Body Image Healing
Reflections on Poor Self-Image
“I look at pictures of people on Instagram and decide who I want to look like.”
“I can never date with the body I have now.”
“Even if I have the best resume, employers won’t hire someone who looks like me.”
These are all statements I’ve heard from clients over the years.
Culture’s False Ideal
Like it or not, we live in a culture that puts a lot of emphasis on how we look.
From an early age, each of us receives bombardment from images of the “perfect” body.
Even small children compare themselves with this unattainable ideal.
Self-Criticism Lowers Self-Esteem
A poor body image, where you don’t like what you look like in the mirror, does a number on self-esteem.
Even when you feel accomplished in other areas of your life, if you think you look “not thin enough, too fat, or misshaped,” your life is likely to feel like hell.
You continuously want to hide. You avoid eating in front of others; you don’t want to get too close to anyone.
“They don’t want to know me. I hate myself too much for that. I must hide!”
Sometimes you can hide it but…
People don’t see that you are comparing yourself to the others around you. You always worry that someone may detect your insecurity.
You feel acute anxiety, tingling, and flushed in work meetings, making it hard to breathe.
You don’t remember how it started, but you now weigh yourself every day – sometimes many times per day. And you continuously look for new diets that presumably help with the loss of extra weight in no time at all.
Even though your efforts sometimes work, it doesn’t take long for that weight to come back, and then some.
Worried About How Others Perceive You
You know everyone is looking at you and is thinking about how ugly you are.
It’s hard to concentrate when you are in a group because you know they are silently judging you. All you can think about is what you look like.
Your fear of how others see you may result from earlier childhood reminders. Perhaps your mother, sister, or friends implanted such worries as they commented how ugly they looked in the mirror. Those memories may be old, but they still haunt you.
Time for Positive Reflection
Let me help you heal all those awful feelings about the way you look.
Our outside does not define our inside.
The truth is that we are all uniquely ourselves. And everybody is perfectly imperfect.
It’s so easy to get caught up in the social media standards of beauty. We feel bad about ourselves by seeing a picture of someone we don’t even know.
Let’s find a way not to have to look like someone else but to embrace looking like you.
Contact me today!