Beginning to Heal Body-Image with Body Neutrality

I have never met a person who was satisfied with their body as it was right at that very second. Particularly among women I work with in my psychotherapy practice, I hear complaints, self-deprecating comments, and how something they are doing related to food, exercise, or anything else just isn’t quite right.

Instead of purely enjoying a dessert or other decadent and delicious food, we often say, “I shouldn’t be eating this.” Why can’t we just say, “This tastes amazing, I love it so much!” This often comes from internalized beliefs about food, and patterns of restrictive diets that lead to food guilt and shame. When given a compliment about an outfit, I often hear it thrown back with a negative, self-rejecting comment, like, “If only I were five (or more) pounds lighter, it would look better.” I hear, “I should be exercising more. I should be eating healthier.” I should, I should, I should… Why is this? Why do so many women hate their bodies and struggle with body-image most of their lives? Why do so many women put so much pressure on themselves to look like what society has deemed to be beautiful, attractive, hot, and sexy?

For those who struggle with emotional eating, disordered eating, or an eating disorder, body-image tends to be the last layer to heal. For so many people, body-image is deeply entrenched and entangled with emotional eating. The long-standing history of feeling less than because of their physical body is old, deeply rooted, and very difficult to shift. Learning how to practice body neutrality allows it to become more possible to shift into gratitude for our bodies, and eventually, maybe even lead to body positivity. Mindfulness, particularly the element of nonjudgment, is essential in this work of true self, and body acceptance in mind, body, and spirit.

So what is body neutrality and how does it help with healing body-image? Body neutrality is a mindfulness practice that creates a neutralizing impact on our relationship with our bodies. Mindfulness is paying attention from moment to moment with a nonjudgemental awareness. Mindfulness allows us to recognize and release judgement in a way that can be neutralizing and have a profound emotional impact. Body neutrality as a mindfulness exercise allows us to focus on facts and functions versus size, shape, judgements, and emotions. When I walk my clients through the process of body neutrality, often there are areas of their body that they struggle with to get to a place of neutrality, however, with time, practice, and more practice, they often find it is indeed possible to accept, and even to love their bodies.

Body neutrality is an exercise that first I have people do in their minds eye. I talk them through each area of their body and encourage them to neutralize any judgements, and consider a fact and/or a function about each body part. For instance, if someone doesn’t like an aspect of their nose, rather than focusing on the judgement or emotion around their nose, can they name a fact, it's this particular shape, it’s in the middle of my face, it has a bridge and nostrils… and so on. And then can they name a function, I use my nose to breathe and to smell. Once we get to a place of neutrality consistently, most people notice a decrease in their self-judgement and emotional distress when experiencing their body.

Then, if possible, we search for gratitude. Is it possible to be grateful for your nose, just as it existing is in this moment? Can you experience feeling your nose in space? If so, experiencing their nose from a space of nonjudgement and gratitude, it often begins to continue to shift from discomfort to neutrality, and then over time, maybe even positivity—although this is not the goal, just a possible outcome. I encourage you to try this practice, to observe your body in your mind’s eye as a whole, and just see if you can be present with your body as the container that lovingly holds you, in this moment, just as it is. Then slowly move through your head and face, neck and shoulders, arms and hands, torso, hips, legs and feet. With each part of your body, consider a fact and/or a function. Notice how that feels. If an emotion or judgement comes in, notice it and let it go. If possible, see if you can offer gratitude to each part as you go through the exercise, not to force it, just to see what occurs.

When practiced consistently over time, body neutrality can transform your relationship with your body, as well as with yourself.

How to Integrate Intuitive Eating Principle 6: Feel Your Fullness

The sixth principle of Intuitive Eating is: Feel Your Fullness. This principle is about more than stopping when you are full. This principle is about listening to your body, respecting your body and making choices based on how you feel versus the programmed stories from your past about food.

When you were growing up were you told to clean your plate? Were you told that there were children starving in another country that would be grateful to have the food you are refusing eat to or complaining about having to eat? While children might feign fullness so they don’t have to eat their vegetables, these stories you hear stick in your mind and can influence your choices and feelings about food as an adult.

How do you know when you are full? What signs does your body send you so you know you’d be best off to stop eating? In order to hear and respond to these messages from your body, you have to be paying attention. Mindful eating allows you to sense and tune into these signals from your body. It’s helpful to discern how full you feel when you are truly paying attention to the process of eating and the impact your food has on your body.

This principle requires that you listen to your body and respect how it feels and make choices accordingly. The principle is about feeling your fullness, meaning you need to be connected to your body, fully aware of your experience in the present moment. The following guide can be a helpful place to start. It is directly from the chart in my book: Wholistic Food Therapy: A Mindful Approach to Making Peace with Food.

Full Scale:

0= not at all full
1= not at all full, but aware of food in your stomach
2= slightly full, still could eat more
3= fairly full, may be helpful to wait 5-10 minutes and see if you are satiated
4= overly full, slightly uncomfortable or bloated
5= completely stuffed, very uncomfortable

Ideally you want to stop when you are a 3 on the full scale. If you find after a pause that you are not quite full, then eat more food. If you find that after a pause when you are at a 3 that you are full, stop eating. While this may seem simple, those food stories can take over and create all kinds of justifications to keep eating or to stop eating rather than listening to your body.

Some of the most common stories/internal excuses include:

• It’s so delicious, I don’t want to stop eating

• There’re only two bites left, what’s the difference?

• I don’t want to waste this food

• I should clean my plate

• This is a “cheat” meal/food so I need to eat it all since I can’t have it again for X amount of time

Here’s why each of these above justifications are ineffective and potentially harmful. For the first mental excuse, “it’s so delicious I don’t want to stop eating,” we’ve all been there. The question to ask yourself is, how am I going to feel if I finish this despite how delicious it is? If you are going to feel stuffed, uncomfortable, bloated, in pain or even sick, is it worth it? Only you can determine the answer.

For the second excuse, “there’s only two bites left, what’s the difference?” Here’s another way to consider this, if you eat it are you respecting how your body feels? What will be the impact of those two bites? Again, only you can answer this. If it feels potentially harmful to eat those bites, is it worth it to you?

The third excuse, “I don’t want to waste this food,” it can be helpful to really consider what wasting food means. Can you save the food for later? If you can’t, ask yourself what is the difference between stuffing it into your body when your body is already full or throwing it into the trashcan? There really is a difference here that can be difficult to discern and yet important. Throwing the food away is actually the more respectful choice for your body and ultimately the less “wasteful.”

The fourth excuse, “I should clean my plate” is a story you are telling yourself. Question this story, ask yourself, why should I clean my plate? What’s the purpose? If this is a story you have been telling yourself due to your childhood associations with meals, it can be a tough one to change. If this feels important to you, one way you can practice overcoming it is to always make a point to leave a bite or two on your plate and just see how it feels. If you truly are still hungry, eat it, if you are not, leave it. Give yourself space to practice a new story such as, “I do not need to clean my plate, I deserve to stop when I am full.”

The last reason is quite common. For those who are still struggling with the first principle of intuitive eating: rejecting the diet mentality, then this reason may feel really big. If you are restricting certain foods and only allowing them as “cheat” days or meals, then you will most likely overeat on those days/meals. If you are allowed to have that food again tomorrow—if you want it again tomorrow—would you feel such a compulsion to eat it all? Restricting leads to overeating and potentially binge eating. Pay attention to any restricting or judging of your food. The same applies to if you are restricting at a meal in order to over indulge in another meal. This pattern is dangerous and ineffective.

If feeling your fullness is an area that you struggle with, try starting with practicing this principle with one meal or snack per day. As always, try to limit distractions and eat mindfully. Pay attention to how your food tastes and the impact it has on your body. Listen to your hunger cues and your full cues. Practice pausing and tuning into your body. You might begin with setting an intention such as, “for this meal (or snack) I intend to listen to my body and stop when I feel full and satisfied.” Note what satiation and true comfortable fullness feels like for your body. Honor this feeling and allow yourself to continue to create closer alignment with your body’s wants and needs each and every time you practice.