Body Image Challenge Day 1

The Challenge:

  Write for at least ten minutes in your journal expressing gratitude for all the things your body allows you to do. 

Also today and throughout the 10 day challenge refrain from weighing yourself.  

To download the 10 day body image challenge and do it with me click on this link: https://recapturingbeauty.byu.edu/challenge/

The not weighing myself part was really easy for me because I don't weigh myself anymore :) Its so freeing to focus on how I feel and my health rather than a stupid number that I'm never going to be happy with anyways, and that doesn't necessarily reflect my health.
My journal experience was awesome! I use to do things like this at CFC all the time and I always find it very helpful, I'm going to try to do it more often!
While I was writing I got to thinking about how positive body image doesn't come from loving how you look, in fact it doesn't come from outer appearance at all. Instead it comes from appreciating the person you are- the soul you are; and appreciating all that your body allows you to experience and enjoy. I've asked myself the question, why is it important for me to take care of my physical body? I've come to realize its because it effects my soul. By caring for our bodies we are caring for the home of our souls. When we don't care for our physical bodies (by either eating too much or too little, or working out too much or not being active) we are damaging our souls and cheating our potential. My commitment to be healthy (true healthy not the medias distorted idea of healthy) has changed from a physical goal to a spiritual goal. My reasons behind wanting to be healthy stem from wanting to have a sharp mind and the energy I need to become the best I can be. Not to see a certain # on the scale or fit into my skinny jeans.
I also thought about how grateful I am to be a woman of strength! I don't want to be itty bitty, I am proud of my curves! Now days it seems like women are suppose to live up to this standard of being so skinny and physically perfect that they are portrayed as FRAIL and WEAK. NO! What is that?! Women are suppose to be strong! Real Woman have character and purpose! We are not equivalent to a clothes hanger or mannequin nor can we be used, manipulated or coaxed into believing that we have to fit a certain "standard" or "mold" of beauty, or that our beauty or worth is connected in any way to our outer appearance. The painted pictures in the media of how women are suppose to be now days is so sad to me. What happened to beauty of the mind and of the heart? The kind of beauty you can feel, not see.

I am grateful for everything that makes me unique and different. I love my curly hair! At CFC we had a body image challenge day and I remember I was given the challenge to wear a short sleeve shirt and to do my hair curly (scary I know! but it was difficult for me at the time). Now I do my hair curly all the time, I use to always straiten it but now I love how unique it is! I am grateful for everything that makes me, me.

Also I am so grateful my body works properly and that I am healthy, that I can walk, talk, hear, see, smell, touch, taste, that every part of me is working properly. That is something I often taken for granted. There are so many people out there who struggle and suffer because of poor health. How can I complain about the size of my calves or worry about the size of my thighs when without my legs I would be completely dependant on other people to do pretty much everything for me! Wow what an ungrateful thought. I just think this appearance obsessed world has there priorities all mixed up.

I am so grateful for my body and all that it allows me to experience, learn and ENJOY! Even all the bad crappy stuff because without all the bad crappy stuff I wouldn't know all the amazing, serene, wonderful stuff! Our bodies really are a miracle and a masterpiece and I am especially grateful that my body has recovered from ED and all the damage I did to it. Our bodies are amazing! And we might as well LOVE the ones we are given because they are the only ones we get! I love my body because its mine. I am so happy to be at a place where I can trust my body and where I truly am loving it, its an amazing feeling that once upon a time was so foreign to me.
GO RECOVERY!!!

Truth:

D&C 101:37 Therefore, care not for the body neither the life of the body; but care for the soul and for the life of the soul.

Samuel 16:7 ...for the lord seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance but the lord looketh on the heart.