Find Joy through Making Peace with Your Body

When we live a life of self-loathing and don’t treat our bodies the way that our Heavenly Father intended us to treat them, we disconnect our spirit from the very thing it needs to fulfill its earthly mission. When we are living in the future, waiting for a “perfect body” in order to reach out and do the things that God needs us to do as women, we are disconnecting ourselves from our body and thus cannot experience true joy.

“New Year, New You!” It’s a phrase we hear frequently this time of year advertising new weight-loss programs, slapped across the cover of fitness magazines and marketed by our Instagram idols. It promises a “new life” that comes from changing the size of your body: more happiness and contentment, more confidence, more friends and more admiration from others. The problem is, that promise is based on a lie. The things that you really want, the things you think will come from having a smaller, stronger, fill-in-the-blank kind of body, are all available to you right now, just as you are. You don’t have to wait for a thigh gap or perfect waistline before you can have more confidence, a better marriage, more friends, a more present relationship with your children or more peace in your body. In fact, as a personal trainer and fitness instructor I have heard time and time again the disappointment that comes from achieving those physical goals and coming to the realization that though their body fat may have decreased, they feel exactly the same as before.

So, am I saying that we shouldn’t set goals to be more healthy and active? Not at all. Our body is sacred, which literally means “holy.” It is the only vehicle we’ve been given to live out our personal mission that was given to us by God. In fact, our bodies are so essential in discovering and experiencing the joy available in the plan of our Heavenly Father, that one of Satan’s greatest attacks on good women is to get us to demean and degrade, punish, obsess over, and even hate our bodies. It is an incredibly potent and effective tool at robbing us of the joy that we could be experiencing as we live our beautifully imperfect lives.

The changes to our lives that we are seeking through the pursuit of a “perfect body” are not achieved by fixing the outside but are actually achieved by changing our inside first–the way we think about ourselves and our body. The beautiful thing about all of this is that we do not have to rely on willpower or grit to make those changes within us. In fact, willpower and grit themselves do not have the ability to create those lasting changes deep in our hearts! However, we do have daily access to the greatest and purest source of lasting change: our Savior Jesus Christ. It is said time and time again in the scriptures that Christ is the one responsible for changing our heart, and for “putting a new spirit within [us].” (Ezekiel 36:26) We don’t have the ability to do that even for ourselves, but we can seek Him and make small changes to our thinking and our habits to allow Him to make that mighty change within us and heal our relationship with our body. I have included some principles below that have made the greatest difference for me as I have learned to make peace with my body and achieve an optimal level of health.

Practice daily gratitude and self-love

Fear and disgust is often our greatest source of motivation when it comes to exercise and eating right. We exercise due to fear of getting fat and becoming unattractive, fear of diabetes or other health problems, fear of judgement or not belonging, or disgust with where we have found ourselves physically. We use exercise as a punishment for eating a second helping of cake the night before or intentionally skip meals because we just “couldn’t control ourselves” with that cookie dough in the freezer. But fear and disgust are negative motivators and could be considered emotionally abusive if we used them to try and motivate our children or co-workers. However, we expect those emotions to carry us through impossible diets and get us up at 5:00 a.m. to go to the gym.

In a recent discourse given on the difference between motivation by fear versus by love, the presenter said, “It is true that fear can have a powerful influence over our actions and behavior. But that influence tends to be temporary and shallow. Fear rarely has the power to change our hearts and it will never transform us.”

In order to truly transform our relationship with our body, we must operate from a place of daily love and gratitude. We need to exercise and eat well because our body deserves the very best, not because it needs to be changed or manipulated. Instead of forcing ourselves to do a form of exercise we loathe, we should move and exercise in a way that feels good to us because we have the ability to move at all.

If you just can’t seem to love your body right now, that’s okay, begin with gratitude. Gratitude that your body has carried you this far regardless of how poorly you have treated it. Gratitude for the simple everyday things we take for granted so often, elbows that bend, eyelids that close and open, legs that hold up our torso. Begin with conscious, daily practice of gratitude for your body and you will begin to feel a reverence and love for all that it does for you.

Focus on what your body can do, not how you look

The diet and fitness industry is a $6 Billion industry built around telling you what you “should” look like and as a society we are eating out of the palm of their hand. Most of our fitness and health goals are based around a certain weight, a particular pant size or a measurement of some kind. But NONE of those things measure the abundant benefits that come from taking care of our bodies and nourishing them with real food. Increased energy, better sleep, clearer thought processes, quicker recovery time, greater flexibility and injury prevention, more confidence, a marked decrease in osteoporosis, heart disease, blood sugar problems and other physical ailments, are all benefits of regular exercise and a balanced diet.

I threw away my scale 7 years ago and it has made all the difference for me. Instead of relying on a machine that can only measure the pull of gravity to tell me if I was doing “a good job,” I try to focus my thoughts on how I feel in the moment. Sometimes I like to sit in my car after a good workout and just be still. I take a minute or two to feel how good and strong my body feels. I try to feel my heart and listen carefully to my lungs as they inhale and exhale good clean air. I imagine my blood vessels surging with oxygen saturated blood moving to every cell in my body and giving me energy and life and I am filled with so much gratitude. While your body may not look the way you desire it to look, if you will take the time to focus on how you feel in that very moment, you may be startled to find that you feel joy and confidence in your body right now, even as it is.

“Add the good”

We cut calories, restrict sugar, prohibit ourselves from eating dairy, carbs, etc, etc, etc. We focus way too much on all the things we need to take out of our lives, or stop doing, that it can get incredibly overwhelming and drains us of our energy. We need to trust that God has created us with all of the internal tools that we need to live a healthy life and we don’t need to rely on strict diets or other regimens created by others in order to achieve optimal health. Instead of taking things out of your life, focus only on “adding more of the good.” Over time, the good habits begin to naturally crowd out the bad ones and you begin to reap the benefits without feeling restricted and restrained. For example, instead of cutting out carbs, focus on adding 5-6 servings of green leafy vegetables into your daily routine. Spend your energy in finding ways to make them appealing and delicious instead of focusing on all that you “shouldn’t” be having. Or instead of saying “no sugar,” decide that you deserve the highest quality of treats and will only eat the ones that fit that criteria. Each time you put some sugar in your mouth, you can think to yourself, “Is this the very best treat I could find for myself today?” If it isn’t, get rid of it and find something that is satisfying and worthy of your time. Then take the time to sit down and actually savor every single bite of it.

Recognize that the body and spirit are connected

The scriptures teach us that the “body and spirit are the soul of man.” (D&C 88:15) Oftentimes we imagine that our body and spirit are mortal enemies at war with one another–our body being fallen and carnal–and we just need our spirit to overpower our body and force it into submission. However, we learn from the scriptures that they are not enemies at all, nor should they be fighting with one another. In fact, “spirit and [body], inseparably connected, receive a fulness of joy; and when separated man cannot receive a fulness of joy.” (D&C 93:33-34 Emphasis added).

Our body and spirit are physically together at this time, however, is it possible that they are disconnected? When we live a life of self-loathing and don’t treat our bodies the way that our Heavenly Father intended us to treat them, we disconnect our spirit from the very thing it needs to fulfill its earthly mission. When we are living in the future, waiting for a “perfect body” in order to reach out and do the things that God needs us to do as women, we are disconnecting ourselves from our body and thus cannot experience true joy. When we deprive and starve ourselves into a certain pair of jeans, we are disconnecting ourselves. When we over-exercise to the point of exhaustion and punish ourselves through too much physical activity in order to balance our calorie intake, we are disconnecting. When we ignore our bodies innate need to be active and binge to the point of feeling sick, we are disconnecting. We cannot do those things to our body without hurting our spirit, and we cannot think deprecating thoughts about ourselves without injuring our bodies.

Base your self-image on the opinion of the One who sees you as you really are

As we move forward into the new year, seeking to become a better version of us, I hope that we will be kind and patient with ourselves. There are enough messages in the world telling women that we are “not enough,” but we don’t need to subscribe to any of them. A joy-filled, fulfilling life can be achieved at any size, and it is found through tethering ourselves to the One who sees us as we really are and knows what we really can become. He gave His life and rose again on the third day so that we could have our bodies forever, and so that we could live in our glorified body with Him and His Father. Let Him teach you who you are and from where your true value and worth comes.

Consider the following questions: What is something that I can add into my life to help my spirit and body be “inseparably connected?” Are there social media accounts or other things that are keeping me from making peace with my own body? What can I do to better understand the sanctity of my body and its role in helping me to fulfill my personal mission?

Feel free to comment below with any questions or thoughts you may have.