Body Image damage

During Food Coaching sessions with people who want to improve and/or change their eating habits the concept of body image always comes up. Body image is the idea that we all have about our body, the idea that we have been ¨taught¨ to believe about our body, and that influences all aspects of our health. Society, beliefs, and wrong ideas can damage our body image and jeopardize any intent of improving our weight. The unconscious beliefs that we all carry within can actually create or destroy a healthy body image. Beliefs are these feelings of certainty about what something means that we all have, and that condition our everyday decisions and behaviors, consciously or unconsciouly.

Food Coaching for improved body image

Even people with normal weight may present a distorted body image that influences their eating behavior. After hundreds of people that I have coached through my Food Coaching methodology and helped them improve their body image, I resume here some of the main assumptions that everyone shares.

Body image problems are all the same.

The answer is not always that obvious. Each one of you is unique and so is your body image. I may be the expert on food coaching but I am not the expert on how YOU see yourself in the mirror. That is why a confident relationship is crucial to be built between us during our coaching sessions. These should be your safe place to explain to me and let me understand what your body image means to you and the ways it affects your eating behavior.

Sharing other people’s experiences will help me with my body image.

Everyone feels right and feels like an expert in their own nutrition and eating habits. Talking to other people may help you communicate your struggle with your body image but taking for granted other people’s experiences can not help you restore your body image. What had worked for someone else it does not necessarily mean that will work for me. Sometimes this may provoke great frustration and even greater resignation.

Just love your body.

Easy to say, hard to feel. People who suffer from emotional eating usually are not aware of how much they do NOT love their body. They think they ¨must¨ do change, and they forget how much they ¨want¨ to change. Telling people to love their bodies while their body image is distorted is like telling them ¨do not worry¨!

Thoughts and practices to improve your body image

You can start today improving your body image by trying these thoughts every:

• I thank my body for doing and having done so much for me until today. List all the things your body performs every day.
• My worth is NOT my body image. List all your accomplishments mental and physical until today.
• My worth is NOT my weight. Ask 5 people what they best admire about you.

Some core practices you can start today to improve your body image are:

1. Celebrate your small victories. The smaller, the better.
2. Adjust what you see every day in your feed while scrolling. Increase the diversity of the bodies that appear in your social media. Follow new, different accounts and unfollow some of the old ones.
3. Let go of people who are not supportive but toxic or judgemental. Identify those who drain you and those who inspire you.
4. Identify 2 things your body did that you have been grateful for today, every night before going to bed.

Moliere said that ¨One should eat to live, not live to eat¨.

Remember that change starts with small, baby steps.

You can do it!

Book a Food Coaching today if you wish to work with me and improve your body image.