4 ways to Boost Body Confidence

As the saying goes, perception is reality and when it comes to battling our body demons, new research published suggests that the way we interpret our friend's body image concerns influences how we feel about our own bodies.

So every time a friend says “I’m sooo out of shape” or “I’m sooo fat” or “ I hate my …..insert body part” it has an indirect but proven negative impact on how we perceive our own body and how we view our own health.

Crazy right? So what can we do to prevent this type of behaviour and boost our body confidence?

1. Acknowledge (and Stop) Fat Talk

I’m sorry to say this but women are notorious for passing the baton when it comes to body image and men are gradually catching up over the last few years.

If a woman says “I’m so fat” her girlfriend is practically obligated to say “no, I’m the fat one. Have you seen my thighs?’”

Studies show that even women who don’t actually feel negatively about their bodies will engage in this type of behaviour and eventually over time it can cause them to question their body image.

One of the best ways to break this vicious cycle and avoid negative self-body shaming is to respond with a positive response, flip the script and change the focus of the conversation to something more positive or simply don't respond…refuse to feed the negativity.

2. Put Action Before Appearance

Shift your focus from what your body looks like to what it can do,

Instead of saying “I hate my thighs” ask yourself: What do your thighs allow you to do? Maybe it becomes more like “my legs are getting really powerful” which allows me to try training with weights and learning to barbell squat, run or swim which makes me feel strong, empowered and awesome while improving my health and shape.

“When you can talk positively about yourself in terms of what your body is capable of doing, you start to view your body in a very different way,”

3. Identify Body Parts You Love

Make sure you’re also focusing on the things that you love about yourself. A lot of people tend to look at themselves in the mirror and say horrible things about themselves because it’s easier and dare I say it more comfortable to be negative than it is to say something self-praising.

Affirming these thoughts verbally out loud only underscores and endorses the behaviour.

Pick a body part that you love and talk out loud about it. In the exact same way, if you’re saying “My butt looks great in these jeans,” (because I’m killing those barbell squats in the gym haha) then you’re hearing that, too. You may feel silly and awkward the first few times but stick with it, it really does have an impact.

4 Why not be as nice to yourself as you are to the people you love?

This was a real eye-opener for me. When you automatically embark on an unprovoked berating of yourself with a barrage of insults take a second to ask yourself a simple but very powerful question, “would I say this to my daughter…or my best friend, my wife or my sister, or my mother?”

Do you honestly think anyone deserves to be spoken to this way? If you can’t imagine speaking to someone you love and respect this way then why would you permit this behaviour towards yourself?

We all have the ability to stop this all too common self-shaming. Imagine if we had the confidence to refuse to condone or partake in this type of behaviour.

What if we actively called our friends out when they began to casually act this way. Imagine if we told them that it's unacceptable. What impact would we have on this almost self-indulgent, narcissistic focus on negative body image?

Don't allow the boundaries between being sympathetic and endorsement to be blurred.

I’d also like to point out that our children learn so much more from how we behave in social environments than they do from what they are told “how to” behave, so when they overhear your casual conversations over coffee as they play they are listening and learning…Lead by example

We are all soo much more than the sum of our body parts. We are all perfect for who we choose to be right now.

be safe, be active, be creative and
as always try and be kind to each other

peace…Keith