You Don't Have to Love Your Body

Feel like you should love your body but can't even imagine getting there? You're not alone. In this episode, we're challenging the pressure to 'love your body' and exploring why this message might actually be keeping you stuck.

Discover why love isn't the only option and learn about alternative ways to relate to your body that feel more accessible and authentic. Whether you're struggling with body image or feeling guilty for not loving your body enough, this episode offers a fresh perspective that could change your entire approach to body acceptance.

Perfect for anyone who's tired of feeling like they're failing at body positivity and ready for a more realistic path forward.

Previous podcast episodes you might be interested in:

Defining Self-Love

Feeling Fat

Want to know why you struggle with food and what to do next? Start watching The Food Freedom Mini Series today. 

Transcript

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Welcome to Binge Breakthrough, a podcast designed to help you finally break through the barriers that keep you stuck, feeling out of control around food. I'm Master Certified Coach Jane Koker, and I want you to know that no matter how long you've been struggling or what you've tried, food freedom is possible. And I'm here to show you how. After years of therapy, eating the first treatment, restrictive diet, and reading all of us, I will still stop in the audience optical cycle of restricting thinking and how I was able to see it all from a new perspective that changed everything. Each week I will share the strategies, tools, and mindset that allowed me to overcome my decades-long battle with binge eating. Your journey to body trust starts now. Let's dive in. Hello, trusted listener. Welcome to Binge Breakthrough. I consider you a trusted listener because I trust that you are listening to this podcast for a reason. I trust that you are going to hear something today that is insightful and impactful on your journey with food and with your body. Because today we're going to talk about your body and something that if you happen to be listening to this podcast when it airs in February, talking about your body might feel particularly relevant as we move through this month of February. We're talking about your relationship with your body. Many of you have shared with me that you feel stuck in a really difficult place with your body. You see all of these messages out there about loving your body. But that feels completely impossible right now. Maybe you've thought, I could only love my body if I lost a certain amount of weight. Or maybe you think, how could I possibly love this body after what I've done to it? But what if I told you that you don't actually have to love your body? Now, I know this might sound a bit different from all of the body positivity messages that you're hearing, especially during this month of love and Valentine's Day. But today I want to offer you a different perspective. One that might help you find more peace with your body without requiring you to make an impossible leap. For so many people, that leap to loving your body feels impossible. So let's talk about what I see happening with so many of my clients. They come to me feeling trapped in this painful relationship with their body. They have feelings of disappointment, frustration, maybe even hatred towards their body. And then they see all of these messages about body positivity and loving yourself. And it feels like this impossible mountain that they could never climb. I had a client tell me recently, I can't even look in the mirror without feeling disgusted. I don't even look in the mirror. I have had clients who literally do not have mirrors in their house, certainly not full-length mirrors. Love my body? That's just not realistic, they think. And I had another client say, maybe I could love my body if it looked different. But right now, no way. There's no way I could love this body until it changes. So they stay stuck in the pain, the judgment, the disappointment. Because the alternative seems completely out of reach. It's like being told to go climb to the top of a mountain when you can barely walk across a parking lot. Of course, it feels impossible. And so, of course, you don't even try. If my only options are loving my body or hating my body, I'm just gonna stick with the hatred, with the frustration, with the judgment. And so here's what happens. You end up feeling even worse because not only do you dislike your body, but now you feel like a failure for not being able to love it, like everybody else seems to be able to do, or at least those people on Instagram seem to love their bodies. It becomes evidence of another way that you're not measuring up, another way that you're not evolved enough or healed enough, another way and another place that you compare yourself to other people, and you end up in the not enough category. So let's look at the brain science around this. Let's understand what's happening in your brain when you're caught in this cycle of body hatred and impossible expectations. Remember how in previous episodes we've talked about the amygdala? The amygdala is the part of your brain that is constantly scanning for danger. It is the part that is always asking the question, am I safe? And when we've had a long history of negative feelings about our body, even thinking about changing that relationship can trigger your threat response. So if you have always hated your body, or for years and decades, you have hated your body, you have been convinced it has to change in order for you to feel better. If this is what you've been believing for years or decades, and then you start thinking about changing the relationship, it's like your brain is like, wait a second, that's not safe. This is how we've always related to our body. We've always hated our body. We've always looked for the things about our body that are bad or wrong or need to change. It might not feel good, but at least it's familiar. We know what to expect. And so the brain that likes to always seek pleasure, avoid pain, and use as little energy as possible when it senses a threat, even the threat of change. So the threat of changing your relationship with your body, the threat of changing your relationship with food, can create this threat response from the amygdala. And so what happens is then you flip your lid. I have a previous podcast episode called What Happens When You Flip Your Lid? And your prefrontal cortex, the logical thinking part of your brain, goes offline because all of the resources go to the survival part of your brain. So this is really important to understand why the cycle of body hatred often connects to binge eating. When we're in that threatened state and when we're feeling overwhelming shame or disappointment about our body, we're more likely to turn to food as a way to cope with the discomfort. And then the binge eating leads to more body hatred and the cycle continues. So here we are very much in a cycle. So we're creating a threat response by the way that we talk to ourselves about our bodies. When we're in body hatred, when we are in shame and judgment and disgust about our body, we are activating the threat response. The amygdala is sensing danger. It's a danger yourself against yourself. But then when we think we have to change it in a way where we have to go all the way to love, and that feels way too big, way too impossible, that also becomes a threat. We have this double threat response. So just looking in the mirror and the hatred and disgust that I have towards my body creates a stress response. And if I think I have to love my body, I have to do this thing that feels impossible, that's also creating that threat response. So then we end up because everything feels so overwhelming, then we just go binge. And then we feel disgusted with ourselves and our body because we've binged. We are in this cycle over and over again. But that doesn't mean that hope is lost. If love feels impossible right now, the idea of loving your body feels impossible right now. We don't have to just say, okay, hatred is the only other option. That's where I'm gonna stay. I want to introduce you to what I call the relationship spectrum, as far as it relates to your body. Just as we have different relationships with people in our lives, we can have different types of relationships with our body. Now, you might be thinking, okay, I hear what you're saying about these alternatives, but even those feel out of reach right now. It feels impossible for me to do anything other than hate my body or feel disgust or shame towards my body. But that's okay. I want you to know we are not trying to jump from hatred to even basic respect overnight. The first step, if you've been listening to me for any period of time, you know what I'm about to say. The first step is always awareness. So the first step is going to be just noticing, wow, I'm being really harsh with my body right now. Without trying to change anything. What are you thinking when you're in the shower? When you are uh when you walk by uh a window. What are you thinking? What is it that you are saying to yourself about yourself, about your body? Just noticing is a huge first step. Now, the next part is going to be acknowledging that there might be other possibilities available other than hatred or disgust and love, even if they don't feel accessible yet. So let's take a look at some other possibilities, some other ways that you might be able to have a different type of relationship with your body. Something that's not hate and not love. All right, so some of the other possibilities. First, respect. Think about how you might treat a colleague that you work with. Maybe you might not particularly like them, but you can treat them with basic respect. You can acknowledge their contribution, you can maintain appropriate boundaries and work together effectively. Do you have somebody in your life like this? Think for yourself. Is there somebody in my life who I don't necessarily like them? I wouldn't necessarily want to go on, you know, a long trip with them. But I guess I can respect them. I can work, I can work with them if I need to. What if we started there? What would it look like to treat your body with that same type of professional respect? Even respecting another person, let's say it's not a colleague, let's say it's just a person that you see as a human being. So we have respect as the first level. Then we have kindness, just basic kindness, like how you might treat a neighbor. You don't need to invite them over for dinner every night, but you can wave hello, you can avoid doing things that harm them, maybe even help them out occasionally. With your body, this might look like ensuring you get enough sleep, staying hydrated, or taking breaks when you're tired. Another option, gratitude. Think about how you feel towards someone who provides a service that you rely on. Maybe it's your male carrier, or if you're a parent, your child's teacher. You might not know them personally, but you're grateful for what they do. Could you find even some small moments to thank your body for what it does for you? Maybe it's as simple as acknowledging that your legs carried you through your day, or that your arms allowed you to hug your child, your partner, someone you love. Sometimes when I think about gratitude and I think about my body, I am so grateful for what it has been through. When I think about the number of binges that I have had, the way that it has processed that food, when I think about previous injuries, previous illness, I'm so grateful that it has the ability to heal, to recover, to process very large amounts of food. There's a lot of gratitude there for me that that did not used to be available when I was so focused on what was wrong with my body and what needed to change. I couldn't even find pockets of gratitude or kindness or respect. Now, there's another level. Appreciation. It's like acknowledging good work. You don't have to be emotionally attached to appreciate function and capability. So here's an example. Think about how you might appreciate a reliable car. You don't have to love your car, but you can appreciate that your car gets you from point A to point B. Your car doesn't just break down on the side of the road. Your car tells you when it needs more gas. You can rely on when you go and get in your car, it is most likely gonna start and get you to your location. So are there aspects of your body's functioning that you could simply appreciate? Even down to appreciating that your heart is beating right now. The various functions of your organs, of your brain, all of the things that happened to keep us alive here, experiencing this current moment. Just take a moment right now. Take a deep breath. Expand your lungs inside your chest. Those are your lungs. Your lungs that are filling with oxygen, your lungs that allow you to breathe, that allow you to have life. When we're so focused on what our body looks like, the things we don't like about it, we just we can't even see the things that we could appreciate, the life that it gives us. Now, think about this. If you've been in a conflicted relationship with your body for years or even decades, of course love feels impossible. And even basic appreciation might feel out of reach. But just like you wouldn't expect to go from being strangers with somebody to best friends overnight, you don't have to make that leap with your body either. You can take time to develop a relationship with your body. But if you are just set in believing and deciding that your body is awful and gross and disgusting until it changes, you are closing off the ability to develop appreciation, to develop gratitude, to develop kindness, to develop respect. These things don't just appear, they are cultivated, they're developed the same way that you develop a relationship with somebody else in your life. Now, I want to talk about something else that is really, really important. It's the energy behind your relationship with your body. Now, when I talk about energy, I'm talking about the emotional quality that you bring to your thoughts and your actions towards your body. So think about the energy of judgment and disappointment that you might be carrying right now towards your body. That energy sounds like I'll never be able to love this body, or this body is impossible to accept. Feel how heavy that is, how much tension it creates. Now, imagine the energy of simply acknowledging this is the body I have right now. Not loving it, not even liking it, just acknowledging it. Feel how different that energy is. It's a little bit more spacious, more open, less constricting. The energy that we bring to our relationship with our body, it's like the soil in a garden. Even if you're not ready to plant flowers, you can at least stop pouring poison on the soil. Cultivate soil. Cultivate the soil that you want for your relationship with your body. Pay attention to the energy that is behind it. Okay, now you might be wondering, how do we put this into practice? When even those small changes feel a little overwhelming or a little out of touch or reach. So let's start with some very tiny steps. So, first, just notice where you are right now in relationship with your body. No judgment, no trying to change anything, just awareness. Where are you right now in your relationship with your body? Are you in active conflict? Are you at war with your body? Are you in complete disconnection? Are you experiencing some moments of appreciation or kindness or gratitude? Where are you? Just notice. Then see if you can find one tiny moment each day to practice something different as it relates to your body. So maybe it's when you notice wanting to say something mean about yourself or your body. It's noticing. Maybe it's you notice, and instead of saying something, maybe you just take a deep breath. Maybe you go ahead and you say something, but you just acknowledge, oh, I'm being really harsh towards myself. If you can see it before it comes out, maybe you can pause. Just noticing, being aware of all of the times that you are in that judgment towards your body. And maybe it's just simply acknowledging, oh, this is really hard when you're struggling with hatred or disgust towards your body. So, one practice that I want to share with you is what I call tiny step forward. Choose one small way that you could show your body just 1% more basic respect than you do right now. 1%. It might be as simple as drinking a glass of water when you're thirsty instead of ignoring your thirst. It might be if you're a person I know that I tend to do this. I tend to um push off going to the bathroom. I know I need to go, just one more thing. Let me just get this email done. Let me just work on this and then I'll go. So if I'm aiming towards more respect, more connection, more listening to my body, more appreciating my body, then maybe I'm not going to push that off. Maybe I will actually realize, oh, I need to go to the bathroom. I'm going to get up now and go. I'm developing connection with my body. It might be just taking one deep breath before starting your day. That connection with when I take a deep breath, when I expand my lungs inside my chest, when I feel my chest rise, those are my lungs. That is my heart beating. My body is so much more than its shape or its weight or its size. So much more. Can I start to see and acknowledge everything that my body does for me that my body allows me to do in this world? Now remember, we're not aiming for transformation here. We're looking for awareness, recognizing the way that we are talking to ourselves, the relationship that we do have with our body, and then taking the smallest possible step towards something else. Whether it's respect, whether it's kindness, whether it's gratitude or appreciation, you don't have to love your body. But I want you to know your body is the only vehicle you have for experiencing this one precious life. You don't have to love it. You don't even have to like it right now. But perhaps there's room for just a tiny bit less judgment. And if we remove some judgment, we make room for more peace, more respect, more kindness, more gratitude, more appreciation. So this week, I invite you to notice the story that you're telling yourself about your relationship with your body. Notice if you're stuck in the I should love my body, but I can't narrative. Or if you're in the I can't love my body if it looks this way or feels this way, or is has whatever limitations that I don't like. See if you can make space for the possibility that there might be other options. There might be other ways that you can look at your body, that you can relate to your body, that when you look at yourself in the mirror, when you see your reflection as you're walking by a window, there might be other possibilities of the way that you respond to what you see, even if they don't feel accessible yet. And remember, wherever you are in this journey with your body, this you are not alone. This is complex work. It is nuanced work and it takes time. And we are all constantly receiving messages from the outside world and from other people about our bodies, about what is and isn't acceptable with a body. So we need to acknowledge that too. Be patient with yourself as you explore what kind of relationship with your body feels possible for you right now. I want you to know that you can improve your relationship with your body. You do not have to love it, but there is so much more that is possible. Open up to the possibilities. 1% at a time. If you continue with 1% improvements, 1%, a little bit more of the open, spacious relationship with your body over time that will compound to a completely different relationship with your body. You may never get to the place where you look in the mirror and you think, ah, I love my body. But you can absolutely get to the place where you look in the mirror and you think, ah, I am so grateful for this body. I appreciate this body. I have so much respect for this body, and I want to treat it with kindness. It is absolutely possible for you. No matter what limitations your body has, no matter the size, no matter your health, no matter anything, it is absolutely possible for you. I would love to hear your thoughts on this. And if you'd like support in developing a different kind of relationship with your body, I'm here to help. All right, I'll see you next week. Thank you for listening to Binge Breakthrough. If you want to understand why you feel out of control with food sometimes, I've created just the thing for you. Discover the number one reason why and get three things you can do today. Visit binge breakthrough.com forward slash quid, and you'll have your answer and your next step. Binge breakthrough.com forward slash quit.