Podcast Ep 25: My Experience – How To Be Body Positive?

The pressure to feel positively towards your body can be overwhelming. How can we practically feel this love for ourselves while taking away this pressure? I share my experiences and how I help myself to feel good about my body. Listen here to know more, but if you can’t have a listen, then you can read what I’ve said too:

My Experience: How to be Body Positive?

“Helloooo, I’m Shruti and this is my podcast space where I speak about life lessons, chronic conditions, mental and physical health tips and experiences.

Please note that this podcast is available in text format on my website allthingsendometriosis.com in the podcast section. And very importantly, this podcast does not aim to substitute any medical advice because I am not a medical professional. I’m just sharing what I’ve observed and learnt over time.

A few months back, I did a podcast on forcing yourself to be positive – it’s actually episode 8 in case you wish to listen to it later.

In that podcast I spoke of how it’s important to be able to let out your emotions even if they’re negative because suppressing them because you’re supposed to be positive can be counter productive.

Now the other day, I revisited an IGTV video I had done in April 2019 on Body Positivity.

So I thought to mix up what I said then and my take on it today because some of the talk on body positivity, just like the talk on being positive can be toxic and we may not even realise how it may be harming us.

So here goes – here’s what I said in that IGTV video in April 2019…

There’s a lot of talk about body positivity – accepting how you are – accepting others etc… it’s all good stuff. It’s all great because it means we’re not looking to pull ourselves or others down based on how fat – thin, fair – dark, tall – short we are.

Again this is all great – but what isn’t right is when there is a nonchalant attitude of “hey this is how I am – if I’m fat, so what, if I’m thin, so what..”… yep frankly, so what!

Now let me shift the discussion a bit – body positivity shouldn’t just be focussed on appearing confident with how we are – the focus should also be on taking care of ourselves.

So let me explain. I don’t feel positive about my body by just saying – “hey my skin is deteriorating, but i’ve accepted it” and that’s where it ends – in fact, acceptance is the first thing – what about the next stage, where we respect what we have enough to then take care of it.

Medication and illness has made sure that my skin has blemishes, the tone is getting patchy, I’m getting rashes. I was confident to meet people at my worst a couple of years back – my whole face was covered with scars, so I was confident but I felt I wasn’t really being positive towards myself by JUST accepting it. Even today, I make continuous, regular, loving efforts to take care and help my skin by eating right, applying natural things on my face – for me that’s positivity. Another person’s perception or reaction doesn’t bother me, what matters is whether I am respecting what I have.

Now going back to what I said earlier – “yep, so what, this is how I am..” – again yep, I’ll say… yes so what – frankly we all have a different approach to things, but overall a nonchalant attitude only harms us – it has no bearing on another person – because we all have our own stuff to handle.

So once again, I believe that body positivity can’t stop at just accepting how you are and leaving it at that – it’s truly positive when you also do things that are respectful towards that very body – like eating right, exercising, getting a regular smear test done, or going for teeth cleaning…
Now let’s pause here – that’s what I said in that video – now here’s what I wish to add today.

I still agree and stand by the fact that acceptance is important and that we must work to take care of what we have – but does that come after accepting ourselves, before accepting or is it a part of the acceptance process?

What is bothering me today is the lack of guidance on how we can work to accept ourselves – it’s not easy, there will always be lapses and then there seems to be this added overwhelming silent pressure that we MUST be positive towards our body!

Well mmm we should. We’re gonna be with our body for the rest of our lives so it’s always nice to create a harmonious relationship with it.

I want to share the one thing I do to help me work on the acceptance and maintain that acceptance.
The one thing I do, more than the self-talk is the action.

I take time out to cut my nails, file them, massage my hands and feet, take care of my skin and hair. All these actions are times when I create and build a bond with myself.

It’s me actively loving myself through these actions that makes my body feel cared for. These rituals lead to acceptance. And that answers my earlier question – taking care of ourselves is a part of the acceptance process and it helps maintain that positivity as well.

Yes I get frustrated with aspects of me, but it doesn’t last long enough to have an impact on how positive I feel towards myself – it doesn’t throw me off my path of acceptance or my ability to maintain it. I can brush these off moments quicker because I’m actively building my acceptance brick by brick towards myself – cementing it, making it stronger each time.

So yes, the talk of body positivity can be overwhelming but it doesn’t have to be if we approach it for the right reasons and through action.

I’ve re-shared and shared these thoughts today in the hope it’ll help someone who is searching for HOW to build a positive relationship with their body.

Good luck.. take care and if you wish to get in touch with your thoughts then please DM me on Instagram, my Insta handle is @footprintsnoboundaries or through email [email protected]

Thank you so much for listening… b-bye.”

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I’d love to know what you thought of today’s podcast. Please do share your thoughts in the comments section below…

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Up Next: Podcast Episode 26 – Just a Few Good Friends
(text version will be posted next Sunday, but if you would like to hear it on Spotify, then you can here)

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Disclaimer: I am not a medical professional. I am a patient and have created this platform to share my experiences. This is all purely informative and in no way am I providing medical advice. Please consult a medical professional.