Wow thanks so much for starting this discussion @goldenrose, I’d never heard of the concept of body neutrality before, this article you shared was a really interesting read.
@aunt_flo your point about potentially being made to feel guilty about sometimes not being 100% body positive totally resonates with me. The amount of times I’m scrolling through my insta feed overwhelmed by body-positive messages but end up feeling even more crap. I think it’s because the focus on image just doesn’t really work for me?
Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s awesome that many people have found find self confidence and satisfaction through the body positive movement, and I’m supportive if it works for them and strives to be inclusive of all types of bodies.
But when I’m going through a phase where I’m not able to love the way I look, that doesn’t really leave much room for me to be accepted, and I’ve found it isolating sometimes when I feel there’s an expectation on me to be proud of my appearance which I can’t fulfil, even among friends.
What does work for me though is focusing on non beauty-related reasons I value my body. It sounds like thats partly what body neutrality is about. Something I’ve done in the past during a tough time was a sort of visualisation meditation. I would spend time focusing on each part of my body and thinking about all the reasons I was grateful for it, even the most simple reasons. For instance, my lungs for allowing me to breathe in air to oxygenate my body, my skin for allowing me to sense the lovely breeze and warm sun, my arms and hands for allowing me to touch and hug people to give affection. It could be anything depending on the person and what’s important to them. And while I have a disability which affects me cognitively, I still had things to be thankful to my brain for, which felt good given at other times I can get really frustrated with my brain. Might sound silly but it really helped me appreciate my body!
