26. Embracing Your True Self: How to Improve Body Confidence
In the latest episode of the Sturdy Girl podcast, the hosts Megan and her co-host delve into a transformative conversation about body confidence and self-love. The episode takes listeners through a personal and relatable journey that goes beyond the superficial layers of appearance and touches on the core of what it means to truly appreciate and accept oneself.
The podcast opens up a discussion about the common struggle of not recognizing the person in the mirror. This experience goes deeper than just physical appearance—it's a reflection of how we see ourselves internally. The hosts share their insights on shutting down the unhealthy game of comparison, especially in an era where social media often dictates our self-perception. They emphasize the importance of redirecting energy toward what genuinely makes us happy, rather than fixating on the numbers that society deems as measures of worth.
Listeners are taken on a journey through various aspects of life that influence body confidence. Megan shares her personal battles with injury and fitness, providing an intimate glimpse into the challenges that test our resolve and the importance of self-compassion. The conversation acknowledges that body confidence isn't just about bouncing back from setbacks but also about recognizing one's worth at every stage of life.
The hosts also explore the impact of personal evolution on self-perception. They discuss how changes in style, career, and the effects of the pandemic on industries like dental hygiene can reshape our self-image. The dialogue touches on the freedom to express oneself authentically and the importance of being true to one's evolving preferences, from coffee to fashion choices.
The episode doesn't shy away from the tough topic of navigating body confidence in a world dominated by social media. The hosts offer valuable strategies for listeners to customize their social media feeds to create a healthier self-image, steering clear of the toxic cycle of comparison. They share stories that serve as gentle reminders to find happiness in life's simple pleasures, such as the joys of pet ownership.
In conclusion, the podcast episode serves as a powerful toolkit for nurturing self-love and body confidence. It challenges the notion that we must always love what we see in the mirror and instead focuses on understanding our inherent value. The episode is a heartfelt call to celebrate our bodies just as they are and a fitting close to the podcast's second season. By providing actionable advice and sharing personal anecdotes, the Sturdy Girl podcast encourages listeners to embark on a path of self-discovery and joyous self-expression.
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Jess: 0:03
Hello, friend, and welcome to Sturdy Girl, a podcast focused on strength, not size, where you'll hear conversations around healthy body image, cultivating confidence and being a resilient human in both body and mind. Sturdy Girl is a podcast where we shift the focus away from your appearance and on to living the big, rad life you deserve. Hello, friends, and welcome to episode 26 of Sturdy Girl 26. We're there. We are almost done with season two. That's so crazy. I don't know where time has gone.
Megan: 0:35
Megan and I I used the correct grammatical words this time I'm very proud of myself at the end of a work day.
Jess: 0:42
We're slowly upgrading the podcast studio. We have new mics today. They're very fancy, they're super fancy. We have about 27 more cords and needed Blake's assistance in setting them up. So hats off to Blake and his hard work always for us.
Megan: 0:56
I feel afraid to touch anything.
Jess: 0:57
It's fine, it's durable and the goal is, by season three, to have some level of fully functional studio. Whether that is felt, pad square things on every wall in this room, wood paneling that has audio, like soundproofing looking at a number of different things, but like these mics are supposed to be fancy enough that we don't need to put ourselves in a soundproof box, we will see. This is the test run, guys. All right, how many hours have we spent on this podcast?
Megan: 1:23
I'm just thinking like 26 episodes in 26 hours of recording, more or less yeah, and then you have to think about all the time that we just talk and drink bubbly water yeah, and hang out.
Jess: 1:34
Yeah, that's basically why I asked you to be a co-host, just so that I could like be assured I'd see you weekly.
Megan: 1:39
That's exactly what it was we're so updated all the time on each other's lives. Now it is.
Jess: 1:44
It is. Well, I mean, that's what happens. Maybe our listeners want to hear about our catch up and maybe that's how we have to plan it. I don't know. That's one thing I will say in creating a podcast is there are podcasts that I listen to that I absolutely love the content of the podcast, but they shoot the shit for like 20 minutes before even getting to the episode, and then you're just like fast forward and you're like, no, they're still talking about their kids. No, they're talking about their one random lift they had last week. Okay, no, actually can we get to the real stuff?
Megan: 2:10
Yeah, and there's a few podcasts I can think of off the top of my head. That started short when I was like, oh, this is cool, I love hearing them shoot the shit, and then eventually it turned into like 45 minutes of them shooting the shit.
Jess: 2:21
I was like, oh my goodness, I mean I want to get to know, like if I enjoy a podcast, I love getting to know the host, but not when that takes up more of the podcast than the actual material.
Megan: 2:31
Yeah, I agree.
Jess: 2:32
So I guess, without further ado, maybe we get to our episode. Yeah, okay, so we are going to talk about body confidence, and one thing with this is body confidence is essentially another term for a healthy body image. So when we talk about tips for improving body confidence, it's also another way to improve that relationship with ourselves. So some of these reminders and tips may be familiar, but we're hoping that we can give it a little bit more of a fun new way of looking at things. One piece to when we talk about confidence. Way back in episode five we talked about confidence as a skill, talked about it as being domain specific. So this is we're talking specifically body confidence.
Jess: 3:15
It's all coming back to me, by the way, episode five, 20 plus episodes ago, you know it was like yes, you remember way back last fall and so, looking at if you want to build confidence in general, I would say go back and listen to episode five. Also, episode 15 has more tips on building confidence in general. This is specifically about our bodies, body confidence. I like to think of it as feeling at home in your body, no matter your size or your shape. This is something too that just kind of a side tangent when I find myself getting into kind of an anxiety spiral, when you get too wound up in your head and your thoughts just start going faster and faster. One of the things that brings me back to, I'll say, back to the present, but back to my body, is to say you are safe here.
Megan: 4:01
Oh yeah, that's good.
Jess: 4:02
Just as a reminder of like, no matter what is going on in your world, your body is your home and maybe your brain is being bananas out of control, but reminding yourself that you are safe in your own body wherever you are and I think that's one thing too with body confidence is when we have that good relationship with our body, when we have that body confidence, we stop wasting so much of our energy on shit that doesn't matter. We stop wasting energy on obsessing over every little calorie, every little thing we put in our mouths sizes, numbers right, what size pants we are, how big our waist is. We stop obsessing about what it might mean about us and instead we're spending more time and energy on doing the things that we love, on living the big rad life that we want, and that's not to say a lot of these things in here are very much both. And yeah, you can care about the food you put into your body.
Jess: 4:57
Yeah, I mean you should you can care about the size of your body. Yeah, but in context of body confidence, it's the amount of time and energy and effort that you're spending on those things that could be spent elsewhere.
Megan: 5:08
And I would argue too that you can have the body confidence piece and the feeling good in your body and not have it just solely tied to, like food, for example, or something. But I mean food could also be a big part of it. Like I like eating healthy, but I like eating healthy because it makes me feel better yeah.
Megan: 5:23
It's more of just like a nourishing, taking care of your body like a taking care of, like drinking enough water, which I don't do Every time. I've been going to my OT therapist like last two weeks.
Jess: 5:34
She's, like you, look dehydrated. Do I look like a wilted flower?
Megan: 5:35
Apparently my hand does every time I pull it out of that brace.
Jess: 5:38
I'm going to side tangent for a second to talking about spending time and energy on our bodies and our appearance, and all of that. In recent weeks we've spent a lot of time with family.
Megan: 5:48
Yeah. And a lot of time on a family.
Jess: 5:52
We have and it's all been so good. I love my family. Two weeks of family time is a lot, but when we were spending time with a lot of Blake's family and a lot of his extended family, who I really don't know all that well, and we're having multiple meals together, I was really surprised by the amount of body talk in reference to foods people were eating and women I'm talking about women in the family, dudes, I don't, you don't get that conversation as much I just. I wish people understood how much their words that they use about themselves matter to them and to how other people hear it.
Megan: 6:22
And I'm trying to think of a tactile way to say this without being jerk about my family, but like I think it's just in general, when you see people, especially when they're really talking down on their own habits or down on like I can't eat that because that's full of carbs and that's gonna, that's gonna go straight to my hips.
Jess: 6:37
I can't believe I'm eating the second cinnamon roll, but like it's to go straight to my thighs. What is that telling other people about the cinnamon roll that's on their plate? Yeah, what is that telling other people about your relationship with food? Why not sit and enjoy the cinnamon roll and the family that you see once a year and just enjoy it? For what is food doesn't have to just be fueling your body, it can also be.
Jess: 7:02
Yeah, there are so many reasons for choosing the foods that we do, and I think this, like going back to body confidence, is where are you spending your energy? Is my point, and I wish I had a better way to articulate this right now, because it's just like it got me so frustrated in the moment, because then I started paying attention to how much other people talk about their bodies or the food they're putting into their bodies, in a way that is degrading themselves, shaming themselves, judging themselves so harshly, when we are allowed to eat whatever the hell we want, whenever the hell we want, and we should never have to justify what we put in our mouths. That's. I think that maybe that's my point.
Megan: 7:38
I mean I do experience that quite a bit. I mean I do think that it's more prevalent in women, unfortunately. Yeah, that's just kind of ingrained in us. It's almost like a justification anytime that you're out eating or you're in a large setting like that. I'm gonna work this off later.
Jess: 7:55
It is, it's such the cultural norm to talk negatively in that situation.
Megan: 8:00
Thankfully, I feel like I've gotten to the point where I've surrounded myself with enough people where that's not like a discussion common, which is great.
Megan: 8:07
I love it. I mean, you know, we went out for we had a dig day on saturday and opened up a new trail system and everyone's like eating just handfuls of cheese, just cheese and bread, and that's amazing. That was the post-ride fuel for the whole day. And cheese, yeah, and you don't hear it. You know you got girls in there two grilled cheese sandwiches in each hand and like just eating food and you're like, yeah, get it, that's fantastic okay.
Jess: 8:30
So I feel like I've really belabored this point and kind of this whole side tangent. But coming back to body confidence, we have three really rad tips for improving body confidence, and the first one is stop comparing. Stop comparing yourself to people on social media Social media is not real TV movies and also to former versions of yourself. And with this comparing, we're all naturally going to compare ourselves to others and I don't think that that ever fully stops. No, so what we're saying here is, with social media, understanding that bodies come in all shapes and sizes, and understanding that what you see like Megan said, what you see on social media is curated yes, it isn't necessarily real and so being able to develop the skill of either catching yourself when you find yourself comparing, able to develop the skill of either catching yourself when you find yourself comparing and then you'll also hear recommendations for curating your social media feed unfollowing people that don't make you feel good about yourself, finding people that look like you. Diversifying your feed Is that really diversifying your feed, no, no.
Jess: 9:39
But like I'm saying that in addition to right and this can be really helpful, especially as you start to want to improve that body confidence, improve your relationship with yourself but it also can be like I want to just give a word of caution to that because what we find ourselves doing oftentimes if we, let's say, we curate our feeds, we follow the people that we want that look like us or that do the things that we want to do, and you've got this curated, you're gonna find yourself falling into a very similar pattern that you did before your feed was curated. I wish I could be confident like that.
Megan: 10:13
I wish I could wear that outfit like that, I mean you're still gonna have the comparison piece, you're still gonna compare yourself at a certain point, and I think that that's just a really hard thing to get away from. In general, with social media, you always have some type of comparison.
Jess: 10:26
Absolutely, and I think too, the problem with saying curating your social media feed will help with body confidence is you're not actually doing the internal work that's needed to improve body confidence.
Megan: 10:38
Yeah, plus I also, like we were talking about earlier, is I feel like it does really limit you to what maybe you're biased towards in your what you're exposed to, yeah. So I mean, if you never have exposure to you know, just, trans visibility day was just recently so like, let's say that you're not looking at things that explore that bubble, or you're not seeing things that you're comfortable with that then you don't have exposure to it and that you can't find any type of relationship to it. It's expanding your world, yeah. And then once you start having the knowledge on that stuff and being able to have that exposure, then you're kind of like oh, I see a different side of it.
Jess: 11:10
This isn't saying like follow people on social media that you hate. It's not saying to follow toxic humans or MLMs or whatever, right Like, that's not our point, don't follow people that piss you off all the time. Just saying like, going into that social media piece of, okay, how do we work on the skill of noticing, when we're falling into that comparison trap or like doom scrolling with that comparison, that there is a skill to be had there? And the way to build that skill isn't just saying follow only the people that make you feel good.
Megan: 11:42
Like that's well. I mean, I would say that I've been doing a little bit of that myself as far as like the huge comparison piece because, being injured, I've been off the bike, I've been off my normal programming and I feel like seeing a feed. That's like I see my other friends not even my friends, but like other people that I follow progressing really fast and like getting better at biking and getting like better at doing more features. And then I'm thinking about like my Whistler trip is coming up and that's like right when I get cleared to ride, and like what am I going to be comfortable with and how far back am I going to be? So it's just that spiral.
Jess: 12:14
But it's recognizing that spiral, because it's not like you're going to unfollow all your friends, no absolutely not, but it's also trying to check yourself. Yeah, no, absolutely not. But it's also trying to check yourself. Yeah, and that's exactly exactly. It Is that skill of recognizing, checking yourself and being like, okay, I can cheer my friends on while also being just like super freaking jealous that they're out doing these things right now.
Megan: 12:34
Yeah.
Jess: 12:34
I think we've belabored the comparison point enough on the realm of social media. The only other point I wanted to bring up is that comparison of ourselves to previous versions of ourselves oh, that's a bad one, that's what I do a lot.
Jess: 12:47
And I won't go too much into this, but it's very similar to the spiral that you fall into when you're scrolling social media. The main reminder I want to have here is our bodies are always changing. When we talk about having good relationships with our bodies, it's knowing that it changes. Talk about having good relationships with our bodies, it's knowing that it changes and then also pausing to consider. I'm relating this to myself right now, in this season, coming out of just a really shitty season and a season of infrequency of movement that I actually enjoy because my bandwidth was so limited and finding myself comparing so hard to a previous version of me, or to be not as trained of a runner as I used to be, and seeing my mile times be so much slower and it's so easy to compare. And then I have to sit and go.
Jess: 13:30
Well, how much of life has happened, what has gone on in my world that has changed?
Jess: 13:35
That's changed my bandwidth for running, for lifting. Let's change these things and gain some perspective, for I don't want to say what I've been through, but gain some perspective of like what has happened and how our bodies have changed. We're not supposed to be the size we were in high school forever. I would say objectively, even through this comparison and through this season of not being as trained as I want to be, not running or lifting as frequently as I have in the past, I am more comfortable in my body now than ever before, than when I was running marathons and in the obsessive focus of smaller is better, and I feel more comfortable now in this body from the work that I've done internally, because it doesn't actually have to do with how I actually look.
Jess: 14:17
Imagine that, okay. So tip one stop comparing. Tip number two get to know yourself, and this is super broad. So we have a couple of sub points within getting to know yourself, and the one main piece I want to talk about is learning your likes and dislikes, being open and willing to exploring new things and figuring out how the hell to express yourself the hell to express yourself.
Megan: 14:43
Yeah, and I think this takes a lot of exploring, like you were saying, like just I love beginning out of my comfort zone and like I mean I hate it but I love it and I love how it makes me feel afterwards. And so I think that, as someone who you know and I'm sure you can relate to this kind of stayed in that bubble of like I'm only going to do these things, this is my identity, this is who I am to like now just being like this is my identity, this is who I am.
Megan: 15:04
Yeah to like now just being like oh, that looks cool, sure, why not? Like I'll try that, I'm gonna suck, but like who cares?
Jess: 15:07
and that's such a great skill to have that curiosity piece, that openness to exploring new things but it has taken so much time to even get to where.
Megan: 15:16
You know what I mean. It just takes so much work. But if you put in the work it just becomes more and more easier to try new things.
Jess: 15:22
I I just think about how much society I'm going to say focuses on get good at skills, like narrow skill set, but get good at them. I think about it in context of, like, the dental industry. Since the pandemic, so many clinicians have left dentistry and so there's a lot higher demand for hygienists. It's interesting having conversations with employers when they talk about, wow, you know, people aren't just aren't staying in places as long, they're leaving and exploring other professions, other career paths, and I'm like, yeah, people are exploring. I think it's great. I don't think that you need to pick one thing and stay with it your whole life. This isn't, it isn't the 1950s anymore. But, jobs aside, talking about identities, when I was putting together the notes for this episode, I was thinking about how, obsessively reading books, jess wanted to envision which this can be a useful skill. Let me preface that If you think about, like, how you would want yourself described in a book, it really helps you to identify, like what you value and what kind of person you want to be. So when you're envisioning your future self, like that can be a really valuable skill.
Jess: 16:26
But I took it maybe too far in a different direction where I'm like, okay, I only chew Trident original gum and I only use Dr Pepper chapstick and I only drink black coffee. It's like your signatures. And I say interesting, not interesting, because clearly I'm word obsessed and it was this whole thing. And I say interesting, not interesting, because clearly I'm word obsessed and it was this whole thing. And then I was so into just like this is how people will know me. And then you realize like, sure, I like black coffee, but I also really like bougie coffee with whipped cream and flavors, and I like milk in my iced coffee and I like shaken espressos and cold foam. I like to be fancy sometimes, yeah, yeah. And so, exploring that piece of like self-expression how do I want to dress, how do I want to act, how do I want to speak, how do I want to do anything? Because you have the ability and the choice to make, to change that. You're in control of that. I think about that a lot in terms of fashion lately, cause.
Megan: 17:19
I so do. I I was just gonna say that because I feel like I've been exploring out of my. I've been going to like more boutiques and like things like that, like not expensive ones, because, come on, adventuring out and trying different things, yeah, and being like what is feels comfortable, what makes me feel confident, and like just a different sense, because I feel like I've kind of been stuck in this like bubble of my.
Jess: 17:40
I mean I'll never give up vans because be realistic, but everything else I mean for you working from home and then working out, you have like a particular style that falls into that. I wear scrubs every day at work and then I'm in workout clothes and so my style has really fallen into that. And then we had Madeline Mahaly on the podcast a few weeks ago on she a personal stylist and she really got me thinking. Her 2024 like style goal is to wear everything in her closet. Then she's saying, okay, by the end of the year if there's stuff I'm not wearing, I'm getting rid of it. And I'm looking in my closet and I'm like half my shirts I own I haven't worn in years.
Megan: 18:17
So I just did this. I just had a huge purge of my closet and I donated it to like the church that we have but they have like a cute little shop that people can go into.
Jess: 18:28
Okay, but I donated all my work clothes because I was like why am I holding on to it?
Megan: 18:30
because I had so many like. I had so many outfits from like, express and like all the stuff was like those nice blousey outfits, and I'm like even when I dress up.
Jess: 18:37
Now I go into my office and dressing up to me is completely different yeah, and I think I just keep coming back to the fact that with fashion there are no rules. So learning that level of self-expression, of being like I want to wear the bright color, I want to wear the crop top, nothing says you can't. So bringing this back around, of just getting to know yourself, is figuring out those likes and dislikes, and this is every realm Like I, just it's so broad I'm like waving my hands around over here because, I'm like it encompasses literally anything you want to, but it's getting to know you.
Jess: 19:07
It's getting to know you and be like yep, nope, still hate mushrooms, actually, still really love cotton candy.
Megan: 19:12
I'm just going to throw this out there. I have some friends and I know people that just like cannot explore with food and I never understood that because, like I love trying new it probably goes back to like how food was presented when they were little. Probably I know so many people that like don't like vegetables and that's so weird to me, like I have one of my really good friends who like won't touch vegetables.
Jess: 19:33
We're in our 30s. Like vegetables are yummy. There's so many ways to cook them. Come on, Like come on but.
Megan: 19:41
I mean, and I get it, no, when I was little, I hated vegetables and I feel like that's. I crave vegetables now. Which?
Jess: 19:53
is so weird. It's like the opposite. Honestly impressive. It's probably all my vitamin deficiencies actually coming forward.
Jess: 19:59
My body's like please feed me a plant, I need a carrot. And in the realm of getting to know yourself, we're also talking about self-talk, and we've talked about self-talk so many times on learning to notice your thoughts as they come up, without judgment, without shame. But that self-talk plays so much into our relationships with ourselves, because how you talk to yourself matters. It goes into that definition of beliefs. A belief is just a thought that we think over and over and over again. So if we aren't paying attention to our self-talk, like how do we even know what we're saying to ourselves and what kind of beliefs we're holding?
Megan: 20:34
Yeah, or just kind of. What reality are we creating?
Jess: 20:37
Absolutely, and like our goal with noticing our thoughts and paying attention to self-talk, it's never to get rid of negative thoughts. We never could, we never can that would be a very difficult goal.
Jess: 20:46
That's never the goal. It's like, with all of the think positive thoughts, think positive thoughts and like that whole pervasive thing, I was like that's not the point. Yeah, the point is to learn to notice how you're talking to yourself, and you build that skill first and then it's working towards. Okay, now can I challenge those thoughts? Can I challenge the way I talk to myself? Because we get to choose how we react to those words that we're saying.
Jess: 21:09
So multi-part in this, like get to know yourself, right. So those words that we're saying so multi-part in this, like get to know yourself, right. So get to know your likes and dislikes. But also get to know how you talk to yourself, especially when we fall into those comparison traps of scrolling social media, of comparing ourselves to our former selves, and also how we look in the mirror and what we say to ourselves when we look in the mirror, because, believe it or not, we are 100% in control of how we talk to ourselves when we look in the mirror and that can impact how we see ourselves. Actually, we probably need to do an entire episode on that. Just talk about, like, affirmations and self-talk when we look in the mirror. Like how do we improve that, yeah, okay, next season Noted. And the third part to this get to know yourself is take care of your body and I won't belabor this point too much because we've been talking about self-talk and getting to know yourself in those, but I love this one though.
Megan: 21:54
Take it away. Well, no, I just love this one because, like you know again, like no matter what you're like feeling with your body, or what size you are, or anything like that like taking care of your body is such a different thing for me, cause it's just about how your body, what you're putting into your body.
Megan: 22:07
Like I say, exercise very loosely, but like what you're doing moving your body move your body and just how that makes you feel, because this ties so much into my own mental health and even my diet ties into my mental health and not in the sense of, oh, I feel so fat because I ate that. It's like oh, I feel like garbage and this ruined my day because I ate these foods that I wasn't supposed to because of actual food allergies? Yeah, absolutely.
Jess: 22:33
This point of like taking care of your body is like I don't give a shit how you feel about your body. It is worthy of respect, it is worthy of nourishment and it is worthy of being taken care of. I don't care how you feel about it. I don't care if today is the day that you feel fatter than you've ever been in your life, or you feel gross, or you can't believe it's been three days since you've worked out, or whatever it is. You still need to take care of your body.
Megan: 22:55
Yeah, and the more you take care of your body, the more that's helping, the better you're going to feel. And then that ties directly into how you perceive yourself and how you're self-talking and how you're feeling.
Jess: 23:07
A hundred percent. That is kind of where I am. I know I keep talking about the season that I've come out of and I think I'll likely talk more about it in detail but just coming out of like not moving my body in the frequency and intensity that I generally enjoy, and then coming back into it in the last couple of weeks and noticing that, okay, my body is not going to change in like 10 days. But I look in the mirror and I'm like oh, oh hi, and like I noticed, just like that, just simply moving my body more frequently.
Megan: 23:38
But I think that ties so much into that mental health piece.
Jess: 23:40
Yep, and that's my point, that's my point is like I'm moving my body, Like that momentum that I've gathered again is playing a part in how I look at myself and how I look at myself in the mirror, because I feel better about myself, taking care of myself better in a way that I know my body needs Exactly. If that makes sense, did I tie that together?
Megan: 23:58
Yeah.
Jess: 23:59
That is the point of this. Yeah Is yes. We want you to work on body confidence and feeling good about yourself and that healthy body image. We want to talk about getting to know yourself and stop comparing and all these things, but at the end of the day, bare minimum, your body is worthy of respect, it's worthy of care, it's worthy of nourishment, no matter what. I don't care how you feel.
Megan: 24:20
So that's that, and it'll make you feel better. 90% of the time.
Jess: 24:24
That doesn't come with a guarantee. These are just. These are skills to build, that's all. The third tip for improving body confidence is to practice body neutrality or body image flexibility. Now I'm going to just call you right back to episode three. We're going way back on. Do you have to love yourself? And this talks a lot about self-love. This talks about body image positivity, body image neutrality. We also have an episode on. Is body positivity the answer? Those are going to have an endless amount of information and we'll kind of summarize a little bit here. There is no one right kind of body image that's considered healthy. You get to choose how you want to identify. If it's body positivity, neutrality, flexibility, that's up to you.
Jess: 25:10
We really like the thought process of body image flexibility, which essentially is a lot like when we talked about last week with cognitive flexibility. It's being able to adapt to changing environments. It's understanding that our bodies change, our feelings about our bodies change and, again, going back to that, it's deserving of that respect and care, no matter what. Essentially, body image flexibility is being able to openly experience thoughts and feelings about the body without acting on them or trying to avoid or change them, whereas when we talk about, like body positivity. It's having a positive feeling towards your appearance yeah, and we don't necessarily, that's not a need. And then, when we talk about body neutrality, it's feeling neutral about our body Again, knowing that we're worthy up body neutrality.
Jess: 25:53
It's feeling neutral about our body Again, knowing that we're worthy, knowing that we have value, no matter what we look like. Yeah, we are simply worthy for being human. But these pieces just come in of how best to identify and body confidence. If you can understand that, like, you're a really cool human, no matter what you do, and you get to choose what you do, you get to choose how you spend your time, how you spend your energy. Why waste all of it Just thinking about your appearance? Yeah, or maybe you spend some energy thinking about your appearance because you're like how do I want to dress?
Megan: 26:22
Yeah, how freaking cool See, but that's like a fun way. Yes, exactly, it's not a wasted energy. Yeah, it's not shaming yourself.
Jess: 26:31
Exactly. Yeah, it's not shaming yourself. Exactly, it's not comparing. That's all. That's that's the main main messages. Stop comparing. Comparison is like the fastest way to kill confidence I know, but it is.
Megan: 26:42
It's so hard in the environment that we have nowadays I feel like, and I feel kind of bad for, like younger generations that are growing up in it because there's so much. We were exposed to it with tv but like, could you imagine having a phone and just constantly?
Jess: 26:54
a phone, so young and having 17 different social media platforms. I don't know how many there are, but there's so many. I can do instagram and I keep facebook for family yep same but I think I missed the boat on tiktok I can't do tiktok.
Megan: 27:10
I've tried, and I feel too old I can't either. I tried, I really tried, but I feel too old I can't either. I've tried, I really tried, but I don't understand. I think I'm just too old. I don't know.
Jess: 27:17
But it is interesting when we're talking about comparison. Yeah, I feel like there was a really big TikTok trend and I think it's filtering into Instagram too of like being able to search like size 10 clothes, size 8, blah, blah, blah, and seeing all these women that identify as this size, this weight, trying on these clothes. I have a lot of that stuff advertised to me right now and, while that could be good, maybe we're someone who doesn't want to go shop for certain things and then you can see what this size eight or 10 or 12 human or whatever size they're modeling looks like versus the size zero that's on the website but it also can lead really big into comparison if you're like, well, I'm a size 12 and that's not what my body looks like and fall into that comparison drop so fast.
Megan: 27:58
Yeah, I have a really hard time with those kind of because again they're like, for some reason, that's what my algorithm is just like. Do you want to look at all these? Here's my Amazon haul and I'm this size. It's like a double-edged sword. Because I do like watching them sometimes because I'm like, oh, that looks cute on the similar size of me. But then also I'm like, oh, she weighs that, but I'm way heavier than that and I'm the same height as her. I'm like where's this extra weight that I'm holding?
Jess: 28:26
And then suddenly that's such a quick way for a spiral where you know you can catch yourself, but still, all my explore feed videos are dogs mine are bikes, horses and apparently amazon fashion mine's just dogs, yeah, oh, and pitbulls, oh my gosh, mine's all aussie and doodle videos, go figure, sam and finn, thanks, what kind of dogs, we have.
Jess: 28:47
Oh yeah, side note, guys, we put photos of our sweet little baby angel doggos, baby angels, on our blog. So go look at Sam and Finn and Mabel Luna. Okay so, just wrapping this up real quick. You cannot compete with other people when confidence is built on self-mastery. Okay so, when we talk about that comparison piece of curating social media feed, whatever else, work on yourself first.
Jess: 29:13
Learning how to express yourself is important for healing, for improving your body image. So get excited about self-discovery. Have fun figuring out what makes you happy, what do you enjoy, what makes you just like, feel like you're in the moment, in flow, lose track of time, what are those things that you enjoy? What do you like to indulge in? What ways do you want to express yourself? Because that's where confidence comes in. The more time that you can spend in that place, the more you're going to be confident in your own body. So I guess that kind of wraps all of that all into one right? Stop comparing, get to know yourself and practice that body image neutrality. All right, friends, thanks so much for listening to our banter, listening to this episode on body confidence. If you enjoyed this episode, please feel free to like, follow, subscribe, whatever the heck you do with podcasts, on whichever platform Apple Podcasts, spotify and the 27 others that I can never remember the names of.
Megan: 30:12
I can only do the three, the main three.
Jess: 30:15
Seeing you leave reviews has been amazing. I love to see them. If you write a review, please screenshot it and email us at hello at sturdygirlco, so that we can send you a little something to say thank you. All right, friends, we will. We will catch you next Friday for the final episode of season two.
Megan: 30:34
Goodbye.