Before we start this, give yourself a few minutes and answer these questions ;
-What are the three things you like about the way you look?
-What are the three things you like about yourself that has nothing to do with how you look?--What does a positive body image mean?
I know, these are some very simple yet awkwardly hard question. We are always our own critics, don’t believe? When was the last time you said something nice to yourself? Think about it, we are all guilty of bashing ourselves. ESPECIALLY on how we look.
What is body image? I can tell you what is NOT body image. Body image is not about how you physically look nor your beauty or attractiveness. Body image is how you think about your body. It is developed through interactions with people and the social world. Body image is our mental picture of ourselves, it’s what allows us to become ourselves.
Body image is determined by 4 factors :
1. How you SEE your body is your perceptual body image.
This is not always a correct representation of how you actually look. Most of the time , this is incorrect. For example : Someone might think that he/she is overweight but in real life they might not.
2.The way you FEEL about your body is your affective body image.
This relates to the amount of satisfaction or dissatisfaction you feel about your shape, weight, and individual body parts. It involves your feelings and you are most likely to hear words like I hate, I dislike, I love * insert body part*
3.The way you THINK about your body is your cognitive body image.
It is your mental action and this can lead to preoccupation with body shape and weight. For instant, it will lead someone to believe that if they become skinnier or more muscular, they will be happier.
4. Behaviours in which you engage as a result of your body image encompass your behavioural body image.
When a person is dissatisfied with the way he/she looks, they may isolate/avoid themselves to their peers because they feel bad about their appearance.
People struggle with negative body image often have an imaginary ideal perfection in their head to achieve. But do you really want to be ‘Perfect’? Or do you want to be real? Being imaginary perfect is like an infinite long perfectly straight-line that only exist in our head. It inflicts in the human body and becomes those images we have plastered inside of our head, images that had been photoshopped into perfect symmetrical, flawless and unattainable standards of beauty.
How about real perfect? Real perfect is different. Real perfect is good enough. Real perfect means that something is fully, wholly, completely itself. Like a tree. When we look at the tree, we can see both imperfection and its beauty. Maybe one side has too many branches and one side is bare, but it is perfectly itself. Like us. We are perfect because we are already fully ourselves.
So, give yourself a break. Let’s be perfectly imperfect. We are not meant to achieve imaginary level of perfections. We are meant to be fully ourselves. Focus on what your body can do, focus on all the wonderful things that your body has been allowing you to do. Rather than spending time thinking about how you can change or manipulate your body to look a certain way, or how to get the ‘perfect body’. What exactly is the perfect body anyways?
So I urge you to dump the idealised version of perfection and give yourself permission to be flawed, wonderful, messy and very human. Redefine perfection , give perfect a definition that includes you as you are and don’t forget to love your body. Loving your body doesn’t have to have anything to do with how it looks.
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