Your Strongest Body

3 Strategies To Navigate Bad Body Image Days

• Betsy Foster • Season 1 • Episode 12

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If you've ever had your day derailed and your mood turned upside down because you don't like the reflection in the mirror, this episode is for you. In this episode I share three tried-and-true tactics to help you conquer those bad body image days (because they happen to everybody). These are practical steps you can take whenever you need them, and they're designed to help you regain control when your self-perception threatens to get the better of you.

I share the various factors that can drastically influence our body image, how to garner grace for yourself when you are not feeling your best and how taking care of our body and mind, through self-care, can profoundly shape our body image.

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Speaker 1:

You are listening to your strongest body. Hi, I'm Betsy Foster, a certified strength and conditioning specialist and certified nutrition coach. I've worked as a personal trainer for over a decade helping people build strength, speed, muscles as well as a deep appreciation for their bodies and confidence that helps them live their life to the fullest. Now I'm sharing what I know with you fitness, nutrition and all the deeper stuff to help you discover your strongest body. Hello, hello, welcome back, betsy.

Speaker 1:

Here Today we're talking about body image. I'm going to jump right into this one. I do like to start these kinds of episodes with a little bit of a disclaimer at the start. One is that personally, betsy, I present as a conventionally fit white woman who so many challenges and issues around body discrimination and the cultural values we hold up against certain bodies. I fall into a very protected category. I even amongst personal trainers, I have a what is like a very conventionally fit body. So when I'm speaking about body image, I think it's important to acknowledge that to start and just say that some of the things that I speak about. I can also acknowledge that other folks deal with much greater challenges as to being included, being accepted, being able to live their life freely from prejudices around different body sizes, body appearances, body presentation, so I think that's important. When it comes down to it, there are a lot of things that I talk about that affect different people in different size bodies very differently. How many times can I say differently? The other thing I want to say with anything like this you know this podcast and my advice expertise is not that of a licensed mental health counselor, and so if you're ever experiencing something where you feel like you need additional help, you'd want to seek that out and you don't want to take my advice as a medical directive. If that makes sense, this can be something in which you can listen to and use to support your own fitness journey, your own journey with your self image and your body image, and know that you also may need additional pieces of support and professional assistance in other areas. So I just like to say that at the start. Now we can get into it. So what we're going to talk about today are three strategies you can use for tackling bad body image days.

Speaker 1:

Bad body image days I think if you are a person living in a body, you have likely experienced a bad body image day or a bad body image moment that is going to happen, regardless of the body that you live in, and a little bit because societally sometimes we are almost made to feel bad about our bodies. You can sell a lot of products If you can sell a lot of programs. If you make someone feel bad about their bodies and feel as if, in order to be worthy or accepted or feel good about themselves, they need to change their bodies, and our brains work in that way as well, sort of kind of tricking us and sort of playing games on us. So these things are inevitable. Even when you have reached what might be the pinnacle of your own body image self image journey, where you feel most times you have a really A really nuanced understanding of how you view your own body. You view your body as something that is really valuable and something that gives back to you as well as you are more than your body.

Speaker 1:

Even when you reach that point, you're going to have days where you look in the mirror or you look at a picture and you do not like the way your body looks, and so that's what we're talking about. And why are we going to feel that way? Because body image is fluid. It is something that is always changing. It's changing because of the lighting or the time of day or the clothes that you're wearing. It's also changing because of the things that we're experiencing in our own lives. We're tired, we're cranky, we're dealing with stress. Some large life event has just changed ourselves and our body, either are lots of emotions that you're experiencing that are all contributing to the way that you view your own body and the way that your body looks.

Speaker 1:

And then we've got all the societal stuff that comes in Social media or just media in general constructs about bodies that we hear kind of thrown our way all the time. It's all going to be inputs for the way we then look at that reflection that is staring back at us or in that image that's staring back at us, and so many of us have such great and wonderful kind of relationships with yourself. And then you look at an image and it doesn't quite match what you think it should look like or it is. You know who you are and what you bring to the table. And then society has these sort of bogus standards and always changing standards. Just don't forget that the body part of the year is the ideal body part, and then we change that over time, as industries and things change. But that's kind of a bigger conversation.

Speaker 1:

So the first step in just in sort of dealing with these, these bad body image moments, these days where it just does not feel like you can change your mind about how you look or you are feeling something very different than you experience most days when you look at yourself, is accepting that these days are going to happen and that these moments are going to happen. What our goal is going to be is to have them occur less frequently or, when they do occur, have them derail us less, so we don't want to lose our day or our momentum, or our drive or our happiness every time we experience something where we are unhappy with the way our bodies look. And so that is what the goal here ultimately is for us to experience that less, or have the tools to handle it in the moment, so that it causes less of a tsunami in our life and is merely just a little ripple that we can move on past, that we can swim through, if we're using that metaphor. So I have three strategies. These are really practical, tactical strategies. You can use all three of them, you can use two of them or one of them. You can mix and match depending on the level of severity of how you're feeling in a given moment, and some are going to work for different things and they're just something that you can try in that moment.

Speaker 1:

To get past that moment. You may ultimately need more dedicated time, more like I was talking about earlier. You might need to seek professional services for which you can speak a little bit more about your body image and someone who is licensed can guide you through the tools in which to overcome that long term. These are sort of like in the moment, but these are great tools to use if this is something that's happening at one moment and you want to get past it. So the number one strategy and I think if you're going to nail one of these and or really just like put some time into it, I would put it into this first one, because I think you are going to be really pleasantly surprised with this strategy.

Speaker 1:

So this number one strategy is going to be about asking self reflection questions. So in that moment when you're feeling awful and I know this can be hard it can be hard when you are in a let's just call it like a bad brain space and you are sort of spiraling and you know that you're feeling a certain way about you, know your body, the when you look at yourself. But if you, if you have these questions in your back pocket, you're going to start to be able to cycle through them more readily. They're going to come. They're going to come to you more naturally and they're going to help you almost deescalate that sense of I hate the way I look. So, number one the question that we're asking ourselves is what other things, feelings, experiences, elements of my life could be contributing to why I'm feeling this way. I know it seems obvious, but people don't do this. They don't, in that moment, try to step out of their own body and ask why and what is contributing to me feeling this way? Because everyone just assumes it's oh, because my body looks like blank Right now. This is all about how you're perceiving how your body looks. So what could be contributing to the way you're interpreting these messages from your brain?

Speaker 1:

Number one I ask clients this all the time, and this is this is so, so helpful. I say have you been able to keep up with the fitness and nutrition habits you've been striving to do, or that you are committed to do or that you usually have time to do. So many times when people are struggling with body image thoughts that are negative, it is because in the last week they have not had time to go to the gym, they have eaten foods that they do not think are the best for their body, or they just don't like the way they feel. They feel like they haven't had control over the foods that they're eating. They feel like they haven't had the time to get the walks in. Everything's been really sedentary. All the things that help them identify as a fit and healthy person, no matter what their body size is, no matter how their body looks. They haven't been able to do those, and so, as soon as you can't do those, you start to feel less like a fit or healthy person. Again, this is regardless of size. This is regardless of where you are in terms of your long-term fitness goals.

Speaker 1:

We're talking about just everyday habits. It starts to you start to see yourself as quote unquote lazy or whatever. I want to be clear that I'm not calling these people, that I'm saying that that's how you're starting to see yourself when you can't accomplish those tasks, when you haven't been able to fit in those habits, those habits that help make up your identity of your best body, of your strongest body. It starts to play those games and listen. There are probably tons of reasons why you may not have been able to fit those in you have a new job, or your kids have a particularly busy travel soccer schedule, or you have all these things that have gotten in the way of you being able to fit that stuff in this week. Will you get back to it? Yeah, next week you have more time, or next month you have more time. So that's going to start to change how you feel about yourself.

Speaker 1:

Once you're able to do that so you can recognize that because you haven't been able to do those things, it's affected the way you see yourself You'll start to be able to understand that maybe who I'm seeing doesn't actually look all that different than what I looked like yesterday, or maybe I'm being hard on myself. No one can be hard enough on themselves to make themselves do something. I truly believe that. But maybe, I don't know, maybe it works for somebody. I think, more often than not, showing compassion and then creating habits and structures that help you get there is going to be infinitely more successful in the long term. But so just check in with yourself.

Speaker 1:

Has this week been a little off? Have you had more parties to go to, where you're eating foods that you don't normally eat, or you've had more alcohol, or you've had less sleep? Okay, so, yes, you have. Is there anything you can do about those behaviors in the upcoming days that will help you feel less like this and that might change your perception of yourself when you look in the mirror? Even if you can't get all of them in? Let's say, you're usually a five time a week gym person. You haven't gotten there any time this last week, but next week, you know you can squeeze in too. Move the bar to help yourself get there.

Speaker 1:

So that's a huge question what is what's different about my health habits, my nutrition habits, my fitness habits right now? That might be changing the way I see myself. If I haven't been as successful or committed, or even just able to fit things in, it might affect the way I see myself. That's a big first question, and usually when people can clue into that, they can understand why, even if it doesn't change how they perceive themselves in that moment. I'm not saying you're going to, you're going to make yourself, just fall in love with your body in that moment, but you might give yourself some room and go oh, this is why I'm feeling this way. I can't really change it right now, but this is why I'm feeling this way.

Speaker 1:

Some of the other questions to ask yourself am I dealing with anything really stressful in my life? Okay, sometimes we forget that, but, like, if you have something that's super stressful, it's going to impact everything. It's going to impact all those habits, but it's also going to impact how you see yourself. Is there anything subconsciously stressful going on, going on in my life? Do I have to start to even dig deeper to understand, maybe, what is standing in the way of me being able to truly see how I look and or how I feel about myself when I look at in the mirror? Am I tired or hungry or anxious or any of those things? What about those things are contributing to the way I see myself? And, hormonally, what is going on?

Speaker 1:

If you are a woman, you may have experienced, and if you are a person who has a period and you have experienced a premenstrual cycle, you may know that you don't love the way you look in that moment or, all of a sudden, all the things that you liked wearing, you hate looking at. They don't look good on you anymore. In your mind this is not a fake. It's what's happening in your body and how it's affecting your own perceptions of yourself. So give yourself a minute. Even if you can't change it, even if you can't magically make it go away, you can at least understand where it's coming from and give yourself some grace, let yourself off the hook.

Speaker 1:

Notice, in all of that and I think it's important I wish I'd kind of said it in the beginning nowhere in this three strategies that I have for you am I saying that you need to just say you love yourself. I'm not even saying you need to find a body part and say how much you love it and say how much you appreciate it. I want you to banish those bad thoughts. I want you to. I'm not saying any of that. I call a little BS on that. You can't just talk yourself into loving a part of your body in any given moment, not if you're mentally not there. That's a little bit of that toxic positivity to me too, because it's unrealistic. So I'm not saying you got to leave this moment absolutely in love with your body. You just need to have better understanding of why you are experiencing this bad body image and then hopefully being able to move on. Hopefully you will feel a little more neutral the next time, or you will feel a lot of body love the next time you look or in the future. But in this moment it's not going to derail your life, it's not going to take steal your worth from you. It's not going to steal your ability to go and have fun and do all the things that you love to do, just because you're looking at yourself and you're seeing something through filters that are making you feel less about yourself. I want you to live your life regardless of how, in that moment, you're feeling about your own body.

Speaker 1:

Number one was that those self-reflection questions, going through those questions. Really, just be an honest with yourself and say what's going on right now? That might be the thing that's bothering me. What's going on right now? That might be the thing that's setting this off. If I can't change it, that's fine, but at least I'm aware of it. Number two is to have a go-to pick-me-up for these moments. So right, you can't change it, you feel this way.

Speaker 1:

What is my go-to pick-me-up? Is my go-to pick-me-up an outfit that I know, regardless of how I looked in the mirror, this is the one that feels great, even if you wear that outfit all the time. If that's the pick-me-up that's going to bust you out of that moment, allow you to go to the party with your friends or stand in the picture with your family because you want to be in that picture. I promise you want to look back and you want to have gotten in the picture. What is it going to be? Is it an outfit that is the right outfit for you, that you can always turn to? Is it an activity? Do you know that if you just drop everything and you go do this one thing, it's going to help you feel better?

Speaker 1:

Then have that in your back pocket. Maybe it's a way you wear your hair, maybe it's a certain kind of makeup that you like. Maybe it's that your pick-me-up is going to get a coffee, whatever it might be. Maybe it's going to read a book. Maybe it's going to do a skill that you know you're really good at and it helps you. It makes you feel better. So you go code. Maybe you're a coder. I'm trying to think of any skill that I have. You go do something that gives you that sense of competency that you need to just bump you up from that place. That's feeling low, have it and have it be. And maybe you have two or three things that you always pick up out of your back pocket to pick yourself up, but just have it there and know that it's okay to lean on that in those moments, because sometimes you just can't change how you feel, and actually trying to change how you feel might exacerbate the problem. So how can you just get yourself out of that a little bit?

Speaker 1:

And then, lastly, number three move your body. Move your body. Moving your body is magical. I know I sound like pretty woo-woo and I have a crystal or two, just admitting, but I'm pretty practical too. Moving your body is magical. Moving your body is magical. The things, the systems, the physiological systems in your body as you move are incredible. There is so much going on. There is so much that is helping support your life. And when you move you have an opportunity to subconsciously or consciously appreciate what your body is and what it does, more than just this one glimpse in the mirror or this one picture that you don't like.

Speaker 1:

Moving your body allows you to reconnect with your body. And I don't mean go do an intense workout to punish yourself. Don't make yourself miserable. The reason that you're moving in that moment is not to change how your body looks. You're allowed to do that over time. If that's your goal, I mean, you're allowed to do whatever you want. But that's not the strategy here. The strategy is not look at myself, I don't like it, so I gotta go work out to make it look better. No, no, I'm talking about movement. So it can be a workout, it can be a walk, it can be a bike ride, it can be a yoga class, it can be whatever you want it to be, and it does not have to be intense. If intense exercise allows you to reconnect with your body and appreciate what it can do, then great. If not, if gentle movement does that, if a walk outside where you can breathe fresh air does that, then that's a good idea.

Speaker 1:

Moving your body as a punishment is not the goal here. It's never the goal, in my opinion. But it's not the goal when you're upset about how you look. It's truly about giving yourself a moment to appreciate all that. This whole body is beyond its image and I'll tell you, I think sweat is wildly cathartic. I think working out, raising your heart rate and a couple beads of sweat can be a very, very helpful thing, because this too, this too, shall pass, this moment, this feeling, and these are the ways we can get it to pass, either quicker or we can get on with our lives and hopefully, the next time we come back to that mirror, we have a different feeling. We have a different feeling. So let me remind you of those three strategies.

Speaker 1:

Again, none of my strategies are just learn to love yourself. This is a very important part of my life. This is, this is that's not it. That's not it for me, for me, at least, and for the people I work with. I try. You don't have to love everything at every moment. I want you to discover love for your body. I do want you to go beyond neutrality to actually absolutely loving your body. But that is beyond just how it looks. It's how it moves, it's how it feels, it's how it shows up in your life. It's about all of those things. But for these bad body image days that we will not be able to escape entirely, even if we are at our you know highest elevation, our highest vibrations, so to speak, we're not going to get rid of them entirely. So these are the ways we can get past it, maybe feel better and at least not let it derail our life.

Speaker 1:

Number one is going to ask some important self-reflection questions. What are the things that could be contributing to making me feel this way? My favorite in the realm of health and fitness is what fitness and nutrition habits have I not been able to maintain? Or what behaviors do I wish I had normally been doing or had I had the goal of doing that I haven't been able to do. That changes your self-perception. It's not a slap on the wrist, it's a reminder hey, I wasn't able to do these things that make me feel stronger, healthier, happier, prouder of my body. So I might be feeling a little picky about how my body looks. It's just an observation. Other questions about what's stressful in your life are you sleeping? Where are you in your menstrual cycle? Things like that.

Speaker 1:

Number two have a go-to pick me up, something that you can lean on when you're having a moment like this to help you get out of it, whether it's an outfit, whether it's a activity, whether it's something that reminds you of all the things that you love about yourself. To get you back in that space. And number three is to move your body, not as punishment, not as a way to change the things you saw in the mirror, but merely as a way to reconnect with all the wonderful things that go beyond your body's physical appearance and allow you to live your life the way you want to. Okay, I hope this is helpful. A reminder that this isn't in to replace any sort of therapy or medical help that you might be seeking or need. This is merely some strategies for you if you're struggling with some of these more acute or temporary thoughts.

Speaker 1:

Alright, if this is helpful, if you liked it. If you are interested in talking about some more elements of it, just let me know. I'd love to hear your feedback. I am so grateful that you take the time to listen to this. If you want to share the podcast, that's amazing. If you want to rate review, that's amazing. If you want to continue to listen, that's even even better. Thank you for your time, as always, and now I want you to go build your strongest body and until next time, bye.