How does your body image affect you? Does what you see in the mirror make or break your day? Are you among the 97% of women who are critical and cruel to their bodies on a regular basisi.

Are you aware of what happens when you notice your reflection? Do you find yourself focusing on judging your stomach, thighs or maybe your hair or skin? Maybe you get that familiar sinking feeling as your eyes rest on the part of your body you dislike? Or maybe you feel dread as you notice how old you look, and then fantasise about looking younger?

Do you find yourself organising your life around how feel about your body? Maybe, getting up early to make sure you have plenty of time to make sure you look just right? Or, it could be you stop yourself wearing your favourite clothes because you’re waiting until you’re the right size and shape.

What is body image?

If you recognised yourself in any of this, you’re not alone. Many women and men feel exactly the same, allowing their body image to dictate their lives.

Body image is how you feel about your physical appearance. It includes your thoughts, feelings, and attitudes about your body.

The term “body image” is often only used to talk about issues or problems you may have with your body. But, regardless of how you feel about your body, everyone has a body image. And it can be positive, negative or a mixture of both.

A positive body image means you feel good about your body and accept it for what it is and does. It doesn’t necessarily mean loving your body. Certainly though, it does mean being able to look in the mirror and feeling comfortable with what you see.

A negative body image can have a detrimental impact on your mental and physical health. It can lead to anxiety, depression, disordered eating, and even eating disorders and other health issues. It can also make it difficult to form healthy relationships and enjoy life to the full .ii

If worrying about your body is making you anxious, have a look at Five practical ways to tackle weight anxiety and feel better in your body.

Experiencing your body

Your body image is how you experience your body. It includes the feeling of your clothes on your skin, the sensations in your stomach when you are hungry or aches and pains in the body. It also includes the shape of your body, the tone of your muscles, your skin and the way your hair falls around your face.

For more, check out https://www.blossomhypnotherapy.com/the-benefits-of-body-awareness/

The four areas of body image

Body image has four overlapping components

1. How you see your body. When most people think about their body image they think about what it looks like. Certainly, how you think you look is not always a correct representation of how you actually do look. For instance, you may see yourself as being overweight when you’re actually underweight.
2. How you feel about your body. This is how satisfied, dissatisfied or neutral you feel about your shape, weight and your body.
3. The way you think about your body. This is how you think about your body. It’s also the amount of time you spend thinking about your body and planning to change it .
4. What you do as as a result of your body image. If you’re unhappy with the way you look, you may stop seeing friends because you feel bad about your appearance. Or you may spend so much time going to the gym or trying to change your body that you stop doing the things you enjoy.

Body image can change

Your body image isn’t fixed, so you can change and improve it. It’s something that can be learned. It can take time and effort , but the more you practice, the more your body image improves. Working on your body image can help you to stop fighting with your body, find the courage to try new things and to live a life you enjoy.

When I work with clients who want to improve their body image we work together gradually and slowly to change the way the feel about their body. We look at how they can spend less time worrying about their body image and more on living the life they want.

Have a look at https://www.blossomhypnotherapy.com/five-ways-to-boost-self-esteem/and https://www.blossomhypnotherapy.com/how-to-have-healthy-habits/for more ways to help your body image.

Here are my top five ways to help you improve your body image. Improving body image can take time. Each step can be learnt and built upon. By taking these steps one by one, you can start to live your life on your own terms.

1. Do a body scan

One way to improve your body image is to start to notice how you feel inside your skin. If you struggle with your body image, you may be aware you rarely pay attention to the sensations inside your body as all you focus is on how your body looks.

A body scan is an exercise that helps you to notice your body image from the inside out. During the body scan exercise you pay attention to the physical sensations throughout your body. The goal isn’t to change or relax your body, but instead to notice and become more aware of it.

Start by paying attention to the sensations in your feet. Notice any sensations such as warmth, coolness, pressure, pain, or a breeze moving over your skin. Slowly move up your body–to your calves, thighs, pelvis, stomach, chest, back, shoulders, arms, hands, fingers, neck, and finally your head. Spend some time on each of these body parts, just noticing the sensations.
After you travel up your body, begin to move back down, through each body part, until you reach your feet again.

2. Dress as if you have the body you want

Don’t wait to have the perfect body to dress how you want and in a way that makes you feel good. Let go of any clothes that are too small and uncomfortable. Feeling out of place in your clothes will bring your attention back to focusing on your body. Instead buy and wear clothes that are comfortable, fit well and are flattering. If you enjoy wearing bright colours or patterns, then make sure to wear them. The more you enjoy what you are wearing, the better you will start to feel about your body.

3. Learn to tame your inner critic

We all have an inner critic who acts like a judgmental Sergeant Major living inside our heads. It’s the inner critic that comes up with all those negative thoughts about yourself..

The inner critic typically says,

“You’re old.”

“You’re fat.”

“You look awful in that”,

“You’re so unfit and unattractive”,etc

The inner critic has many guises. It can sound self-soothing, luring you to do things and then punishing you for giving in. For example, it may say, “Have that second piece of cake. You’ve been so healthy all week.” Or it will tell you, “You’ve had a hard day. Just rest on the sofa. You don’t have to go outside and be active.” Then, as soon as you’ve done what it say, it shouts at you, “I can’t believe you messed up again. You’ll never lose weight. You just sit around all day eating chocolate!” The critical inner voice is working all the time to create creating a vicious cycle that keeps you stuck.

When you start to notice those critical thoughts, try responding with a compassionate and helpful response. You could try to reply to those thoughts the way you would to a close friend  who was saying those things about themselves, For instance if your mind starts telling you “Your waist is too thick. You need to lose weight” You could try replying “There’s nothing wrong with my waist. I take care of my body and am shapely and attractive.”

Try not to allow your inner critic to steer you off course. Instead respond to it with kindness and understanding, so that it gradually starts to lose it’s hold over you.

4. Learn Self-Hypnosis

Hypnosis allows you to experience positive thoughts and images as if they are real. Using self-hypnosis can support any changes you want to make to the way you think and feel about your body image.  It can help you to learn to respond to situations and emotions in new and helpful ways. Self-hypnosis harnesses the power of your mind and teaches it to work for you in the way you would like.  You can use self hypnosis to focus on the changes you would like to make to your body image.  You can also use it to imagine what it would be like to feel differently about your body and what that would mean to you.

For more on how hypnosis can help you have a look at https://www.blossomhypnotherapy.com/how-can-hypnotherapy-help-me/

5. Focus on what’s important to you

This exercise helps you to see how your body image affects you and what you could be doing differently.

Find somewhere comfortable to sit and where you know you won’t be disturbed. Close your eyes while you imagine that you are eighty years old and you are looking back on your life as it is right now.

Notice what you spend your time doing. Are these the activities you enjoy? What would you like to be doing? What will your 80 year old self think about how you spend your time? Will your 80 year old self want you to be spending your time and energy on your body image? What would they want you to be doing?

Now finish the following sentences:

I spent too much time worrying about…..

I spent too little time doing things such as…….

If I could go back in time, then what I would do differently from today onward is…..

Would you like to make living life easier, right now? Get your free Live Life on Your Terms recording here and begin to live your life with confidence.

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