Feeling Proud of the Body You're Living In

One of the things that I see in society today...

almost across all countries...

is trauma around our bodies.

Men and women alike are struggling to accept themselves the way they are.

Now, that doesn't mean that we don't strive for health...

but if we're judging ourselves against society's standards...

we're doing ourselves a big disservice.

Here's what I've learned about my body, no matter the size it's at...

and how I shifted out of the trauma mindset around how I look.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hey my loves, welcome back to another episode of the other side of the struggle. Okay, we are going to talk today about your body because this is something that I see women and men getting shamed a lot about, and I just don't feel like that's necessary. And it's one of the things that actually we need to anchor into if we are going to heal from trauma. So we're diving into this subject today. But first, again, before we do, don't forget, grab your time with me. If you guys want help healing from body dysmorphia, if you want help healing your trauma stories, your money stories, your relationship stories, if you want help healing trauma, so you can set unbreakable boundaries, become the goddess or god that you are meant to be, and create the life and living that you love. Don't forget to schedule that call. 30 minutes with me. Let's see what we can do to start creating something completely different, a completely different narrative to show you what really is true in your life so you can anchor into it. So that way you can have the better relationships, the the family life that you want, to be able to be the mom or the dad that you want to be, whatever it is you're looking for in your life, better money stories, more financial freedom, etc. Give me that call and let's see if we can't help you heal some trap trauma, some blocks, and create some boundaries to anchor into so that way you can have a pathway forward. Okay, let's go ahead and get chatting then about finally feeling proud of the body that you're living in. And let me tell you guys, this is a big deal, okay, because whether you're obese or whether you're too thin, or somewhere in between, somebody's always got an opinion of how you look. And if you remember, one of my biggest messages to you guys is not to listen to the opinions of other people, but that's not always easy, especially if you have been conditioned to listen to everyone else's voice over your own, which happens a lot, and that's usually something that happens in childhood, right? But I'm here to show you today just how beautiful your body actually is, no matter its size. Now, that doesn't mean that we don't want to work on health, okay? Not at all. I personally am working on my own health, it's one of the things that has actually been slowing me down. And if you've been listening to my podcast recently, you know, is one of the things I talk about is that, you know, one of the things that's stopping me from being able to really anchor into my boundary of I do what I say I'm going to do when I say I'm going to do it, is my health. My health often does come up and stop me from doing what I say I'm going to do. And so that means that another one of my boundaries needs to be to actually work with my body. If I'm going to make this boundary a thing, I need to listen to the things that are making it hard. Does that make sense? And so, like, for instance, another thing that I noticed when I set this boundary for myself and I've been practicing it, I needed to be a lot more intentional with my time boundary, making sure that I am not filling my bucket and filling my schedule so full that I can't do the things that I say I'm going to do when I say I'm going to do them. I needed to actually take things off of my plate. That was one thing that helped me, but with my help, it's been a lot harder. And so one of the things that I'm doing right now is I'm making sure that I am filling my body with adequate nutrition. That I'm really, really, really pushing a lot of nutrition into my body. So that way it can regenerate, it can heal. I'm also trying to make sure that I am getting enough rest, supplementation, exercise. It's one of the things that I'm working towards because I'm trying to get that energy back up and everything, right? But I am also studying health a bit more and making that more of a priority so that way I can come back and really anchor into this boundary because I know what this boundary will do for me. Okay. So this is why I'm saying like your health really is going to be a major priority. And the other reason that it's such a big deal is because it is one of your four main energies, your mental, emotional, physical, spiritual energy, right? If we don't have the physical, but we have the mental, emotional, and spiritual, that's wonderful. But physical will still hold us back and slow us down if we are not being intentional towards it. So here's the deal: you don't need to fight your body to feel proud of it, and that's gonna go against everything that society is gonna tell you. Your body is not fighting you, and you don't need to fight against it to be proud of it. Your body's not broken, it's not betraying you. It literally is the physical manifestation of God's love for you specifically. It's constantly working to protect, preserve, and communicate with you and work with you so that it can honor the Holy Spirit that is inside of you, his child. When we talk about your body being a temple, this is why it truly is a sacred space, and it holds something very sacred as well. But a lot of people still feel really disconnected from their bodies, and it makes sense, you know. If we have a Christ, we also have an adversary. I've said it many times: a savior and an adversary. We have to have opposites in this world, but it makes sense that he would want us to feel shame about our bodies, he wants to destroy us in every way possible, and in any way he can get us to feel shame because we don't fit some narrative. Oh, he is going to throw that in our face. And this is why it's also really important to listen to God's narrative about you. Because everybody is going to have an opinion, but not every opinion is going to be the same. If we're listening to the Lord's opinion of us, God the Father, our Holy Father who created us, if we're listening to His opinion about who we are, well, chances are we're going to be a lot happier because we're only making one opinion matter instead of many. And that can get really overwhelming, especially for our nervous systems. And that's the thing we don't want to do. We don't want to overwhelm our nervous systems. You know, even though, like, I love my husband, I love my mother, I love my grandmother, I love my kids, I love my neighbors, and for the most part, their opinions of me are pr are really, really positive. And that does matter to me. But it will though those opinions will never outweigh the opinion of my father in heaven. Because he sees beyond them, he knows how many hairs I have had on my head since birth, how many I've lost since birth up to now. He knows the intents of my heart, he knows what's going on in my body, he knows me better than I know myself. And if that's the case, his opinion matters more than anyone else's because he sees me through perfect love, he sees the real me. And if I want to create the very best version of myself, well then his opinion should matter the most. But too often we're listening to outside voices and to society's voices, and they tell us what we should look like, what we should be, how we should eat, how we should dance, how like, etc. Like exactly how we should look. And if we don't feel fit that narrative, well, then something's wrong with us. We're disgusting, we're not good enough, etc. We aren't worthy. And that is not the message that God wants to give us. But it's no wonder why people are feeling frustrated, ashamed, disconnected, embarrassed, exhausted, and stuck in a body that they don't understand. It's because they're trying to see like outside of themselves, like what's really happening, instead of really just sitting for a bit and listening. And sometimes that's hard, especially when you are dealing with shame, guilt, and possibly even pain. Now I will tell you I need I need to lose weight for my health, okay? I I have said that, but not because I'm ashamed of myself. I will never, never subscribe to losing weight because of s because it fits somebody else's narrative. No, sorry, uh-uh. I've done that, I've lived that path. It sucks. Sorry. Not doing it. Refuse. But I would love to lose weight or to release weight if we're gonna talk about it in a healthy way. Simply because I want to work with my body and I want my body to be healthy. Okay, yeah, I'm all sub for subscribing for that, but I do not do not care what somebody else thinks about my size. I simply care about my body because I know that it's God's physical manifestation of his love for me. A lot of people are walking around trying to get into a better body when really what they want to feel is proud of the body that they are living in. And they're telling like there's so many voices out there that's telling us like why we can't feel that. They want to feel safe, they want to feel attractive, healthy, clear, connected, comfortable in their own skin. And I get it. Everybody wants to feel proud of themselves in some way. But if you look at your body as your enemy, you will feel ashamed of it. If you look at your body though, as again, God's physical manifestation of his love for you, then all of a sudden you feel love towards it back. I mean, let's talk about that extra weight that I'm carrying around, possibly you are. What is it? Your fat cells are so smart that they when your body detects a toxin, the fat cell actually encapsulates it so that way it doesn't go into your nervous system, it doesn't actually harm you. And it's our job to work with our body to release it naturally so that way it comes out of one of our flushes. You know, we flush through the kidneys, through the bowels, through our sweat glands, through our nose. Like there's a lot of ways that we actually flush toxins out of our body. And just recently, actually, just because I've been pushing a lot of nutrition into my body, it had a detox. It wasn't fun. I was not looking for that, I wasn't trying to detox, I was just trying to make sure I was getting healthy, I was uh like healthy food and really, really giving my body what it needs. And it finally released some things that it probably had been holding on to for a while. And even though that wasn't super fun, I can sit there and still say, Oh body, thank you. Thank you for finally feeling safe enough to release this. Thank you for releasing this so that way it's not something that I have to deal with constantly. Thank you for releasing another layer of inflammation. See, that's what happens too. Our bodies inflame to keep us safe. Our bodies are so smart that it literally wants to keep us safe. That's all it wants, and it wants to hold us in safety. But if it's holding too much, it does start to break down, and this is why it's really important that we need to listen to it. Most people have been taught to fight their body instead of actually stop and try to understand it and what it's trying to say to us, because our emotions and how the body is feeling is its voice too. And I've talked about like the emotions being like the voice between your subconscious and your conscious, and that is true, but oftentimes your emotions are also the voice of your body trying to talk to you and say, tell you what it needs, how it needs support, right? Because you have to make decisions to go and eat better, you have to make decisions to exercise, maybe use a different product, different like whatever it is. Maybe it's to stop sugar. I know that's kind of sucky, but maybe that's what it is, too. Whatever it is that your body is reacting negatively to, it is our job to listen and respond. Your body isn't the problem, it's not failing you, it's not too much, it's not or not enough, and symptoms doesn't mean that something is wrong with you. Your body is not the problem, your body's responding to what it's had to carry for so long, and you get that, especially if you've been dealing with trauma, your body actually does respond to that too, emotional trauma. And oftentimes, like I actually see it constantly. Women who have dealt with betrayal, and especially women who've been dealing with betrayal on a consistent basis, are usually women who are gaining weight and they don't know why, or losing weight and they don't know why. I've seen both ends, and usually it's women that gain weight and they don't know why, and they don't know why they can't release the weight either. And it's because that there's trauma stuck in her nervous system, but you know, it's more that way for women because women that's one of the ways we tend to protect ourselves is by creating distance, and by creating distance, we have to fill the space with something, right? Men, on the other hand, yes, they can gain weight due to feeling unsafe, but usually they have to anchor first and foremost into their femininity or their feminine side in order for them to start to gain a lot of weight. And it usually happens again because we're not feeling safe. The nervous system is triggering that we're not safe, we're not safe, we're not safe. And so listening to our body and how our body is responding to certain triggers or stimuli is really important, okay? Because your body's not betraying you, it's literally trying to protect you, it's trying to preserve your life, and it's trying to communicate the needs that it has, it's adapting for you, not attacking you. So here's the thing you've got to understand: your body is very intelligent. It's been designed specifically to house you and to hone you. It's responsive, it's protective, and it's deeply loving in its function. It requires love actually to heal. And so one of the best ways that we can actually heal our nervous system, and why I love tapping actually is by sitting there talking to our nervous system and tapping as we're talking. And the reason why is as you're tapping on on the nerve points in your body and you're speaking to your nervous system and or the nerve points, right? It does tend to re-regulate. Your body is trained to listen to your voice and to trust your voice. You can take action and it knows that. So as you listen to it, it will communicate with you what it needs. But if you're sitting there in love for yourself, it will heal. The adversary also knows this. No wonder why he's trying to get you to shame your body, not love it, because the more you don't love it, and the more you fight against it or think it's your enemy, the more it hurts. Because it's not receiving the love it needs to be able to heal. See, I believe the body is, like I said, it's his physical, it's God's physical manifestation of his love for you. It has your back, it's constantly trying to protect you, preserve you, provide for you, and it's really listening. It's it's paying attention to what's coming in and what's coming out. It's paying attention. Our job is paying attention with it. Because it loves you so much that its whole purpose is to protect you and make sure you're safe. So when the body signals us, it's not that it's trying to shame us, tell us that we're doing something wrong, it's not punishing us, it's not failing us, it's just simply communicating what the needs are. It's uh saying, I need help, I need support, we need safety, and we need to release this. So it becomes now our ally instead of our enemy when we look at it this way. The body doesn't work from cruelty, it works from protection. So why does it hold on to stress, inflammation, toxins, over like emotional overload, nervous system dysregulation, protective weight, fatigue, and tension? Again, it's just simply trying to protect you. And it's our job to start listening and researching. You know, one of the things that I noticed about my body a few months ago was just the deep brain fog I was having. And brain fog can be a sign of lack of sleep, lack of nutrition, and lack of and lack of hormones. And all three of those were very present in my life. So as I'm sitting here working on, you know, a better sleep schedule, I'm working on, you know, better nutrition, better exercise, my brain fog has actually been getting better and better and better. Hormonally, I don't want to do I don't want to do like the like the Western side of things very much because I've seen what it what it's done to people in my life, like horse hormones and things like that. But there are ways that we can support our hormones, right? For women, especially in my age, MACA is really good to help hormonal support. And like I said, as I've been putting these certain things on board, it has helped me with pain, it's helped me with my mental clarity, and it's helped me with energy, even. I still would like to see it become better, and so the point is, is I just need to listen a little more and check in with my body and see how it's doing. And the other thing, too, that I want to point out to you is how cool is it too that our body also reacts to emotion. You know, I know like when I'm feeling angry, I'm feeling that in my gut and in my liver area. I also hold a lot of anger in my shoulders and in my fists, right? And whenever I'm feeling angry, I also really love to put on a little bit of castor oil over the top of my liver. I don't put it, I don't drink it, I don't take it internally, not unless if I really, really need to release some things, but that's pretty rare. And just putting it over my liver gives me a really, really good calm. Okay. So castor oil is a big deal around in my house. There's also ways to deal with parasites, there's ways to deal with a lot of the toxins that are showing up in our systems. Okay. But emotional regulation is one of the best ways to take care of our bodies so that way we can bridge the gap into that that that we've been like to release the the things that we've been holding on to, like grief, betrayal, fear, stress, our nervous system overload. It's just carrying our our bodies are just carrying a story, a really, really full story, and it needs the opportunity to let go of some things. I also really love the idea of uh journaling because it helps take what's in the brain and put it onto paper. It's almost like a second brain. And it also like your your mind and your brain will follow the patterns that your hand is creating as it's writing. It's actually a type of EDMR therapy. So these are just some things that I use to help regulate my nervous system so that way I'm in less pain and less sickness. Okay. So here's the thing when we think when we really do feel proud of our body, we don't look at the size, we look at the intention, like what it's really trying to do. And that makes it feel lighter. The symptoms kind of disappear, and we start coming into understanding, care, consistency, listening, honoring, and partnering with our body. And remember that all things are healed through love, right? The more we love our body, the more we appreciate it, the more it has the ability to heal. You don't become proud of your body by punishing it into submission, you become proud of your body by learning how to care for it well, by listening to it and loving it. We've talked about what your body needs rest, nourishment, hydration, detoxification, nervous system support, emotional honesty and authority, truth, safety, boundaries, self-respect, self-compassion. And just remember that your body is trying to protect and provide for you. And if that's the case, then healing means giving it what it needs to do that job well. We get to release trap toxins from the body and from the nervous system, and we don't have to ask our body to hold on to every little thing because not every little thing is going to stop cutting it. We don't have to ask it to hold on to things that we're not willing to heal. That's where forgiveness comes in. The more supported your body feels, the less it has to scream for your attention. So reverence your body, give it gratitude and respect and love and partner with it so that way you can finally feel the peace down inside your soul. It will release things. And it will help you feel confident in your body no matter how it's showing up, what size, what shape, no matter. Because feeling part of the body you're living in doesn't mean you think it's perfect, it means you're no longer at war with it. And it means that you love it because God loves you. Alright, my loves. Don't forget, please come and schedule that call with me. I would love to see what I can do to help you feel more confident in your body, more confident in your skin, no matter what size you're at. I would love to help you heal any relational trauma that you might have been dealing with, and help you create the boundaries and life and living that you love. So please feel free, schedule that call with me. If you think I can help you, let's have a chat. Cowley.com forward slash Aaron Dash Anderson dash coaching forward slash creating dash your dash unbreakable dash boundaries. Okay, my loves. I will see you on the other side. Bye.