was just, like, comparing myself to back in the day. And what results you get from that. Guess who's treating themselves really disgustingly? Me. I prove it true. I'm disgusting. So I'm treating myself as if I am disgusting. Therefore, from that model I got really fucking depressed because I was sick. I got overwhelmed like, fuck, what do I do? I'm disgusting. Then I'm treating myself like that. Then in response to me treating myself like that, I actually start to get depressed over time because I'm just reiterating this shit and I'm just like getting sad about it. Like I'm bullying myself. It's not fun. Then what you want to do is you want to look at how do you want to feel? I really want it to feel accepting.
[00:22:34] What do I do if I'm really accepting of myself? Well, I'm going to look at exercise in a way that suits me. And for me, that's really long walks with my dog in the morning. That's more eating. Intuitively, that's buying when I see clothes and I like them fucking buying them in the size that suits me now and coming up with a thought that really fits that. And for me it's I am giving myself permission to love myself in this moment right now and accept myself for who I am and make me feel really calm because ultimately that's what I wanted. I want me to accept me. I want me to love me regardless. That calms me down, that takes all the pressure off. And it's like, Yeah, we can start, just start to enjoy life and like live it and have fun. And separately to this, another really good tip that I like to also recommend to people is really start to change your social media as well. What I mean by that is we're flooded with a certain type of body. So I so for me on Instagram, I follow a whole heap of different like body types and shapes. Get your brain acclimatized. Yeah, acclimatised to new body shapes. What's really interesting and reason I do pick this up for people is you will start to realize potentially, like everyone's different, that it's really comes down to you kind of hating you because I would see women.
[00:24:08] Who were like, you know, bigger than me in size wearing the same outfit. And I would just think they looked absolutely beautiful. But if I'm wearing that outfit, am I thinking those same thoughts? No. Logistically, that doesn't make any sense. If I just hate myself because of my weight, shouldn't I be hating like technically others as well? Think about it, right? Like I should be looking at someone who's bigger than me wearing the same outfit and having that same like angle. I wasn't. I was thinking how beautiful they look me in the same outfit. I was not thinking I'm beautiful. And that made me start to realize, Oh, it really is just about me and the standards that I have set on myself. Wow, that was really powerful because it really got me to get an understand why this was so hard for me to like pick up on. It was like, I am supposed to look a certain way. I am supposed to only meet these certain standards again, probably coming down to like self wealth, self-love, self worth, and some internalized misogyny and patriarchy around like how women are supposed to look, etc. and stuff like that. But I do really encourage you to look at that and secondly, start to look at photos of yourself in the past and when those thoughts pop up, because I know they fucking do where you go.
[00:25:27] Oh, I used to be so skinny back then. Oh, my God, look how good you are. You know, I used to look so fat. Then I want you to just politely stop and just really look at that photo. Really, like, don't be thinking of anything. Just looking at that photo. Notice the feelings that come up, sit with them. Notice where they are in your body. And I want you if your brain does still push through and it's okay if it does and say something like that, I want you to say and I really. Love how I look in this dress like right now. And I'm working to believe I really love myself right now. Give it an opposite to that, because you are strengthening that neural network, that negativity that I hate myself, blah, blah, blah. When you do that, you're you're using it to judge and shame yourself. And you want to get out of that habit. You want to look at it and be and be almost neutral. Like, Yeah, this was me back then. And I thought the same thing about myself when I was looking at you in that moment, when I was looking at all the photos back then, and I looked great then and I believe I look great now. It's just giving you it's opening that new pathway because I'm still you know, I'm still in this like I'm giving myself permission to accept myself.
[00:26:47] I'm still in this like, you know, I'm working to believe, like, oh, all that level is where I'm at when it's coming to my body image. But it's just, it's just unlearning some bullshit beliefs that have been really sitting there under the roots, like real deep in the roots. And I'm just bringing it to the surface. Like my brain had rationalized it so much to just be like, Yeah, we're just losing weight to fit into our dresses and it has nothing to do with my self-worth or love or value. And again, this comes back to this all about how do you fall back in love with your self again at all fucking levels? I've talked to you about self-compassion when it comes to breaks and work and stuff like that. Well, what about your body changing? What about like going through different things? Like, I've never had a baby, but I don't doubt. Like, I'm kind of glad that this has popped up now because I do not doubt when my body goes through a whole heap of changes and then post the baby. Am I going to set myself with the same expectations that I was doing right now? You're goddamn right I will. And it'll just be like, okay, I just expected to lose all the weight and just go back to like pre-baby and everything versus looking at myself with kinder eyes and being like, hey, I did amazing fucking thing if I choose to have a child.
[00:28:10] Like a lot of this is another thing with society. I do not understand people who have babies. That is fucked. That is amazing. You put yourself your body through something for nine whole months and I feel like still in society, it's kind of swept under the rug like, yeah, and they're just back at it again and you know, you lose the baby weight and it's all good. You'll be back to your old self again. It's like, Jesus Christ, you just gave birth. Like, celebrate what yo body and you did, girl Jesus. Anyway, it's probably like a whole other episode that I could do on that one. I know this one was a little bit long. I gave you a full spiel and a story I kind of wanted to just share really where I was out with this. I have actually been wanting to talk about like body image for a while, but I haven't felt comfortable, probably because I thought I was disgusting and I'm really glad that this is kind of happened. I've been able to share with you, with share it with you and cover it. And again, if you want more deeper help with this, if you want to get to a place where at least with me, I have these tools and skills that I was able to do this on another area of my life.
[00:29:22] Yes, I was feeling depressed for a couple of months, but I was able to pinpoint it and I cannot get over how much better I already feel because I know what the thoughts are. I know how to challenge it, and I know what I need to do. If this is something that you want to learn for fucking life. Reach out to me book in a discovery call. I want to fucking help you. I want to help you be able to train this part of your brain, this muscle, so that you can create an amazing, more wholesome life for yourself. You can sit there like me, look up this weight issue and go, You know what? I can fucking I can fucking handle this. Is it going to be hard? Am I going to destroy these beliefs in a week? No, but I know how to do this. I fucking done it before. I feel so much lighter because I have so much fucking faith in myself. I've done it before. I can do it again and I love teaching people how to do that. So if this is resonating with you book in a call, let me see how I can help you. All right. That is the end of the episode. I feel like it was a long but a good one. There'll be a part two about creating safety for next week, so get ready for that. See everyone by.