Episode 11: Unwrapping a Stress Free Holiday: Navigating Food, Body Image, and Self-Care

The holiday season, with its magic and merriment, often brings along stress and anxiety. From managing food and drink consumption to dealing with body image issues and setting boundaries, navigating through the holiday season can be a daunting task. In our recent podcast episode, we discussed these issues in detail with our special guest, Ali, offering practical advice to help you thrive during the holiday season.

The first step towards a stress-free holiday season is preparation. We discussed the importance of creating a plan that focuses on maintaining consistency with the habits you already have. This involves identifying your non-negotiables, such as moving your body in some capacity or staying hydrated, and ensuring you consistently apply these habits throughout the holiday season.

Stress is a common factor during the holidays, but its impact on our relationship with food is often overlooked. Recognizing the physical manifestations of stress and managing it through activities like movement and mindfulness can help you maintain a healthy relationship with food. It's crucial to be mindful of your body's needs and let go of the idea of attaching morality to food.

Holiday gatherings can be a maze of foods and well-intentioned yet uncomfortable conversations about body image and food. We shared our top strategies for navigating these situations with grace and respect. This includes setting boundaries in conversations about food and body image, having an accountability buddy to help navigate stressful situations, and creating a plan for the day that includes self-care activities.

Alcohol is another common feature of holiday gatherings. We discussed strategies for handling alcohol consumption during the holidays, such as setting a drink limit and creating delicious mocktails. It's important to be aware of how your body responds to alcohol and to avoid compensatory actions the next day.

Finally, we discussed how to savor the holidays without stress and set the stage for an incredible upcoming year. This involves having the right mindset, creating habits that will sustain you throughout the year, and planning for the upcoming year.

To sum up, the holiday season can be stressful, but with the right approach and mindset, it's possible to navigate through it with ease. The key lies in maintaining consistency with your existing habits, managing stress effectively, setting respectful boundaries, and being mindful of your body's needs. By doing so, you can truly savor the season and set the stage for a healthy and happy upcoming year.

• Full Transcript

  Jess: 0:01

  Hello, friends, 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 the 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 11 of Sturdy Girl. I am joined by an incredible guest host, ali hey hi, hello, and we want to just have a nice conversation about preparing you to have the best holidays possible.

  Ali: 0:40

  Yeah, being able to actually go into the holidays and be present and enjoy the people around you, enjoy the delicious food that you only get a few times a year and not be stressed about it, and that's the whole point of this.

  Jess: 0:53

  We want you to be present, we want you to enjoy the time with your loved ones, whether that's family or friends, and just be in the moment. So here we have some great tips and tools and all the things to make it successful. Because when you're spending time around family that you don't normally spend time around, it can get tricky. When you are around food that is not normally around, it can kind of send our brains into a little bit of a spiral. So Absolutely.

  Ali: 1:19

  I think it's like the holidays in general, the thought of the holiday is stress people out. Right, you and I were talking before this that the holidays have, I feel, like two connotations one, that they're magical and exciting and like we can't wait for them to be here. I don't know about you, but I'm a December 1st. Christmas music gets turned on. You're not a November 1st person. No, well, honestly, was I excited about the Christmas music playing at the coffee shop last week? Absolutely, I would never say no to it. But it has that magical connotation. But it also has a connotation of stress and guilt and fear. And, okay, what am I going to do so that I lose weight during the holidays or so I don't lose my progress? Or what if someone says something to me who hasn't seen me in six months? Right, we love to have all the what ifs kind of take over and we don't get to actually be a part of the magic.

  Jess: 2:16

  I prefer to lean into the magic of the holidays. And one just side note I feel like since the pandemic there's been a lot more acceptance around the people that decorate for the holidays on November 1st. I'm like, if that brings you more joy, please by all means do it to full support. Like Starbucks already has their Christmas drinks out.

  Ali: 2:34

  Technically, people who put up their holiday decorations early are happier people. It's a scientific fact. So I'm down.

  Jess: 2:40

  Do it brings a joy, and that's I want to lean into the magic. Can that be? The theme of this whole episode is we want people to like lean into the magic of the holidays because that stress, that guilt, that shame, those feelings that inevitably come up and we're not saying deny them or not saying they aren't going to come up, but we can acknowledge them and still find that magic.

  Ali: 2:58

  Well, and I think too, so much of what we're going to be talking about, and also what we've already commented on, is like the spirit of the season, the magic it makes me think of, like when we were kids. Yep, we were just so excited for the holidays. We were so excited to see people that we haven't seen in a while and get presents and go play outside and like there was so much magic around it, and we're actually going to be giving a lot of tips around kind of how to bring back the childlike pieces of who we were, because we lose a lot of that as adults. We have, like the pressure to have all the Christmas shopping done weeks in advance and make the most elaborate meal and make sure everyone's extended cousins are happy and decorate perfectly and everything else, all the shoulds that fit in our way when we talk about, okay, how do we actually prepare for the holiday? Right, if we're looking at, okay, we know the holidays are happening, they're here every year, right, rather than going into them blind and just assuming, okay, well, I'm going to take it as they come, going to be reactive, yeah, how do we be proactive and actually have a plan in place to set ourselves up for success, knowing, okay, these are the foods that usually trigger me, these are the people that usually make a comment or I would choose to not be around if I didn't have to, right? Yeah, yeah, I would set up a plan around that. So I'll kind of let you start.

  Jess: 4:22

  If we're looking at, like habits that people can focus on as we move into the holidays, the consistency piece, yeah, I think that's a really important place to start when we talk about, we know the holidays come every year. Is it really that much different? Are our actions that much different in the holidays as they are on the day to day? It's like you had mentioned. You know who are we being around these things, around the events, around the dinners, around the family interaction. We're spending time around the people that we don't normally. We're spending time around food or situations, but how do we fall back on the habits that we've already created for ourselves Right, and we talked about these being kind of our non-negotiables of how do we show up for ourselves to know that we are taking care of, so that when we go into these situations, we know that we have kind of created a plan for the day, if you will, because we already have existing habits that we're following through on. Like I said tangent for just a second, I did a group coaching program last fall and it was 12 weeks. It was like October, November, December. It took people through the holidays but it was on, I'm gonna say, honing in on, but like solidifying those habits that you've already created for yourself. So if you have movement goals and no, that's not to say like please go do a hard ass CrossFit workout before Thanksgiving dinner, like that's not my point, but like you have a movement plan for me to week. So for me, you know, I lift three times a week, I run three times a week. I use those things as both physical and mental health pieces. How do I support myself through these busier seasons? To still get this movement in? Or maybe the movement is modified so then Thanksgiving day, instead of getting my run in, or maybe I run a shorter distance before, or whatever, I ask my family if they want to go for a walk, and that's something that like for Thanksgiving for me. My grandparents live on right on the river in southern Oregon and there is a paved bike path and that is either before or after we eat, depending on time of day. We go for a walk, and now this isn't like we're not speed walking, this is like a meander, because grandma isn't as mobile as she used to be and we just like walk down to where there's like a small bit of rapids, a little waterfall. We walk back and it's like a mile and a half total and it's just perfect, because it's so much more about being with those people.

  Ali: 6:34

  Yep, and it is about hitting a goal. Yeah, I think the biggest piece of non negotiables and kind of what we're both saying is it's not about building new habits that we have to follow through on during the holidays. It's about taking what are the basics, what are the things that are non negotiable in your life already, and how do we just consistently apply those throughout the holidays, rather than, where a lot of us fall in the trap, is we kind of do the all or nothing? Like oh, I'm so busy during the holidays. Something else is always more important. I'm going to put my stuff to the back burner, whereas the non negotiables are maybe okay. Every single morning, I I personally start with affirmations and a devotional Okay, well, maybe that's something that you're like. Hey, I need to continue doing that during the holidays because it gets me in a good headspace.

  Jess: 7:23

  I think to that point, you know, starting the day with something that brings back. You know want to call it presence or groundedness, or something to bring you back to the present moment and bring you back to being in your body. Especially I love that right when you wake up, because shifting into this five am wake up cycle that I am in the morning start out very rushed and it's wake up, get ready, go, and it's already the brain, the mindset of I didn't get enough sleep, I don't have enough time, I don't enough, enough enough to be able to be like I'm in the here and I'm in the now. And let's set some affirmations for the day. How am I feeling now? How do I want to feel today? What's the day to go to the?

  Ali: 8:00

  intention behind the day, right? Yeah, actually, it's funny that you mentioned that, because that's one of the biggest things that I work on with my own clients is when we wake up in the morning. Are we automatically giving our energy to anyone and everyone else, or are we pulling the energy into us? And especially around the holiday season, it can be so easy to wake up and have a million things on your to-do list. Maybe you have extended family staying at your house, right? You immediately wake up thinking, oh God, I already have to pour into other people. Take five minutes, bring the energy back into you. Set the intention for the day, decide, okay, what are going to be my non negotiables and, to your point, it might not be a specific oh, this is exactly the workout I'm doing every day. Maybe you're not negotiable is just I'm going to move my body in some capacity. Maybe the non negotiable is hey, I know that I feel better if I drink water. I'm going to make sure that I always have a water bottle with me, because I don't know about you, but holidays usually involve wine and we can put two together.

  Jess: 9:02

  Yeah, absolutely Well, that too. And do you think about how do I want my body to feel Right? That's a really kind of important thing for me and this is a conversation I have with clients as well is this time of year is supposed to be magical. How do you want to feel at these gatherings? How do you want to feel this time of year Like, yes, okay, you're going to feel stressed out. If you are a hosting family, if you're planning these things for many, many people, I'm not going to deny the stress piece, but if you want to feel good and present, how can you make that a reality? How do you want to go into that?

  Ali: 9:34

  Well, and I also like the idea of, because we do a lot of like stress management work in my programs and it's less about like, what you're saying is, we're always going to have stressors. That's just a part of being human, especially with the holidays, right? How do we manage it? Right, it's less about controlling them and more about managing ourselves.

  Jess: 9:54

  Managing your reaction, managing the fact that actually this is convenient. I just recorded an episode on kind of stress management and body image and stress management and self-confidence. So, yes, all of this because that's kind of where my brain was going to was on the stress piece of it, because stress can distort our perception of our bodies. Stress can heighten emotions, it can change how we process things and if we're stressed about the holidays enough presents, the right food, the decorations, family, all of those things we can try and look at that stress and that stress is a certain situation around the holidays. But we can take and turn it back on ourselves so easily to say, well, okay, I can't control a lot of these things, but I can control my body, or I can control the choices about my body and we can start making these choices around ourselves. So when you say like, oh, going into the holidays, I want to lose weight or maybe you want to start all these new habits or whatever, that's not the point, that's not going to help the stress.

  Ali: 10:53

  If anything, it's going to increase the stress, as most people know, like stress increases your cortisol. Cortisol is directly linked to our bodies, usually either holding on to body fat, gaining body fat right, we have digestive health issues, we have increased mental health issues. We don't sleep as well. I mean, recovery is trash, and so it's like, oh, we're going to do all of these things and stress our bodies out when, in general, we could just stay consistent with the habits we already have, keep our stress low and we're going to have more beneficial outcomes by doing kind of nothing.

  Jess: 11:28

  Yeah changing nothing, continuing to show up for ourselves in a way that we know takes care of us. Yeah, along the lines of stress too, I was thinking about the stress response cycle. I'm not familiar with that at all when they talk about kind of closing that loop and finishing the stress response cycle. Movement so there's a number of different ways and they talk about like laughter movement, something to you know. Turn down the mind if you will, but movement was a really big one. So they were talking about like you're dancing in your kitchen, you go for a run, you go for a walk. Those kinds of things help to complete that stress cycle. So when we talk about movement around a holiday or a holiday event, there's a number of different benefits, but in this, let's say, you are stressed. That can help your body start processing all of that.

  Ali: 12:14

  I kind of look at it as if you feel stressed, if you feel anxious, you can typically feel it in your body. Your body holds that, and so how are we moving through it? How are we like getting it out of our bodies? So, whether it's through movement, whether it's through, you know, journaling, whether it's about talking through some of those things before you're maybe in that situation, all of these things are things that you can do throughout the year, but they're going to be extremely helpful during the holidays, right when stress is inevitable.

  Jess: 12:44

  So one piece of that too and I feel like I bring this up every episode it's awareness, because it takes time and effort to even gain awareness around. Oh, I am feeling stressed. I'm feeling stressed in my body and I feel it in the tightness in my shoulders and the clenching of my jaw and the earlier onset fatigue that I'm noticing, right Like those things. When we can develop that awareness and then have the ability to respond in a way that says Okay, how do I manage this?

  Ali: 13:12

  stress. Yeah, I completely agree. I think also another tip that comes to mind that I personally used to be stressed out about a lot during the holidays. While there'd be twofold, one would be the food. I struggled a lot with my relationship to food, and so the holidays were 10 times worse, because I was always thinking about Okay, how do I track this? How do I stay within my plan? Do I bring my own food? Or it was I would fall off the bandwagon right and say, okay, it's a holiday, I'm gonna eat everything I can, because I can only have it one time a year, and the the sex is all or nothing. And the second thing I was always stressed about was how I looked, so the clothing I was wearing, what I looked like sitting down, if a person would make a comment on my body or not. All of these possible outcomes that I didn't know which one were going to happen. So I don't know where we went to have it first. But I think, like food is a big one around the holidays.

  Jess: 14:09

  Yeah especially with as much emotion as around food and making those traces. I feel like there's a lot of both and here because people have such a complicated relationship with food and so we can sit here and say, like food doesn't have morality, eat whatever you want, however you want, and some a lot of people listening might go yeah, jess and Ellie, that's not helpful at all. Because, there's so much more to that, but the majority of this is what kind of habits have you developed around food? What foods do you know make you feel good, whether that's from a nourishing perspective, from a satisfaction perspective or a nutrient density. Knowing that, hey, if I make sure that I have a carb dense breakfast to start my day, I function a lot better throughout the day. And you know, maybe it's planning Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving is at like 330pm instead of a normal dinner time. It's that weird in between. So you're like late breakfast, but do I really eat lunch? Because then we're eating at 330. And you figure all that out. And it's knowing that, hey, I want to enjoy this food, but I know that my body functions better this way. So maybe it's going into that meal with a plan and saying I would like to make sure that I choose a vegetable in there for micronutrients, I want to make sure that I'm eating the protein. Or you can have the complete opposite perspective of you. Know what? I'm going to go into this entire meal and enjoy myself. If that sounds good, I'm going to eat it. If not, I'm going to set it aside.

  Ali: 15:30

  I think it's interesting because, to your point, I think every person functions differently. Everyone's needs are different. When I look at going into a holiday meal and kind of what I teach my clients to do is also what we've already mentioned is like the self awareness piece. I know that if I go into a holiday meal and I've skipped breakfast and lunch because I'm trying to save calories so I can eat whatever I want during the meal, more chances than not I'm going to binge eat the entire meal. Right, and I'm going to feel sick afterwards. Versus, like you're saying, if I plan ahead and I say, okay, I'm going to eat normal, I'm going to have my normal breakfast, I'm going to maybe have a snack because our holiday meal is at a weird time, and then I'm going to go into the holiday meal saying what do I actually want If I can have everything that's on this table? What do I actually want If there's no restriction, there's no guidelines? It takes away the fascination. It takes away this idea of oh my gosh, I can only ever have this pie once a year and I'm never going to be allowed to have it again. Tomorrow I'm going to have to start my diet. I'm going to have to be so good You're already going to go into your head. Well, I can never have this again, so I better have as much of it as possible and, in a way, you're like more, you're moralizing food. Yeah, even when you don't intend to Great, rather than going in and saying, ok, what is available to me, what am I actually really excited about? Ok, and then what's going to make me feel good? Find the balance, enjoy it and move on, because chances are you're going to feel worse by overanalyzing, by guilt-tripping, than you are if you just enjoyed the damn food and then moved on.

  Jess: 17:06

  Exactly. One thought I do have, and this is something that I've had conversations with clients around. I love your perspective of you're. Like Jess, this is a terrible idea. But one thing I suggest in these holiday meal situations too is like there's nothing wrong with if you want to try one of seven different things. Put like a bite's worth on there by plating your food to see the amount that's there, so that you don't go into it when you say you know what. There are no restrictions on food, there are no guidelines Eat what you truly want. But maybe what you truly want is to try everything, having it out on a plate to see the amount you're eating, so that we don't get into it. And all of a sudden you're like, holy shit, I have to unbutton my pants because I just I wanted to try everything. And here I am like I'm halfway through and I can't fit anymore. And so having that visual and that's not saying check how much you eat it's saying you want to try these things but you might have to visualize the amount so that when the, when the apple pie, pumpkin pie, whatever comes out later that there's still room for that without feeling terribly uncomfortable.

  Ali: 18:06

  Yeah, Again, it goes all back to awareness awareness of what you actually want versus what you think you want. Awareness of your hunger and fullness cues. Awareness of, hey, if this is just the first round and I know my family has like four rounds of food, great, Maybe I need to pace myself. Maybe I would rather have. Oh, my God, my aunt makes this caramel covered popcorn during the holidays. It's incredible, and I know it comes out at the end of the night. Right, we're all sitting around, we're telling stories and we're just snacking on this stuff because it is it crack. It literally is so to me, I'm like okay, the pumpkin pie, I can have that whenever I want it. It's actually not my favorite. Just because I can have it doesn't mean I have to. So I'm going to probably wait and I'm going to demolish some of that popcorn because that's what I actually want. Again, it's the self awareness piece when we're able to say like, hey, I'm not going to demonize any of the food. It's one day of the year If I want to feel good at the end of the night and feel satisfied. Right, Taste buds and nourishment. How do I find them?

  Jess: 19:12

  And this is a really good segue. So let's say you choose your foods and then the pies come out and you're like I'm passing on the pumpkin pie, it's not my jam, I want to wait for this popcorn because that is what I want to enjoy. Your uncle looks across the table at you and is like what? You're not going to eat any pumpkin pie and make some comment about your food or your body. How do you respond?

  Ali: 19:31

  I think what you and I had mentioned earlier was super interesting, because it definitely depends on the person, right? If you all listening work have not noticed, me and Jess probably have a little bit more of an outspoken personality when it comes to Just a little. But it comes from years of practice and years of our own self work around food and around our bodies, right? If we weren't both confident in who we are and what we believe in, it would be a lot more difficult to make some of the comments or set some of the boundaries that we have set. So for people who are new to this, who are saying, hey, I'm not 100% confident in my body yet, I'm still questioning things about my relationship with food, maybe it is just as simple as like ignoring it, laughing it off and being like okay, no, I'm good, you don't have to engage them, right? Because if we don't engage, they don't have anything to refute or to rebuttal. Right? A lot of times the other person is either looking to get a rise out of you to get some kind of comment reaction. They're either talking more about themselves right, they don't want to feel guilty for having the piece of pie and they're looking across and going well, she's not having it. I wonder why she's not having it. Should I not have it their?

  Jess: 20:50

  comment is a reflection of their own internalized experiences around food and diet culture. Absolutely.

  Ali: 20:57

  And so it has so much more to do with them than it has anything to do with you? Or is it having the conversation of like hey, my choices tonight have no effect on you or your food choices, but thank you for being concerned.

  Jess: 21:09

  And there's something incredibly powerful and just setting that boundary, because you absolutely and in saying that, you're not being disrespectful, you're not making for an awkward conversation, you're not being sassy, you're just like hey, I appreciate your concern, but I don't think that we need to discuss my body or my food choices today.

  Ali: 21:26

  It just shut it down, or you can be like me and ask them if it has anything to do with themselves.

  Jess: 21:33

  Again, it depends on the person who you are and it depends on who you're talking to.

  Ali: 21:39

  Absolutely. I would never in my life say something to say one of my grandparents. If one of my grandparents said something about what I was eating, I would laugh and just kind of ignore it and move on right, Because I know it came from a good intention.

  Jess: 21:53

  Absolutely. I think that my grandma, my grandma's the most wholesome human and she makes ridiculous comments about food and body and all of those things all the time, you know, and we can tease her, but I don't need. I don't need a sasser.

  Ali: 22:09

  There is. There. There might be individuals that you're like oh, they always bring up what diet they're on. They always make a comment of what my body looks like or what I'm doing or do I really need to eat that? And I would definitely be the person that would look back and be like I don't know, do I? Did it affect you? Weird, it's funny that my food affects you because they don't know what to say back. They kind of feel stupid and that's also they think that they're helping. Yeah, I mean you're like no, no, and most of the time they do think they're helping, they do think it's coming with a good intention and unfortunately, obviously to this point that they're still making comments. No one has corrected them. They've enabled the behavior because they don't want to have the confrontation or they don't want to have the uncomfortable conversation. But if you feel like you're at a point in your life where you're like you know what, no one else is going to say something, it's probably my place to to finally set the boundary. You can have the conversation in a respectful way that they might actually learn something about their own relationship with food or with their body.

  Jess: 23:13

  Or that cousin makes the same or similar comments year after year after year and you're like all right, we're having this conversation yes. It's time to go. Yeah, I think too. Talking about this as well, I've just had to respond to the ridiculous comments that friends or family make, even if they're well intentioned they're still just.

  Ali: 23:31

  I come from it in the process of. We're now all adults. We all come with our own past experiences and trauma and biases. But if this is something that hurts your feelings or makes you feel uncomfortable as an adult, it's probably our place to now set a boundary so that those things are not said to kids that are younger. Yes, because we can all think of an experience or an example of when we were younger and felt this way around the holidays, because someone made a comment, or even if it wasn't towards us, it was maybe about themselves, or it was about the food. Right, we heard it and it affected the way that we saw food and our bodies moving forward. So we can stop the conversation now. We can actually help the younger generation from having to even go through it.

  Jess: 24:13

  I like that. I was also thinking too, with this kind of circling back, to creating a plan for the day, creating and deciding how you want to feel for the day, using a few minutes for those affirmations, for the day of just being present in your body, so that we don't have necessarily as much of the heightened emotional state with the stress that comes from holiday events and gatherings. And then we have something to fall back on in those moments when, like, yeah, maybe you do set that boundary, but what's the aftermath? How are you feeling afterwards? If you have set yourself up to have those affirmations or know how you want to feel, you can come back to. You know I feel safe in my body, I make the choices that are best for my body. Like, what have you talked to yourself about beforehand, so that you don't get into maybe a negative thought spiral, even though you set the boundary, even though you maybe internally are proud of yourself for being, like, all right, we are not going to engage in that talk or you ignore it, or however you choose to respond and you made the right decision for you. What are you feeling afterwards? So having that plan?

  Ali: 25:23

  for the day. I completely agree. It's one thing to set up a plan, another thing to fall through with it. Right, we always come back to. I think you and I say it all the time is like consistency and repetition. Yeah, set yourself up for success, whatever that means for you, and maybe around the holidays that means okay. Part of this plan is that I do have a accountability buddy, and I don't mean it with food or movement. I mean like, hey, if I'm starting to feel stressed out or if I'm uncomfortable, I know I can go to this person and we can be in the corner of the family gathering talking to each other. I know I can get away, maybe someone to back you up. If the aunt, three times removed, wants to talk to you about what diet you're on, this individual can come up and say, hey, like I actually need their help in the kitchen, like we'll get back to you Having someone there that can be in your corner, right, yeah, like, be a buddy. I also think with that, you made a really good point of when we're setting ourselves up for success, when we're setting up for, like, these habits, these non-negotiables, in order to not allow a heightened emotional charge to affect us. Not only do we need to be mentally set up for success, we need to be physically set up for success, but I think a big thing that we forget about is if you haven't eaten consistently throughout the day before a holiday meal, your emotions are going to be all over the place. Your mental clarity is going to be all over the place. You're going to be quicker to react rather than respond. So, again, when we're setting up these habits, it's looking at what is going to keep me most balanced. So if something were to happen, I'm going to be cool. It's not going to rock me right, because I'm balanced and I like myself.

  Jess: 27:00

  Yeah, the hanger is real, it's real, real man. So a slight little side note when Blake and I first started dating my roommate at the time a really good friend took Blake aside and she said now Jessica's really easy to figure out. She's being real grouchy. She needs one or three things, maybe a combination if it's really bad. She either needs food, sleep or some kind of workout. And Blake and I have been together almost eight years and he says there's not a single time that has led him astray. And so it's one of those things where, if you can know that man, I'm really starting to get reactive here. Like what do I need? So often again, when holiday dinners fall at such a weird time in the day, we don't pay attention to that hunger or we're trying to save ourselves to have a bigger appetite for the meal, and that will affect those emotional reactions. And then to that point, kind of going into one other piece of just tips on body image through this, when our emotions are heightened, during stressful times, or if we are not eating adequately or frequently enough, it also changes how we perceive our bodies. Eating foods that maybe we don't normally eat can also change how we perceive our bodies. Wear comfortable clothes. It sounds like such a just like giveaway tip for the day, because we want to wear something cute, something festive, something that ever wear those things, but also recognize that if you're going to be eating a whole ass meal, your clothes are going to fit differently when you have an empty stomach versus when you have a very full stomach. Is it the stretchy pants, the stretchy dress? Is it a looser sweater? Like, wear what's comfortable to you, and that's going to be very dependent on you as the individual. So I'm not going to say, like, wear the stretchy pants, wear a dress, wear whatever, but pay attention to what you feel good in, and especially to in those moments where you're seeing the family that you don't normally see. Don't wear something that you're having to constantly pull up, push down, adjust, fidget with, because that's going to make you so much more aware of your body and the discomfort.

  Ali: 28:57

  Yes, this brings up so many like of my own experiences around the holidays. Same, I kind of like twofold again, my mother is going to hate if she listens to this episode, which she probably will. She's going to hate that I tell this. But around the holidays. Her logic for a long time. We've worked on it since then. But her logic was you should all wear jeans because, one, you need to look presentable right, a very traditional mindset. But two, if you wear jeans, you can't overeat because you'll be too physically uncomfortable, because your jeans will be too tight that it will cause you to not overeat, so you'll be good. All that did was cause me to wear an outfit that made me feel really physically uncomfortable and then proceed to overeat regardless because I felt like there was a restriction on what I couldn't, could not have. And then I'm sitting at the table with my pants unbuttoned underneath my sweater, feeling like absolute garbage.

  Jess: 29:51

  But I didn't overeat. I didn't overeat, but I feel so disgusting, right?

  Ali: 29:54

  now Versus yes, wear what you want, but also not as an excuse to oh, I'm gonna wear my stretchy pants so I can fit more. Because I think of it in the sense of oh, holiday foods, for the most part, typically have also different ingredients and different things in them that we also don't normally have. Right, they might have more sodium. So our body is going to also respond differently to some of these foods. Again, setting ourselves up for success being the headspace of knowing my body did not magically gain weight after one day. My body's maybe retaining water. It maybe has more sodium that I consumed the day before. Maybe I feel gross because we weren't watching football for nine hours straight. It's okay, it's one day. Yes, not going to impact the rest of you.

  Jess: 30:39

  And so then, the other side of things is the day after these holidays. Do not go into compensatory actions, to quote unquote. Fix yourselves. It's not. Oh, I need to burn off this food I ate. Oh, I need to add an extra five miles to my run or do a harder workout, or whatever it is to compensate for, maybe, how you acted out of the norm the day before with your eating or amount of intake.

  Ali: 31:03

  Because, if anything, you're actually going to put your body into more fight or flight and it's going to counteract what you're even wanting it to do. You do not need to earn your food based off of how much movement you've done. You also don't need to burn off your food. You can just go back to being normal. Just go back to your normal consistency.

  Jess: 31:22

  Yeah, your normal habits, your normal non-negotiables that you had the day before. Because, yeah, if you have more sodium, or a lot of times, holiday foods tend to be more calorically dense, tend to have, like you said, ingredients that we don't normally eat. For me, dairy is a big trigger, but I still enjoy it. And then the next day I'm like, oh, my body doesn't feel great, but it's one day and I just go right back to my normal behaviors.

  Ali: 31:45

  And if the people listening are doing what we're kind of telling them to do and being who they know to be, they're being self-aware, they're planning ahead, they're leaning into the balance of nourishment and satisfaction, then the next day they're not going to be in pain, they're not going to feel guilty, their bodies are going to feel pretty and good. If anything, they're probably going to feel like wow, I have so much energy because of the caloric surplus, I have so much more in my body. I'm ready to go. I am curious because we didn't talk about this before, but I want to hear your point to it. I think about around the holidays we tend to have a lot more alcohol, and that's something I do hear about from clients. A lot is like hey, I actually feel pretty good about the food. It's the alcohol that I have a hard time with, because my family is saying hey, have another. Hey, we're going to drink for the next four to five hours while we watch football. Right, it's a community, a connection thing. So what would you say is like maybe a good rule of thumb, if you know, hey, my family is family, is a big fan of the bushlight and I want to enjoy it, but I also don't want to go overboard.

  Jess: 32:51

  I mean it's that's a very Nebraska here. Sorry, I was going to say I was like you're showing your Nebraska roots right now.

  Ali: 32:58

  It'd be. Pbr here in Portland, but Either way I don't touch it, but that's because I don't like beer.

  Jess: 33:04

  So so it depends on the person, right, and that's kind of any answer to every one of these types of questions. It depends, but it's looking at. Is there a way to enjoy yourself while also knowing your limits, knowing what you enjoy and then knowing how you can handle the pressure of the family passing you another one, passing you another one? Do you set a limit so that you're like you know what, at Thanksgiving I am going to enjoy two beverages, or I will allow myself to drink until 7pm. In between each beverage that I have, I will have water. Figuring out like what works for you to know that tomorrow morning you aren't going to feel like shit is having that piece right there and there's no right answer, Maybe it's. You bring yourself along some like athletic brewing, non-alcoholic beer and that way it looks like you're you know you're still drinking beer right alongside of them.

  Ali: 33:55

  It's a pressure is really there. It's about for success to not even have the conversation.

  Jess: 34:00

  Yeah, or is it, do you like? I love how popular mocktails are. They're like gating popularity, especially with all your bubbly water flavors and all of those things. Bring stuff to make mocktails, and if people choose to add alcohol to them, great. But then you're able to enjoy it and not worry about man. I'm going to feel terrible tomorrow Because, for me personally, I don't feel good when I drink alcohol. So I will have a drink, maybe two, around the holidays, but any more than that, and I can guarantee you, the next day I will have a migraine, and I just don't like to do that to myself. And so I worked to the point for myself that I've set the boundaries with my family so that I do those things like we'll bring stuff to make little fun mocktails or, like you know, non-alcoholic mojito type things, right, and that works really well.

  Ali: 34:43

  I also think that the alcohol conversation is the same as the food conversation. No one has the right to make the comment on your choices. Yes, just as much as I don't like when someone asks me well, you don't have a boyfriend, are you getting married? Are you going to have a baby, like you're getting up there in age, those are questions I don't need to be asked at the holidays. I also don't need to be asked, hey, why aren't you drinking? Because we don't know everyone's experiences. So what I would say around alcohol is one either. Like you said, set the boundary. Another big one that you also mentioned is like water Make sure you're actually hydrated, because it's harder to drink more alcohol if you have a lot of water in your system. Another big thing for me is connection. Have a conversation. It's not just about like who can get drunk the fastest right, yeah, it's, usually it's depending on your family. And well, true, true. And the last one is it goes back to kind of full circle. It's go back to your habits. Have you eaten a meal? Have you moved your body? Have you set yourself mindset wise up for success? I think with any of the questions you might have around holidays, around stress, it all goes back to the basics.

  Jess: 35:55

  Great, so you don't drink bushlight at the holidays. But what do?

  Ali: 35:57

  you drink? Absolutely not. I do drink. I will have like a nice glass of wine. I am also someone that, like I'll have like a drinker or two. I don't love alcohol. I don't dislike it. If I'm going to drink, it's going to be like a really fun holiday cocktail. I typically am not going to drink more than one or two because they're usually too expensive to keep buying. And yeah, I'm kind of the same way of like I value my next day a little bit too much, I would say. Once you feel confident in your body, you feel confident around food, you feel confident in who you are, your presence does not have to be doled by drinking if you don't want it to be. You're able to be present without needing the addition of other things. I love it. That's all I got for you.

  Jess: 36:43

  I think this was awesome. We covered a lot of ground. I feel like this will help set people up to feel the magic of the holidays Enjoy the food, enjoy the people, enjoy the experience and manage that stress because, again, we're not trying to get rid of it.

  Ali: 36:58

  It doesn't have to be that hard, it really doesn't. You can actually just enjoy the holidays and it's not that bad.

  Jess: 37:04

  Know that they're not going to make or break anything, absolutely.

  Ali: 37:09

  Fall back on the habits? Yeah, as long as you go in with the right headspace. I think that not only you know takes you through the holidays, but that transitions into the new year and that is definitely a conversation for another podcast.

  Jess: 37:21

  That is the idea, for the last episode of the first season is to make next year the best year yet, so join me again as a family. Sign me up. I love it. Okay, let's line off here. Thank you so much, friends, for listening and we'll talk to you next Wednesday. Bye, everybody. If you enjoyed this podcast episode, please feel free to follow, subscribe, like whatever the heck you do with podcasts. As always, stay sturdy, friends, and we'll talk to you next week.

Episode 10: Stress Management and Body Image with Kerry McGinn, DPT

In our latest podcast episode, we sit down with Kerry McGinn, a doctor of physical therapy, a 500-hour yoga teacher, and a personal trainer, to explore the intricate relationship between stress, body image, and confidence. Our enlightening conversation navigates the complexities of how stress manifests physically and impacts our perceptions and interactions with our bodies.

Stress, often seen as a negative force, is a vital component of our well-being, pushing us forward and affecting our bodies. However, in today's fast-paced society, it's easy for our bodies to get stuck in the fight or flight mode. This state of chronic stress often leads to physical manifestations, which in turn affects how we view and communicate with our bodies. Kerry provides valuable insights into these complex conduits, highlighting how he uses biofeedback techniques to help his clients manage stress and chronic pain.

Our conversation takes an intriguing turn as we delve into the concept of control and its relation to stress and body image. Often, when external stressors overwhelm us, we turn to our bodies as a symbol of control, seeking to 'fix' something within our reach. This approach is further fueled by societal influences and media messages that shape our perceptions of our bodies. Recognizing this pattern is the first step towards reclaiming control over our reactions to stress and creating sustainable coping strategies.

We also delve into the concept of confidence and its connection with stress management. Confidence, we discover, is a skill that can be developed through repeated exposure to challenges and an awareness of our capabilities. Reducing resistance to intimidating tasks can also boost confidence, transforming our approach to stress management. The discussion brings to light the importance of providing ourselves with emotional and physical support, especially when facing formidable tasks.

As we wrap up our enlightening conversation, we equip our listeners with practical stress management tools to reconnect with their physical, mental, emotional, and energetic bodies. We underscore the importance of indulging in activities that bring joy, as these moments of happiness often provide relief from stress.

Our podcast episode with Kerry offers a thought-provoking exploration of stress, control, confidence, and so much more. Whether you're grappling with chronic stress, struggling with body image issues, or seeking ways to boost your confidence, this episode is sure to provide valuable insights and practical tools to help you navigate these complex issues. So, tune in, and let's start decoding the connection between stress, body image, and confidence together.

• Full Transcript

  Jess: 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. Kerry, thanks so much for being on the podcast. I'm stoked you're here. Can you tell me a little bit about you, what you do, your journey and how?

  Kerry: 0:33

  you got there? Yes, well, first of all, thank you so much for having me so stoked to chat. All things stress, body image, and wherever else this takes us today, it'll take us another direction. I'm sure. I'm sure it always does in the best way possible. But by trade I'm a doctor of physical therapy, a 500-hour yoga teacher, a personal trainer and all sorts of other little certifications and continue ed. I am definitely one of those continuous life learners, and probably sometimes too much, because I just love all the things about health and the human body and I also will often say to people I am the product of my own experiences. I joke sometimes that a series of unfortunate events led me to practice and view the human body in the way that I do now, and while that sounds I don't know sad or upsetting, it's actually been a really beautiful journey that's gotten me here, and I don't think I'd be the practitioner or the yoga teacher or just the person I am today without all those experiences wrapping it up and leading me to the way I treat people in front of me today.

  Jess: 1:39

  I think that we all go through shit, right, and it's not pretty and it's probably sad, but it does. It shapes us into who we are today, the choices that we make to get ourselves to where we are today.

  Kerry: 1:50

  I think it's been like even just like in terms of stress, like my own journey with understanding stress. I work with a lot of my clients these days with pain and also how stress affects pain. So I work with a lot of chronic pain clients or just recurring pain, a lot of people with chronic illness or chronic pain and how stress affects that and then how that affects how we treat our body, how we look at our body, how we talk to our body, and that's also things that I've been through before so I can understand when my clients are coming into me and some of the things they're saying. I'm like no, I really do understand that because I've been there before. I've felt those feelings that you're feeling right now.

  Jess: 2:27

  You have such a well I want to say well rounded I don't know if that's the word I want just experience and education as far as like, yes, physical therapy. So, yeah, when people are coming to you in pain, you have the direction on how you want them to maybe move their bodies, whether that's something that's body weight or weighted or whatever. But you also have this training in yoga so you're able to further the movement in a way. That's more of a flow, if you will. Yeah, 100%. And then you also have stress management as well, because you're like, you know, maybe this pain you're having is as a result of all these other stressors, because I also be personally for a second. Any of the I'm gonna say, injuries with air quotes here, but any weird pains that have come up for me over the years end up being related to like, oh, you just started a new job and you bought a new house and you moved, and now your lower back is starting to act up. When you resumed powerlifting, yeah. So here's the thing let's adapt to the volume, let's find the manageable load Right. There's so many pieces that that stress kind of reflects. So I can't imagine how great those conversations you end up having clients. But I'm also wondering if someone comes to you for PT and then you end up having conversation about stress, are they like wait, no, I came to you because my shoulders messed up and you're like well they're connected.

  Kerry: 3:40

  Yep, you just read my mind. I was gonna say it's great to have these conversations and like the people oftentimes I am people's like last resort I'll say especially some more of my chronic illness, chronic pain folks. They're like I've tried everything, I don't know what else to do. Someone recommended you, so I'm in your hands. It can't get worse. And can you fix me? Yeah, exactly, and it's like a bit of a challenge. But they're also like I believe you and they're coming from a different perspective. But I do also, especially literally the story you just told. It was me last May. Like I just moved, just started some new position, so I had a low back spasm last May, so I literally been there. And then I have some other people who just, you know, know me from the community and know me as a yoga teacher, like, oh, I'd love to work with you, a physical therapist. So when I start asking them questions about like what are your stress levels? Like Are you sleeping? Like are you eating enough? And I'm not a nutritionist, but my concern is like are you getting enough calories in so that your body doesn't feel like it's in panic mode 24 seven?

  Jess: 4:36

  Absolutely Well. And those, those pieces of biofeedback right. Are you eating enough? Are you drinking enough? Are you sleeping enough? How's your stress management? How's your hunger levels, how's your digestion? All of those things are so important.

  Kerry: 4:48

  Right. And so we feel like but, but like it's just this one spot in my shoulder, like I promise we'll wrap it all up in a nice little bow in a moment. It's not going to be like a perfect bow, but it'll have some strategies in it, but we'll like bring it all together. So you're like, oh, I can understand how this stress and this kind of move is affecting how I feel in my physical body. And I'll be honest, some people understand it. Some people still are like, no, no, but I just want to focus on the shoulder and I get that. You kind of. I kind of have to meet everyone where they are in their journey, and sometimes it's going to be easier than others.

  Jess: 5:21

  For sure I do have a couple of very good friends who are also physical therapists and it is interesting the general understanding of physical therapy and what it does and why you go see someone for PT. And then there's a lot of the practitioners now that are like no, there's so much different. Ever an approach Like I'm not just going to fix your body. That's not how this works. I'm really fortunate for the PTs that I've been around because it's helped me to address so that when, like right now, I am actually going through a weird shoulder thing from low bar squatting and from building a deck and I'm like oh my gosh, I need to get a PT, they're going to fix me. And then, like my friend Taylor, who's a PT, is like Jessica, no, that's not how it works, which I know, but we want, we want that fix, we want to have that thing.

  Kerry: 6:03

  That's going to be the answer to make it better 100%, and it's definitely something I struggle with as a practitioner and I've definitely struggled with also on the flip side as a patient like I've gone through my own burnout journey and been like, well, just tell me the one thing that's going to fix this, cause I'm done oh, the doctors, appointments and whatnot. And also as a practitioner, it's easier to take that step back and to be like, okay, let's look at the bigger picture. And the way I often will help introduce this to people is patterns. Like I love a good journal and note taking, so that's probably where it comes from too. So, you know, let's just look at patterns Like how do you feel on a Monday versus a Friday? How do you feel after you know a 12 hour shift versus a six hour shift? When is your pain worse and when is it better? And a lot of times when we're in pain, it's such a for lack of a better word painful experience. It challenges this whole idea of how we think our body should be working and how we think our body should be. And then you know, we can talk, even get into that whole like having to change your exercise routine and what role that plays on people's mental health and how there's so many like nuances to this and, when it comes down to it is some people don't even realize. Oh, my pain actually feels better now than it did two hours ago, but it felt worse at the end of the day, like we're not always in tune with the ebbs and flows of it as much, and so it can just get very overwhelming and like, oh my gosh, just get rid of this, fix this, work some magic. It's wrong, this feels wrong. Make it stop. Exactly.

  Jess: 7:28

  Instead of like oh yeah.

  Kerry: 7:29

  Saturday I felt pretty good. I forgot Like I went to pizza with friends and then I went for a hike and then I went out to dinner and then I slept well and I had really no pain, versus if you have two 10 hour days in a row like, oh my goodness everything hurts.

  Jess: 7:43

  I'm laughing because that's literally even me with my shoulder. And when I'm like oh yeah, during the work week it gets really bad because I am retracting mouths with this arm, and then on the weekends it gets a little better, like, yeah, you have to follow those pieces of it. Okay, let's segue a little bit. I mean, you kind of touched on a little bit of you, what you do, a little bit about your journey, but I was curious to talk a little bit about potentially stress and its impacts on body image, on our own well-being. Yes, I love this.

  Kerry: 8:15

  I think my journey always like peppers in a little bit along the way because, like I said, I definitely learned through different stages of my journey. I learned and then I felt it, or I felt it, then I learned. So it's always interesting how it intermingles and I'm sure you know a few people feel that way out there. But when it comes to stress and body image, I think it's really important to understand the stress response in the body, then that kind of cascade of effects. And I'll say one thing that kind of blows people's mind is that stress in itself is not inherently a bad thing and in order to grow, to change heck, to build muscle, to get stronger, to learn, we need stress. Stress is what has pushed evolution along. It has what pushed our own personal growth and professional growth along and even our physical bodies. Like if you can't run I'm just using running as an example, even though I'm not a runner like if you can't run one mile, then you're not going to run 26 miles, and in order to run 26 miles you need to stress your body with the one mile, or running and exercise in itself is stress on the body too. But we see it as a bit. I think a lot of people see stress and exercise not as the same, when exercise has the same effect on our body as some stressors do and it's good, stress is pushing us forward, that sort of thing. So that idea of stress is not inherently bad. I feel like I always have to start with stress is not bad, it's part of life.

  Jess: 9:37

  Are you familiar with Steve Magnus at all? He's written a few books, but in one of them it's called Peak Performance. And their entire equation is stress plus rest equals growth. Yes, yep. And the comments listening are like oh my God, jessica, I've heard this a hundred times, but it's true, it's. I mean, if you stress the body and you rest, mm-hmm, equals growth. It's the same for life situations. It's how muscles grow. It's how we grow.

  Kerry: 10:06

  Exactly and I think that's important to know. Then you look at, okay, what is how stress really affect us. So stress, at its core, it is our body's response to a certain stimulus. So stress in itself is just a response to a stimulus. That stimulus can be a back squat. That stimulus can be an email from your boss, it can be a fight with your partner, it can be a hard hike, it can be so many different things. And when we get stressed, regardless of the stimulus, is a neurochemical Kind of cascade happens where our body enters fight, flight or freeze mode. So our body gets ready to either fight the stressor, run from the stressor, or freeze in more extreme situation. And once again, none of those Responses are bad. If you are trying to hype yourself up, I'm thinking back to I play college across like before a game. We'd want to hype ourselves up, get ready for it. So you want to get your heart rate up, you want to get the blood flowing, you want to increase your respiratory rate Because that's gonna help you perform. Same thing, like if you're giving a presentation in front of the room, like I give a lot of corporate presentation, I don't want to be falling asleep and like in getting ready for bed mode. I want to be ready to stand tall and project my voice and give my lecture. So stress and the response to stress is enabling us to do those things. And what happens in our modern society Is that we get stuck there. We get stuck in being constantly in fight or flight mode, so we never push over to the other edge, which is parasympathetic, rest and digest mode, which I feel like a lot of people are commonly know rest and digest and fight or flight. So we never move out of that fight or flight into rest and digest. And rest and digest mode is when our muscles heal, when our body fights back illness, when our brain makes more neural synapses. Like you said, stress press, rest equals growth and in order to grow you need both. You need both. And when we get stuck in the stress, that's when I really see that negative effect on body image, on self-confidence, on just how we feel as a human being in our body, mentally and physically.

  Jess: 12:11

  You said you see it more when people get stuck in that fighter, fighter flight, higher stressor. Yeah, absolutely, you're in a heightened emotional state.

  Kerry: 12:21

  Yep, you're more reactive, and that, in turn, it changes the way we experience our bodies, exactly and also, if we're in fighter flight for so long, it can increase inflammation in our body, decrease our bodies ability to digest food, decrease our organs abilities to do their work, because when we're in fighter flight mode all the blood is Taken from our organs, it goes to our brain and our muscles to get us out of that situation. So if our blood is always shunted to other areas, it's gonna shut down some necessary processes even you know. I think back to myself, and part of my burnout experience was twofold. I was in a physical therapy job where I was, you know, seeing 22 patients throughout, you know, an eight-hour day without a lunch break. So not only was I not eating, but I also had this weird guilt about going to the bathroom. So, like I wouldn't go to the bathroom, I would like hold everything in. Yeah, it was terrible. And then I got to this point where, you know for maybe TMI, but I was chronically constipated because I was just ignoring my body's signals throughout my work day, and then my body could not Literally get rid of the waste that I was producing because it was so, you know, muscles were tight, I was not allowing myself to rest and digest and I'm sorry, but if anyone out there's ever been constipated, you don't feel so great about how your body looks. It's just not a time when you're like oh, I'm feeling great when you're just Constipated it's just not.

  Jess: 13:47

  It's almost a distraction from everything else. For sure, with the body image piece and stress I was just thinking about, our emotions and a stressful time are really heightened. Mm-hmm, right, it changes how you perceive your body. Our body image is the lens with which we view our body. High stress times distort that, it amplifies, it can amplify what we see, because these are our perception. Body image isn't actually how we appear Really physically, it's how we perceive our appearance and, yeah, I wouldn't restress. There's that inflammatory response. But then there's also that like well, I'm stressed and I can't get this done, and these, all of these things are going on and it takes and distorts it enough that it's like a Funhouse mirror sometimes when you look in the mirror, when you're stressed and suddenly that body image is a lot harder to kind of stay at a Baseline that is, you know, healthier or more flexible. I don't know if you're familiar with body image flexibility at all. Okay, big fan, just from that. That piece where you're not talking body positivity, we're not talking body neutrality, we're talking body image flexibility and stress, from what I have seen have read, takes and makes that body image a little more rigid.

  Kerry: 14:55

  Well, there's so many pieces to that, but I think one thing that just came to mind when you're saying that is when you're stressed like that for so long, I personally see we're trying to control more than we're trying to control. And when you're talking about body image flexibility, you're not really controlling, you're kind of witnessing. And when you're so stressed that you're just trying to grasp on to anything that you can do to feel better, I see that in myself and in my clients you start to pick things apart because you think that you can control that instead of just witnessing how you feel and are experiencing your emotions and your physical sensation. And to also add to that is you said you know our emotional reactivity is higher, our physical sensations can also be higher and we kind of dissociate from where we actually are in the moment. Some people do. So add that all together and your ability to stay flexible and stay in that witness role kind of goes out the window.

  Jess: 15:48

  And there can also be the response to if you're kind of fixating and changing or controlling your body. That a lot of times Becomes a response to stress. Yeah, I have all of these stressful things going on in my life. What is something that I can control? Can I control my body, can I control what it looks like, what it does, and so then it can give a person the illusion that they're addressing this stressor or Addressing the situation and creating an answer or a solution, when it's actually just deflecting.

  Kerry: 16:16

  Yeah, no way. I see that more often when it's external stressors, when it's kind of out of someone's control you know, whether it be work related stressors or even just another family member that's say is sick, it's something that you can't fix. Then you look to okay, what can I fix? That fix? I should say an air quotes, because it's really you know, you're not really fix anything, you just can't get that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, but I know, just try to get control over it.

  Jess: 16:42

  That's the answer that your brain looks for.

  Kerry: 16:45

  Exactly like what can I fix? I can't make this person happier, I can't fix this at my job, so what's something within my control and often to your point? That goes back to, okay, people micromanaging what they're doing with their body and then how they're viewing their body, even though their body really isn't the stressor. It's just happening as a product of the stressor.

  Jess: 17:07

  Yeah, and it's one of those two that maybe it is turning back to your body as the the thing to control and then it takes away energy from Maybe addressing the actual situation. That is stressful. So you're like addressing a symptom if you will right, it's the emotional piece of it that then reflects on our body image and then ignoring the symptom, and so you're avoiding and you're like, okay, well, maybe I need to shove these emotions down and then, okay, now Maybe it's starting a new diet or a new exercise plan, or would you some kind of quick fix like Getting my hair done or doing new makeup or buying new clothes, or something like that. Almost as like a deflection from the actual situation, it's a very unsustainable way to, I'm gonna say, manage, air quotes, manage.

  Kerry: 17:52

  Yeah, no, 100%, and I think you know we can't put down or can't forget about the Roll, that media and not even just social media, but just messaging has played a role in all this. You know there's so many pieces to that too that it feels like okay when everything's out of control. What is in my control? And especially, I might you know, over generalization, I think for women it is even more so. Well, this isn't my control, because the media is telling me that this isn't my control, that this is the only thing that is in my control when I can't control anything else.

  Jess: 18:23

  I think another piece of this too that I feel like I come back to when it comes to confidence and body image, a lot is awareness, mm-hmm, because if we can develop self-awareness around Situations, and it takes practice like I just throw it out there, like, oh yeah, develop awareness. But for me personally I Just started a new job. Even though this job is wonderful, it is still stressful. Right, it was stressful leaving the previous position to start the new position. It was a lot. It is stressful. I have developed enough awareness around my own response to stress to know, okay, when I am stressed, I have a tendency to pick apart the tiny things about myself or my body for absolutely no reason, because it gives me a sense of control, because I can't control how stressed I feel about settling into this new job Yep, yep, so that's what I do and then realizing like, oh, you're doing it again. Or it's a pattern of awareness Totally and the tendency towards and I'll speak for myself personally, I can't generalize, but the tendency towards while I'm feeling this stress, maybe I need to switch up what I'm doing for my physical activity, yep, and now it's not the you know program hopping and that kind of thing. I'm a power lifter and I will forever power lift as long as my body allows. I freaking love it and I also have on and off seasons of running, like those are still things. But my brain will be like do we need to go into hypertrophy phase and maybe add in some more running? Maybe the answer to your stress right now is to go for a really long run, even though you've only been running three to four miles at a time.

  Kerry: 19:53

  Cause you're looking for something to control, and it's even farther than control. It's. You're looking for something to almost feel, something other than the stress, absolutely.

  Jess: 20:03

  But I guess, kind of circling back to my point, is like that stress brings so much more attention on your body. Yes, cause we live this entire experience in our bodies and so when we're stressed, you're like, well, what's going on in my body? And there's a difference between, like the awareness piece of oh, I'm more stressed, so I'm noticing like my digestion has changed. I'm more stressed, I'm noticing that crap, it's taking me a lot longer to fall asleep. Those things, the awareness piece of then, okay, how can I minimize this stress, how can I handle it? Versus turning the attention towards our bodies and you're like, oh, my God, what's wrong with me? You, all of these other things to like change and fix, it's the mindset on how you go about those actions.

  Kerry: 20:42

  And I think often and you alluded to it earlier some of that comes around when we're not really allowing ourselves to feel the feelings associated with stress, because it's challenging to feel sad or angry or all those emotions that can come with it. And this is maybe not like the best example, but you know, say you know your example. You're starting a new job, it's stressful and you're kind of I've experienced in the past like, oh, I'm annoyed at myself, that this is stressful and that adds more stress to my plate. I really, truly don't want to feel annoyed at myself because that's an uncomfortable feeling to feel. So let me just be annoyed at little things like oh, this pants feels too tighter. Oh, I feel like a little this. You start sitting in the mirror and picking up out your body because you really don't want to sit with the emotion of being annoyed at yourself, which ultimately goes back to you don't want to sit with the fact that this is a new experience. Talking from personal experience. This is a new experience and it's a little scary and daunting while also being exciting. And that's really complicated for ourselves and our minds to be like. Oh it's exciting, oh my gosh, this is terrifying. It's too much that we don't want to really accept just yet.

  Jess: 21:49

  How hard is it for us as humans to acknowledge our emotions and sit with them? That's something that I have loved reading about, like acceptance and commitment therapy, and they talk a lot about being able to acknowledge thoughts as they come up and not attach to them and let them go, but it's a lot about acknowledgement and awareness of present situation without judgment. I mean, I think we talk a lot of non judgment when you talk like Buddhist principles, right, and like yoga tradition, and I love that, but being able to acknowledge and sit with those. I'm annoyed at myself because, yes, I completely resonate with that, because, say, I'm part of this new job. Situation is I'm getting up at five in the morning and a decade ago, when I was in the thick of back to back marathon training, I was up at five every day to go run. But there's a difference between getting up and doing something you love and that you're like training for this goal it's fun and getting up for work and that five a and wake up has been a brutal and I get so annoyed with myself because my brain is like at 3% capacity at five in the morning to get ready and I have to set stuff out the night before and I have to make sure that everything is like okay, you need to take this paperwork in. Okay, put your keys on top of it on the counter so that before you leave, you take it with you. And just that acknowledgement of yeah, I've been annoyed at myself because I'm like you are not functioning where you should be right now and then you have to be like okay, but I'm also like stressed, I'm getting to use to new sleep schedule. I'm getting used to like you're trying to acknowledge those pieces of this is a stressful season and this will go away.

  Kerry: 23:19

  I love that. I say that often, like this is a season. I work with a lot of people who there's a lot of body image wrapped up in that, because there's that added layer of well, now, my body is not doing what I ask of it. So then the body image is so rooted in, while I'm broken and picking apart themselves for not only how they look, but how they can or cannot function. And there's this I don't know exactly what I want, how I want to say it, but this judgment, always there's so much judgment around it and that can also play such a negative role. There's judgment not only about the body image, but there's judgment about how you're feeling, which then puts more pressure on the body image piece and at the end of the day, then your brain is kind of cognitively overloaded. Sometimes it's just like where am I? What am I doing?

  Jess: 24:08

  Yeah, absolutely. Any thoughts on stress impacting self confidence at all? Yeah, you know, I think that's it's so intertwined. But I just curious if you had any like separate thoughts there.

  Kerry: 24:20

  No, that's a really great question because I think it's another interesting thing where some stress and rising to the challenge of stress can increase our self confidence. Right, like, say, you know, example, powerlifting like that's stressful, like it's placing a stress on the body, but then you like complete a powerlifting, like well, I was able to complete that task and let's take it out of the body performance realm, even because let's talk about this new job of yours, you know, showing up for yourself and keeping promises to yourself, even if that's just like I am going to wake up at 5am and get my butt to work every day this week and doing that successfully with all your things in tow, all the paperwork, all the lunch, rising to that challenge, I mean like, wow, look, I just did that week, I completed it, great work. That increases your self confidence. So, on one hand, stress can also be a useful way to increase self confidence, but then you tip over that tipping point where it's no longer helping you increase and it's just like I'm the worst, I can't get anything done, I'm awful, I look awful, and the negative thought spiral just takes you to zero self confidence and it's just this kind of like teeter, teeter, totter, of like finding that right balance where, like I'm rising to the challenges, I can handle this without going off the deep end of a negative thought spiral.

  Jess: 25:35

  Exactly. I'm just nodding my head over here Because I'm like, yes, all of these things, because confidence I love. Mel Robbins defines confidence as the willingness to try. Because confidence is a skill. Yeah, for sure. It's that willingness to try and try again, and try again, and try again, and that's how confidence is built. And so when you're talking about doing the thing and being like, wow, I'm proud of myself, I did this uncomfortable thing, I did this thing, that may have been the just manageable challenge and you repeat that over and over and it builds that confidence skill.

  Kerry: 26:06

  Yep, the willingness is there when you have evidence to show that you're capable of it. You need the evidence to be willing to try sometimes.

  Jess: 26:15

  And that in turn decreases the resistance to doing the thing. Yep, 100%. Yeah, I don't know that I will ever not have resistance to 5am.

  Kerry: 26:24

  Yeah that's fair.

  Jess: 26:24

  I don't think I will either, but like there's decreasing resistance in the, but I don't know that there's much confidence in myself for getting up at 5am every day. I had a friend tell me who's like oh my gosh, it's really, it's not too bad at all to get up at 5. It's the first couple of weeks that are the hardest and then you just keep getting up at 5am every day and it gets easier. And I was like nobody getting up at 5am on a Saturday.

  Kerry: 26:47

  Yeah, exactly, You're like not, not for me, Not for me, no, no, absolutely not, I think it's. I think to your point there, because I've definitely I've had early wake up calls for a large portion of my career and I noticed I still didn't like getting up at 5am but I was getting more confident that I would actually do it and not press news five times.

  Jess: 27:09

  You actually wake up to your alarm. Okay, okay, yes.

  Kerry: 27:12

  I was like I was just starting to 5am job. I was like snooze, snooze, snooze and then you wake up freaking out, running out the door, exactly Okay.

  Jess: 27:21

  I'm not going to lie and I don't know this actually has any applicable context beyond just my own experience. But the only way my first week at this new job that I got out of bed on time was. I was like if you get out of bed on time and you get out the door on time, you have time to stop at Starbucks and get coffee.

  Kerry: 27:36

  Yes, yes, I bribed myself.

  Jess: 27:40

  I was like, okay, how, how are you doing? I really just want cold brew with some salted caramel, cold foam on top. Yes, okay, okay, I'll get up then.

  Kerry: 27:51

  One of my mentors says something like I just work for the little treats that I give myself throughout the day. I was like I feel that so hard?

  Jess: 27:57

  Emotional support coffee is a real thing it is.

  Kerry: 28:03

  I love the idea of little treats. I'm like oh good, I answered my emails, little treats.

  Jess: 28:06

  Yeah, we're basically all children. Yeah, exactly, I love to hike and she has a good friend with a couple of kids and she always takes candy so that if they start getting a little bored or a little grouchy or whatever, she pulls out candy. Here's some gummy candy. I love that. Keeps them going. And then she's telling me this and I'm reaching into my pack for, like sour patch kids. I'm like, me too, I love it. I'm like why do you think like the trail, whether it's hiking or trail running, I mean, I always have gummy candy. It's brilliant, it's like your little power ups.

  Kerry: 28:37

  No, I love that. It's really and honestly to take that background to like stress management really is. That's what I always say. It's those little things that really help, like little small tools and tips and you know we're joking about coffee and candy but even just like little ways to show up for yourself and sometimes that is a coffee or a candy. Other times it's deeper and it's more elaborate. But stress management really comes back to those little things that you can do and in my opinion and this might not be the most science backed opinion, but I've seen it over and over again it's showing up for yourself in a way that feels caring in the moment.

  Jess: 29:17

  We talk a lot about nourishing ourselves. Yes, yeah, and whether that means that you are eating nutrient dense foods or that means you were nourishing your mind with a book that you wanted to read, right, but those things are like taking care of you.

  Kerry: 29:30

  I actually used to run a group coaching program called nourish your nervous system. You know, there's so many ways that people can manage stress out there and there's so many different tools and techniques and schools of thought, and what I've really found over the years is it's not always exactly about the what, the what, but about finding what works for you and that's going to be different for every single person Something that feels nourishing to me like for me, getting out into the woods and going on a hike is very nourishing. For me Some people it's not that's a task, that's a chore, that's an exercise only, but that fills me back up in a way that other things don't. And to your point, like sometimes that's going to be your favorite, like oh my gosh. I'm thinking like my favorite comfort food is buffalo chicken pizza and like sometimes I just need a buffalo chicken pizza. And then other times I'm like, okay, I have a really like next week I'm doing a certification and I have a really full week next week. I know that if I at least have some nourishing nutrients food in the morning to fuel myself, that's going to feel really nourishing so that I feel better capable to handle whatever is thrown my way that day and so maybe I meal prop in advance and that's going to work for next week, but that might not work for the week after that. And it's finding what works for you when and having those tools, because you then can really feel that ricochet effect on your mental, your emotional health and how you see yourself in this world.

  Jess: 30:52

  And as you start to build awareness around your response to stress and stressful situations, you can anticipate how to take care of yourself. Because a lot of this too, as we're talking about all these stressful situations, a lot of it doesn't have to do with the actual situation. Yes, it's the emotions that we have in our reactions to the situation, the stress response, and then how we take care of ourselves in that. So these tips as far as ways to nourish your body, ways to maybe prepare for that stressful week ahead. So for me, with my 5 am wakeups and knowing that the brain isn't working right that early, so then it's. The coffee maker is already set and ready. If I'm not going to go to Starbucks, I have oatmeal already out next to the bowl. And I mean I wear black scrubs every day, so it's not like I have to pick out my outfit. That doesn't take much brainpower, right, but you minimize and you plan that piece, or it's knowing like you know what. I prepped all of my lunches in a week. I eat the same thing for breakfast and lunch, all during the work week. We've grocery shops so that by the time I get home from work I don't have to ask what do you want for dinner? It's hey. Do we want burgers tonight, or do we want chicken?

  Kerry: 32:02

  Right when you do all those things like how does that feel in your physical and mental body Versus? You didn't do it on any of those things.

  Jess: 32:09

  Meal prep while I'm doing it is not my favorite thing, right. I get that, so in the moment it's kind of like meh, this is what I have to do. But the rest of it, just knowing like I'm setting myself up for having a smoother day, so that I already know that this is stressful, but this is how I'm gonna get through it.

  Kerry: 32:26

  Yeah, exactly, you're providing yourself with those skills or those coping strategies beforehand.

  Jess: 32:32

  Or just knowing like the work schedule is super busy right now that the office that I'm at we are finishing up a remodel, so we've been in a temp office which is, you know, so much fun, but it's made it so like my breaks are a little bit shorter. And I don't say that like, oh, they don't give me a lunch break, they do, I just choose to use my time to finish chart notes prep for the rest of the day, get things cleaned up, to move back into the office. So I brought more snacks yeah, love that Versus a full meal. So it's an easy. I chopped up an apple. I had a protein bar. I ate some yogurt like those pieces instead of like a set down full meal.

  Kerry: 33:06

  And that goes back to your plan on self-awareness. You were able to make those choices because you were aware of what your needs are and when you were just talking that, that kind of reminded me of some of my experiences with like the opposite of that, when I haven't developed that Well, the opposite and also the same. Like I know, when I'm stressed and in that chronic stress state and I'm not taking care of myself, I know one of my first kind of reactions is like having a lot of really challenging feelings around sensations in my body. So this is like a really silly one. Like my sensory processing is a little bit more challenged when I'm in that high stress mode, so things like wearing too tight of pants or wearing the wrong bra or too many layers. I know that I'm more sensitive to those things when I'm in high stress mode. And I also know when I'm more sensitive to those things is when I tend to look in the mirror and then pick apart my body image because I'm feeling, you know my pants are too tight, so that must mean that I'm fat or my bra doesn't fit, so that must mean this, and I start to tell myself these stories about what's going on when really the problem isn't my body or even the clothes, it's the original stress. So I don't always have the self-awareness to prevent it. But I've developed over the years this self-awareness of sitting with this uncomfortable sensation in my body and not blaming myself for feeling this way. Witnessing it and being like this really has nothing to do with how you look or how you think you look, and a lot to do with You're in a really stressful experience. So your brain's just trying to place blame on something else, Like it's not about those genes you wore those genes two nights ago it's about how you're feeling and you know there's so many different layers to that too. And sometimes that looks like oh, maybe that means like I really don't want to go out tonight, Like I kind of need a night in to myself. Or maybe it's like okay, I know that I've kind of hit my upper limit of stress and I can feel it in my physical body and I can feel how it's affecting my body image and my confidence and my self-talk. So we need to put in some tools and strategies to help moving forward.

  Jess: 35:17

  I love that this has all just come back to awareness of learning that, because it takes a lot of trial and error and it takes a lot of, like you said, you can't catch yourself necessarily before that Maybe negative thought spiral starts, but you catch yourself in it and you're like, oh, yeah, no, you're stressed. Okay, let's acknowledge these feelings because they're there and they're valid, but I don't have to identify with them because I understand where they're coming from.

  Kerry: 35:41

  Right, and I think that goes back to what you said about body image flexibility. It's this acknowledgement of how you're feeling, too, and how that's playing a role as well, and how you're seeing yourself and even how you're feeling in yourself, how you're feeling physically, but also mentally and emotionally.

  Jess: 35:58

  Absolutely so. Any other tips for managing stress or maybe managing body image during high stress times?

  Kerry: 36:05

  Yeah, so let's dive into that a little bit. I think to your point and to what it keeps coming back around to is developing some sort of self-awareness practice. So whether that's journaling or even you know some people aren't journaling, so that's totally fine. When I work with, some of my clients say, let's just do a daily check-in every day, and that doesn't even need to be a written thing, that can be a. Let me just sit for 30 seconds or stand or even like sometimes I do it when I'm laying in bed at first and just be like how am I feeling physically? Am I tired? Am I muscels sore? How do I feel? How am I feeling emotionally and how am I feeling energy-wise? And just noticing, without a label of like, oh, I'm feeling this way, so it's gonna be a bad day or whatever. It is, just noticing this is how I'm feeling, because when you know how you're feeling, then you know, when you might be feeling a little off, that you might need to put in some of these other tools. So that's kind of the first layer. If you don't have the awareness, it's really hard to implement stress management tools.

  Jess: 37:00

  But do you know how few people actually take the time to check in with themselves? Because most people don't you go through your entire lived experience in this body and to say, okay, how do you feel? Because that's I mean. You talked about being a big fan of journaling. I am too. I love it, and a lot of times my journaling tends to be just brain dump, thought, download, whatever you wanna call it. Yeah, I love it, and then I can go to like structured. But a lot of people love, if they're gonna journal, they want journal prompts, and that is the very first one for me is how are you feeling? How are you really? Yeah, check in with yourself, because sometimes we just push ourselves to keep going and you're like there's a reason that your body is saying it's tired Right.

  Kerry: 37:41

  I love to do talk about real tangible tool is called a five body check in. I learned this from Dr Ariel Schwartz, who does a lot of work with the polyvagal theory and yoga. She also does a lot of work with like complex PTSD and all that but her five body check in. You say, how is my breath feeling? Is it shallow, Is it deep, Is it fast, Is it slow? How's my physical body feeling? So like muscles, joints, bones, like just kind of moving things around and seeing what's up? How are my emotions? What emotions?

  Jess: 38:08

  am I feeling?

  Kerry: 38:08

  right now. How's my energy feeling? And, depending on who you are like, sometimes I take that as like am I fatigued, am I excited? Or how am I feeling energetically in terms of like, am I feeling in alignment? Am I feeling on the right path? More of like that chakra energetics as well. The vibe, the cue line. Yeah, exactly, I just wanna make sure you've got them all breathing body, physical body, oh, and then mental body, cause sometimes emotional and mental body can be very different. Like you can be feeling a really strong emotion and then notice that your mental body is, your mind, is really moving quickly. Or you can notice, oh, I'm feeling really happy, but my mind is moving a little slower. And just checking in with those five mental, physical, emotional, breathing and energy body, and that's a really great place to start and just noticing patterns.

  Jess: 38:55

  That is almost the embodiment of everything that we've talked about.

  Kerry: 38:58

  Yeah, yeah.

  Jess: 38:59

  I like that tool. I mean one kind of stress management tool that I've used is that like body scan. So when you're talking about just that checking with your physical being, you know you start with the top of your head and you go down just incrementally and I think of it in muscle groups, but we'll think of it as like you can go by body part and just check in of like, is that muscle relaxed? Is that muscle relaxed? And I know some people do that for helping to sleep as well Going through and making sure each muscle is relaxed, cause a lot of times our jaw is clenched, our shoulders are in our ears, my toes a lot of times are like curled underneath each other and you're like, okay, I'm just going to relax all of this.

  Kerry: 39:33

  Totally, and a lot of people, to your point, don't realize what their physical body is doing when they're not consciously tuning into it.

  Jess: 39:41

  Or especially to during stressful times, because our bodies take on so much of that stress. I mean, I work in dentistry, my full-time job is as a hygienist and I can't tell you the beginning of the pandemic, the number of people that came in and they were like my job is wrecked. Yeah, what is going on and we're like that is a physical symptom of your stress.

  Kerry: 40:01

  Yeah, I feel like if you haven't experienced that sometimes it takes an extreme experience like oh my gosh, what is going on? To really recognize that. So it can be hard, your jaw-locking clothes yeah exactly and it's like, oh my gosh, I have to do something. But you know, ideally we won't all get to that space. So maybe starting a practice like a body scan or a five-body check-in you don't have to get to that space before you notice that the stress is affecting you. And I want to take it back to some other tangible tools because, to your point, I think that can be really helpful. One really overlooked one that's been impactful for me is finding joy, finding activities or places or people that just spark joy in my life, and adding more of that. And one of the people I've studied with and I can't remember who it is right now will often say that stress management isn't always about taking something out, it's about adding things in that give back to you. So for me, like a powerful thing has been adding in more joy and that looks like maybe I'm watching the sunset. And actually a big thing this year has been reading fiction books, Like I got into. I love reading, I love reading and I could read nonfiction books when we stop recording. We need to chat because I say I love reading as well but you know, like adding giving myself the permission to read really some of my fun column guilty pleasure books that you know might not be furthering my education in any means, but I just get great joy in diving into the story. That has done more for my stress management than I can even tell you right here right now. I freaking love reading fantasy.

  Jess: 41:31

  Yes, me too, I read fiction and nonfiction alike, because I love reading in general. But the bringing joy piece is something that I come back to when I have conversations with clients who are struggling, and maybe they're struggling with stress, maybe they're struggling with their workouts, maybe they're struggling in general and I asked them when's the last time that you did something that you felt joy? When is the last time that you did something that you kind of lost yourself in and found that I don't know if you want to call it flow state or whatever you just forget that you're doing something for the sake of doing it, for the sake of enjoyment. You're not practicing French because you want to learn the French language. You're not reading this book because you're trying to learn about astrophysics. You are doing it simply for the sake of enjoyment. I'm pretty sure I'm actually like an 85 year old inside, because the patients at work that I connect the most with are in their 70s and 80s and we're like, oh my God, I did this really great thousand piece Ravensburger puzzle last week and it brought me so much joy. You know those things. Or we read the same books, or like I grew up crocheting and knitting and all of that, and I'm like, yeah, I'm a baby grandma, it's fine, I love it.

  Kerry: 42:34

  When you were just talking about all those things and bringing joy, I actually felt this deep sense of excitement, for I'm a day off this weekend and I'm like oh my gosh. I just can't wait to get lost in like crafts and books and walking outdoors, and it really is just sparking so much joy. And you know I'm not kidding when I say I feel a sense of warmth and calm that washes over me Just knowing that I have the space for that. It makes me so much happier and more confident in who I am when I give myself that time to find joy.

  Jess: 43:05

  For me, it's hard to do yes, 100%, because our society is so focused on constant productivity, on constant doing instead of being.

  Kerry: 43:19

  Yep, it's an unlearning. You have to unlearn it. I'm still unlearning it. You know, like I'm saying, I have a day off on Sunday and I'm sure I still have a to-do list that I'm gonna have to, like, stick it high.

  Jess: 43:27

  I was gonna say you have a sticky note somewhere that you're like this isn't a priority right now. This self-care piece is more important. I get it. Actually. My nonfiction current book is called Laziness Does Not Exist and it is challenging so much of what I think motivates me and why I continue to do the things and why I struggle with sitting down and being quote, unquote, unproductive.

  Kerry: 43:49

  Right, oh my gosh, that could be a whole nother podcast. I gotta talk about that for like three hours, I think. Because I'm in the process of unlearning all of that myself and you know, even with all my knowledge on stress management and I think that's another takeaway instead of people like this isn't a perfect process. Even though I have all this knowledge on physical tools on how to manage stress, and body-based tools and breathwork and meditation and the mindset, like I have all the information in the world I really do have, and I have access to it by the internet as well I'm still unlearning. That piece of you don't always need to be productive and that process in itself is a I don't say it's a stress management tool, but it's a part of the process of building awareness, and building awareness around how you handle stress, how you operate in daily life, then therefore, how it affects yourself, confidence and body image.

  Jess: 44:41

  It's all interconnected. You just brought that full circle.

  Kerry: 44:44

  Happy to.

  Jess: 44:45

  I love that.

  Kerry: 44:45

  Okay, it's like I think about a lot.

  Jess: 44:48

  I think that that is a really good place to wrap up body image, self-confidence and stress. But I wanna talk about you for a minute. I have a few rapid fire questions before we wrap up, let's do it. Okay, this is a very important question to me. What is your favorite kind of cookie?

  Kerry: 45:02

  Ooh, this is a tough one. So I have chocolate chip girl through and through. But what am I aunt's used to making since sound bizarre? These cream cheese spritzers, yeah, surprisingly fantastic, and I remind me of Christmas because that's when I always ate them. Okay, explain these cookies. There's like actual cream cheese in it and which you would be like ew, gross. But there's also like, obviously, sugar and all that good stuff. But there's these just little fluffy balls of goodness. But she always put sprinkles on top. And are they soft? Are they chewy? Are they crispy? Not crispy, a little soft, okay, and not chewy per se. Like, not overly fluffy, like fluffy and soft, with a slight hard edge to them.

  Jess: 45:49

  Okay, I'm gonna need to explore this. This is that.

  Kerry: 45:51

  I'll send you the recipe.

  Jess: 45:52

  Okay, and this applies to our conversation. My next question for you what is one activity that brings you joy and takes your attention away from your body?

  Kerry: 46:01

  I think for me that's ever changing depending on the season of life that I'm in Okay, Current season, Anything outdoors. I live in New England and we just had our first snow, but the fall colors this year have been like absolutely magical. So anytime I could just whether it be walking or hiking or standing out, probably walking or hiking outdoors I just feel so much joy in the ability to be outdoors or as an experience at Me too.

  Jess: 46:27

  I love that. What is the number one book that you've recommended or given as a gift?

  Kerry: 46:33

  Oh, this is tough. I've read almost 50 books this year, which is like my crowning achievement for the year. Forget about everything else I do.

  Jess: 46:41

  Are you on Goodreads? I am Okay, we're connecting.

  Kerry: 46:45

  Connecting. So I'll just I'll give one fiction book and one nonfiction book. A fiction book that I loved this year oh, there's even too many of that, but I'll say the first one, the House of Salt and Sorrow by Erin Craig. It's like kind of a fantasy retailing of a folklore and it just I could read it again. It was so, so good. And then nonfiction, one that I read a couple of years ago that I actually was surprised. I loved it so much, but it explained the nervous system and some of our reactions to it in such a great way is called Call of the Wild by Kimberly Ann Johnson how we heal trauma, awaken our power and use it for good. And it was a great book in general but also as a practitioner. It broke down some of the stress and nervous system things that I talk about with my clients in a really grounded, science-based way, without weighing people down with fancy words and complicated explanations.

  Jess: 47:46

  Lamin's terms yeah, and it did talk a lot about.

  Kerry: 47:50

  you know sexuality and vitality and that as well, but once again in a really grounded way that I think, whether you're 30 or 70, you could take something away from that book.

  Jess: 48:01

  That's fantastic. Okay, last question how do you take your coffee or tea or morning beverage of choice?

  Kerry: 48:08

  I go through seasons with coffee as well. I'm currently in my coffee season. I definitely tend to drink coffee more once it gets cold out, and I am totally like a seasonal coffee gal. This morning, I treated myself to a Starbucks as well, and I got something ridiculous like sugar cookie almond milk latte.

  Jess: 48:26

  And it was just so good, oh so their holiday stuff is out oh yeah, holiday stuff is out.

  Kerry: 48:31

  My boyfriend was like is that Christmas coffee?

  Jess: 48:33

  I was like it is and it brings me joy. Thank you, I was like I'm all into it.

  Kerry: 48:37

  He's like great. Great for you, babe. Enjoy.

  Jess: 48:40

  I love that so good. Kerry, thank you so much for being on. This has been such a rad conversation. I feel like we could definitely have a part two and talk all things laziness and productivity. I would love to pick your mind on yoga and your entire yoga journey, but I'm proud of us for keeping this decently focused. Thank you for having me. It's been wonderful. If you enjoyed this podcast episode, please feel free to follow, subscribe, like whatever the heck you do with podcasts. As always, stay sturdy, friends, and we'll talk to you next week.

Episode 9: Defining Core Values Can Change Your Life

Find your core values worksheet here.

Life is a journey, and in our latest podcast episode, we dive into one of the most essential aspects of this journey - embracing and living by your core values. These core values form the foundation of your actions, influencing your decisions, and resonating in your everyday life.

Core values are more than just passing thoughts or emotions. They are the principles, criteria, and standards that drive our decisions, beliefs, and actions. They serve as the compass that helps us navigate our choices, make better decisions for ourselves, and shape our lives.

Identifying your core values can be an enlightening process, but it doesn't end there. Like a pair of shoes, your values should fit just right! The process of transitioning these values into actions and reflecting on instances that demonstrate them is an integral part of authentic living.

In this episode, we share an inspiring story about a shift in mindset that enabled one individual to live in alignment with their values. We also introduce Sally McCray, an ultra-runner who epitomizes resilience, to illustrate the power of core values in action.

Your core values should be more than just words on a page - they should be reflected in your actions. The act of embodying your values, whether it's resilience, authenticity, or family connection, makes them a living part of your everyday life.

One of the key takeaways from this episode is the importance of self-reflection and awareness. It's essential to regularly check in with yourself, assess whether your actions align with your values, and make any necessary adjustments. This awareness and reflection allow for continual growth and alignment with your core values.

Another crucial point we discussed is that core values are not set in stone. They can change as we grow and evolve, and that's perfectly okay. In fact, it's a sign of growth and evolution. So, don't be afraid to reassess your values and make changes as needed.

In the end, living by your core values is about crafting a life that's fulfilling to you, not just living by others' benchmarks. It's about creating a life that resonates with who you truly are and what you genuinely value.

So, are you ready to embark on this journey of self-discovery and fulfillment? Tune in to our latest episode, explore your core values, and start crafting a life that's truly yours. Remember, the voyage of self-discovery and fulfillment starts with understanding and embracing your core values.

• Full Transcript

  Speaker 1: 0:01

  Hello friends 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 the podcast where we shift the focus away from your appearance and on to living a big, rad life you deserve. Hello friends, and welcome to episode 9 of Sturdy Girl. Today, we are going to deviate a little bit from our usual discussion of body image, self-confidence, resilience, and we're going to talk about something equally as important and that is values-based living and learning to identify core values and live by them. Now, core values can be super powerful and super important, but I want to tell you this little story before we kind of jump into what core values are, how to apply them, all the fun stuff, and that is at the end of 2022, I sat down and I said okay, what kind of core values do I want to embody in 2023? And I decided that my core values were going to be growth, fun and boldness, with a really big focus on that growth piece. Now, for me, I decided like, oh yeah, there's personal growth, but I really wanted to grow ever while my coaching company and the universe said hold my beer and in just Q1 of this year I had tremendous, painful growth in just about every arena of my life. And so my caution to you jokingly, of course be careful what core values that you decide are most important to you, because you will start living those and then the universe will start responding to exactly what you put out there. I don't mean for that to sound woo, but it definitely was a big hold my beer moment and I had a lot of growth. And then the rest of the year, yeah, I've had fun and I've worked on boldness. Man, I've really worked on boldness. So there you are, fun personal anecdote to get us started. But let's dive in to core values. Let's start with what are core values? Simply put, core values are the principles, criteria and standards that can drive and guide our decisions, beliefs and actions. It's a strongly held belief about what is valuable to us, what is important or acceptable to us. Core values help us to know what we do and what we don't stand for. They help you to know what you want your life to look like, to feel like. They help us make better decisions for ourselves, for our lives, for others. Now think of this as kind of like your inner compass in your guide, and a lot of times when we're talking about values, it reminds people of corporate America, talking about a corporation or a company's core values. Well, there are similarities in guiding principles there. These are your own personal values and we are not talking at all about corporations. Please and thank you, these are the ones that you get to use as your own guide. So, again, core values they're like your inner compass. What good is this compass if it's just sitting in your pocket or if you don't know how to use it? How many times before have you thought about identifying your core values and you sit down and you look at a core values worksheet or Google core values and you're like, oh yeah, like being authentic is important to me Resilience, family connection, integrity right, when we start listing off all of these values that we resonate with and that's important, we want to do that. But then we leave it at that and we're like, okay, cool, I know what my core values are, and then we just move on. What good is that compass if it's sitting in your pocket or you don't know? Like, okay, resilience is a very important core value of mine, but how do I use this. That compass helps you navigate those decisions as you go along. They help you to live your life's purpose right. So that's what this episode is all about is not only identifying your core values, but it's also how to live them and make them worth your while. And, to that point, core values are more than just thoughts and feelings. These are the actions that you take, that you live out in everyday life. This is what we're focusing on here in this episode. So, thinking of core values right, I want you to start thinking about them. You're listening to this episode and you're like Jess, I feel so put on the spot. I can't think of any off the top of my head. So I got you. This is what you're going to do Go to sturdygirlco, forward, slash values or use the link in the show notes and download our non-exhausted list of core values and its accompanying worksheet. I got you. It is about 100 core values. Now you're going to use this list and you're going to peruse through and you're going to pick 10 to 15 values that really resonate with you. Now, if you're doing this as a follow along, hit pause on here, right, let's actually think about these. What actually resonates with you? Okay, did you hit pause Now from that list of 10 to 15 things? Think about the values that you've chosen. Then you're going to go through this list again and see if you can get it down to three to five that really just stand out. If you can't get this list below 10, perhaps look for values that are similar to others, like wholeheartedness and authenticity or strength and resilience. And if you're having trouble choosing things that resonate with you most, here are some questions to ask yourself. What is most important to you? What's most important to you and your relationship with yourself, with others, with friends and family? What matters to you most? What makes a good person according to you? What are their identifying traits and features? What do they value? When was the last time that you got really fired up about something? What kind of things piss you off? Because, if it helps, if you don't know what your core values are, start by crossing out the ones that they are not. Think about things that you don't want. Think about those things that do piss you off and think about how those are related to core values. These kinds of things can help you mull over. And the other thing I want to mention is your kind of brainstorming. If you want to pick strength or resilience, authenticity those very common ones, but still those that resonate with us right? A lot of us choose the value of family for a reason, but don't get too hung up on these just because you pick them doesn't mean they are forever, but we want to narrow things down to that three to five mark. Bernay Brown actually mentions in one of her podcasts that, after collecting over 500,000 pieces of data, she consistently saw people use this tool of values based living most effectively with only two core values. For the purposes of this episode, though, let's not stress about picking only two. Get it down to that three to five mark, and then let's continue on. And one more piece of this as we are giving space for mulling over these values, it might be helpful to think about this. If you were a character in a book, how would you want to be described? If you were able to hear your best friend give your eulogy, what would you want to hear them say? No, seriously, pause and think about this for a minute, because I don't know about you. I am a voracious reader, and it really resonated with me the first time I ever heard this example of how would I want someone to describe me in a book, Because maybe this is helpful, maybe not, but if I were to give my own answer, I'd want to be described as someone who was resilient and curious, someone that lived wholeheartedly. Those are my core values that I aim to truly focus on and embody, and I'd also, honestly, just envision the book version of myself, as you know, a tiny bit sassy, with an obsession with reading, but that really doesn't fit into this discussion of core values. Moving on, since I'm sharing so openly my own core values, that wholeheartedness, that curiosity, right, I'd be remiss if we didn't talk about this evolution of my own personal values, Because this framework of values-based decision making, which we'll get to the active decision making part in just a minute, has really shaped my life for the better. It's changed the way I talk to myself and interact with the world. You know I've shared about being a long distance runner for a decade. While I still love running and there are a lot of good, great, amazing things that has brought me, my mindset around running was this Run to be smaller, eat only to fuel my body and push myself to stay disciplined. I did this all in the name of quote, unquote health Because, in my mind, I was being healthy by running five to six days a week, lifting five days a week, eating around 100 grams of carbs a day, because that's what was healthy at the time and promoted. Having consumed my life, getting smaller, consumed my life, and when I was finally able to pull back to look at my life, my actions, the things I did on a regular basis through the lens of what I truly valued, which at the time, for me, was community, connection, growth, health, I was not living in accordance with these values at all, and so it was a really big shift to understand that all these things that I thought were supposed to improve my life were actually making me really miserable. So I don't know if we use that as a cautionary tale or just from the point of even if we're aware of values, we might not be aware that we're living those values. So at this point, you've selected your core values. For the time being, you have your three to five. Can you think about any behaviors that demonstrate the value you're trying to embody this? This is how we can start putting it into action. Right, If we have that compass, we are learning how to use it. Can you think of a particular person that lives this value? Can you think of a time when you demonstrated this value? These parts, these questions right now are so important for us to be able to apply said value. If you value resilience, what does it look like to put it into action, Is it? I am demonstrating resilience by continuing to show up for my runs as I train for this race, getting out on the trails and conquering that vert, even if it's power hiking. I am building resilience. Is there a person that we know that just is the embodiment of resilience? Now, I don't know if you follow Sally McCray. I think her Instagram is yellow runner. She would be an embodiment of a resilient human, mad ass ultra runner tackling crazy 200 mile races. That takes a certain level of physical and mental resilience. Can you think of a time when you demonstrated this value? Right, If your value is resilience, what did that look like when you did it? Because if you can reflect on times that you demonstrated it, it's going to be easier to call to mind later when we're talking about this values based decision making. In episode six, we interviewed Jillian from the bite size nutrition podcast. If you haven't listened to this episode, I highly recommend going back and listening to this rad life chat that Jillian and I have about body image, our body image story, beliefs, values. But she likened values and figuring out our core values to trying on shoes. In fact, in this 45 minute interview I think she used three different shoe analogies and I freaking loved it. So values are like shoes. Some shoes are really cute but don't fit right. Some are fun to walk around in it first, but ultimately give you blisters by the end of the day. Maybe you choose the wrong shoes for the occasion. Putting converse on with your cocktail dress, you might try on a pair of shoes that you want to love. You've seen so many other people in these shoes, but they just don't fit right and you get so frustrated. That's what I can feel like trying on different values. Allow yourself to walk around in your values, embrace the ones that fit and perhaps donate the ones that don't, Because these core values, they're practiced every day. We put shoes on every day when we leave the house, or at least most of us do. These core values, it's not a set it and forget it situation. You use these core values as a filter with which to take action. Think of a decision that you've had to make recently or one that you need to make soon. You get to ask yourself is this a decision or action that aligns with my values? Is this a line with the version of myself that I want to live and be the best version, or my favorite version? Now, I say favorite version for a reason, because a lot of times, the rhetoric you'll see online is to be your best self and your higher self, and that can feel unattainable. So I like to think of these values as leading to creating the favorite version of you. What does that favorite version do? Because our favorites can change, but we're always working towards being a better version of ourselves and continuing to improve. So favorite best living out our core values. So I want to ask you this what story do you tell yourself? Are you living a life that is fulfilling to you or are you living in accordance with other people's standards and values? Because if you ever really asked yourself, what do I want? What do I really want out of my life? What do I value? What do I want to do? How do I want to feel? These things you say are important to you, but are you acting in accordance with that? What are you actually doing on a regular basis? If you value family and you can't remember the last time you called your mom do you value family? Is it demonstrated in your actions? That's the whole point of this. You can say you value something, but what do those actions look like? Run yourself through what is going on in your life. What are you doing on a regular basis that aligns with your values? What are you doing that doesn't align with your values? Bring awareness, Take away the judgment. It's just this acknowledgement piece of. We often get stuck on autopilot or just going through the motions. This happens. We're human. The point of this exercise isn't to shame ourselves or judge ourselves for the actions or inactions. It's to say I want to embody these values. What do actionable items look like to make that a reality? If you realize that these things are out of alignment, take a look at what things you can change, what things you can't and what work is required to get there. Let's talk about that awareness piece for a second. It's a word that's come up a lot more in my life recently, From taking KC Orvitas' Health Mindset Coaching Cert to reading extensively about acceptance and commitment therapy. The simple act of bringing awareness to something is so powerful. And now, in dentistry I talk a lot about bringing awareness to the position of your jaw throughout the day to decrease frequency of clenching and grinding. When we bring awareness to our thoughts and the subsequent actions we take, this awareness is simply an acknowledgement of those thoughts and then the space that comes after that. So let's use an example. Let's say your friends ask you to go out on a Saturday night. Sounds fun, right, it's the weekend, you don't work Sunday. But guess what? We're training for a marathon and we're getting close to peaking and Sunday is our long run day. In that moment you have a choice. The first thing here is to recognize that choice Awareness. Remember there is space between your thoughts about the matter and your decision, Because your brain in that moment might be going a million miles an hour the guilt of saying no, the worry of being rested and prepared for your long run. Right, you have both sides. We want to spend time with our friends, we want to be fun, we want to be that person that goes out on Saturday nights, but we also want to race a marathon. We want to go into the race while rested, while fueled, recovered, as close to injury-free as possible. So, when you think about making the decision to go out, what do we do? When we have a set of core values, we can use these to review any time we need to make these kinds of decisions. So you're that marathon runner. What do you do? You review those core values and maybe you reflect on your core value of authenticity. You take a deep breath and decide to stay in, explaining to your friends your big goal to run a marathon and cross the finish line without injury. Now, these values-based decisions are context-dependent. Just because you decided to refrain from going out on a Saturday night one time doesn't mean you're always going to say no to staying out late on a Saturday. What season are you in and how do these values align? That is the key here. If we're going to like star star star, the whole episode, values are context-dependent and also I'm going to say seasonal. Right, but those values can change. You are not tied to your values forever. Your best version of you is what we're working towards here. If that idea of the best version of you changes over time, so too can your values. Try on a different pair of shoes. And the last piece to core values and values-based decision making is self-reflection. Now, if you've listened to any other episode of Sturdy Girl, you will know how important self-compassion is and the importance of reflection. This is much like my current clients do each week when they check in. So I coach runners, I coach lifters and I also do performance nutrition and I have my athletes every single week send me a form checking in on their week. Now this form is for me as much as it is for them and they reflect on their runs, their lifts, their nutrition, how well it went together, their biofeedback, and then they look at were their opportunities for improvement where things went really well? You can do this for your values. Set aside regular time to reflect on how it went trying to apply these values that you've chosen, how it went putting them into action. Think about how you want to check in with yourself and see if the shoes I mean values are fitting, Do they fit well in your life and what you want out of it. Use curiosity to guide this. This is really so important. It allows us to set aside time to reflect to say is this a value that I want to guide my life by? Maybe your value of faith worked for you in the past, but maybe the value of connection is coming to the forefront for you, so that that's what you want to focus on embodying, going forward. There's nothing wrong with this, right? So, before this episode ends, I want you to decide the when, the where and the how of that self-reflection piece. Is it weekly, Is it monthly, Is it a journal session? Is it just a quick bit in your notes app? Have an actionable way to check in with yourself to say is this core value worth embodying? Does this fit into my life? This part is going to be even more. It's like the course correction, right? You're following along on a map, You've got your compass guiding you and all of a sudden you realize you've had your map upside down because that value isn't aligning as well. There's nothing wrong with that. But that self-reflection piece powerful, so awesome, Because this, this, friends, living our best lives, living by our core values this is how we live that big, rad life, the one here at Sturdy Girl that we care so damn deeply about you finding and living. That's why this episode is part of the first season. No, it's not about body image, but damn if it doesn't help you live a better life. So let's recap. Download your core values worksheet from sturdygirlco. Choose 10 to 15 values that resonate with you. Narrow that down to 3 to 5. And then start trying them on like shoes See which one fits into your life and the life you want to live. Ask yourself those questions what is most important to you? What do you want? These are your own values and standards for living your best life, and no one else's. All right friends, that is all I have for you today. Another solo episode I hope you enjoyed. It has been so much fun recording these for you. I love the messages I'm getting and I would love to hear from you. If you pick your 3 to 5 core values, send me a message on Instagram at Sturdy Girl underscore. Send me an email. Hello at Sturdy Girlco. I want to hear them. I'd love for you to share actions that you're going to take to embody these values. Bonus points for that. So stoked you're here. I'll talk to you next Wednesday. Stay Sturdy friends. If you enjoyed this podcast episode, please feel free to follow, subscribe, like whatever the heck you do with podcasts. As always, stay sturdy friends and I'll talk to you next week.

Episode 8: Unlearning Diet Culture: A Discussion on Body Image, Intuitive Eating and Food Freedom w/ Coach Ali

We've all been there - feeling chained to a diet or struggling with self-image. It's a burden many of us carry, but there's a way to break free. On this episode of the podcast, we are joined by Ali, an internationally certified body image and food freedom coach. She helps us shift our focus from size to strength, from control to intuition. Through her own story of overcoming disordered eating, Ali introduces us to the liberating principles of intuitive eating.

Intuitive eating is a philosophy that encourages a healthy attitude towards food and body image. It's about breaking free from the on-and-off cycle of dieting and learning to eat mindfully and without guilt. As Ali shares her experience with disordered eating, she sheds light on the futility of dieting and the importance of intuitive eating.

However, to truly embrace intuitive eating, we must first explore the roots of our body image issues. Did you know that our beliefs about food and our bodies often take root in our childhood? It's a fact that many of us are not aware of. In our conversation with Ali, we delve into our personal body image stories and the often unacknowledged fear that holds us back from embracing physical activities.

The fear of not being good enough can be paralyzing. It can prevent us from living our life to the fullest. But the truth is, we are more than our bodies. We are more than our size. And we are certainly more than our perceived flaws. As Ali says, "Building confidence isn't about achieving a certain body size or following a strict diet. It's about authenticity, resilience, and developing a secure relationship with oneself."

Finally, we explore the world of self-work and self-reflection. Ali guides us in reframing our thoughts, identifying and transforming our negative self-talk. Stress can have a significant impact on our body image, but it's not something that we often discuss. Ali emphasizes the fundamental importance of cultivating a healthy relationship with ourselves, especially in times of stress.

Remember, building confidence isn't about achieving a certain body size or following a strict diet. It's about authenticity, resilience, and developing a secure relationship with oneself. It's about breaking down barriers and embracing our true selves.

So, tune in for an empowering journey that could revolutionize your relationship with your body and food. It's time to unchain ourselves from diet culture and embrace body positivity and food freedom.

• Full Transcript

  Jess: 0:01

  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 the podcast where we shift the focus away from your appearance and on to living the big, rad life you deserve. Hello, my Sturdy friends, and welcome to episode 8 of Sturdy Girl. I'm your host, Jess Heiss, bringing you a freaking awesome interview today. My friend Allie is an internationally certified body image and food freedom coach. A little intro on her she spent a decade of disordered eating and trying to hate herself skinny and she craved more from her life than a smaller gene size. Today she's changing the narrative of what healthy looks like by helping women transform their relationship with food and who they see in the mirror. We dive into what doing the work looks like for improving confidence, for improving body image, for showing up and living your freaking best life. I really don't want to give away too many details. I'm going to keep this intro short and sweet to let us just completely dive in. So let's get started. I can't wait to hear what you think. Okay, allie, tell me a little bit about what you do. What kind of coach? Are you All the things? I know all of it. I've been on Instagram for quite a while and I love that. This is our first interaction beyond messaging on Instagram On the DMs.

  Ali: 1:28

  I swear. Half the time I have conversations in the DMs and then I meet people in person or on a call. Yeah, we haven't known each other for years, are you sure?

  Jess: 1:38

  I know, immediately as we started talking, I'm like wait, this is our first conversation and I'm like hello friend, good to see you again.

  Ali: 1:44

  I don't do surface level. Deep soul connection is my vibe. So I laughed because when you asked me what kind of coach I am, that is like the one struggle that I've actually had as a coach is how to explain what it is. I do Everything. Yes, I hope you be a better human. My official title I'm a body image and food freedom coach, so I help women feel happier, healthier, more confident in their bodies without dieting, because I truly believe diets do not work and the reason you feel disconnected to your body, the reason you're scared of food, is usually because of decades of dieting and trying to hate your body into a smaller gene size. I love that.

  Jess: 2:26

  Okay, question for you Are you anti-diet, would you say completely against diets?

  Ali: 2:30

  So I feel like anytime we use kind of aggressive word choices like that, like anti, anti everything right, because I always feel like there's a gray space, I like to say I live in the gray space of I don't think diets work, because diets usually mean that there's a restrictive property to it. Right have to be perfect, or you have to follow a food scale, food rules, color or numbers or whatever it might be. So I definitely don't believe in any of that, but I do think the terminology is misconstrued. So the actual term diet right Just means like what you eat every day, yep.

  Jess: 3:10

  I was just thinking that when I'm like diet actually just means your consumption.

  Ali: 3:14

  What do you eat? Yeah, what kinds of foods do you typically enjoy? So I coach all of my women in intuitive eating. I feel like most people are like oh, it means I get to eat like an asshole and have no repercussions, right?

  Jess: 3:28

  No, no, but I mean there's a whole concept behind intuitive eating, right, I mean?

  Ali: 3:32

  yeah, so there we look at principles rather than rules. The big thing for my clients is that when you have dieted your whole life and that has been the only goal you've ever had and I know from personal experience that was my only goal for over 10 years of my life was to find a diet that finally worked, that finally made me smaller, whatever it was right. When you go from that mentality, it's all about being perfect, it's about making sure the exact number matches up, it's about weighing every single thing you eat right, so it's less about the food and it's more becomes a mindset problem.

  Jess: 4:08

  Oh, absolutely.

  Ali: 4:09

  So with intuitive eating, we look at principles, so we look at it as like it's messy action and it has so much less to do with what kinds of foods you're eating and more to do with who you're being around food, the mentality of like okay, break up with the concept that some diet or magic pill or some perfect plan is going to come around at some point and fix you.

  Jess: 4:31

  Some level of exercising absolute amounts of control around your diet and exercise and all of those things is going to fix you or magically transport you into this like perfect life that you'll never, ever have to do again.

  Ali: 4:44

  Yeah, that's not true, right? Most of us are going to live into our 80s. Well, if we're going to live into our 80s and what you're doing right now makes you miserable, exhausted and obsessed with food and with what your body looks like, you probably aren't very healthy and you're not going to enjoy that the rest of your life. It's not sustainable, it's not realistic for most people, and with me working with only women, I would argue that women have a little bit of a harder degree when it comes to, like, our self-image and our self-worth and the expectations that society places on us. Absolutely, you also add in now. Women now are not only in charge of kids and the home, but they're also working. Right, we've got more hormone disruptors than ever. There's just so many other factors that we now have to deal with.

  Jess: 5:32

  We try to control by food in our body Because it's something that we feel is within our control when so much feels out of it. It's a coping mechanism. And even you're saying these things that I'm nodding along earlier this week, talking about like we're meant to be raising the family and working and running the home and doing all these things and I don't have kids. We have four children.

  Ali: 5:52

  I.

  Jess: 5:52

  I found myself earlier this week. There's stuff going on in my career, stuff coaching, the podcast, all of these moving parts and pieces, and things are changing and happening everywhere all at once, at one point, like head between my knees, overwhelmed, and it's amazing to me that the first thought goes towards what you can control, and that's like food and exercise and what you're doing to and for your body. It wasn't in a bad way necessarily. It was more of the curiosity piece of I had to kind of pull back and realize I haven't drank very much water today.

  Ali: 6:21

  Yeah you're not.

  Jess: 6:21

  You're not actually I haven't eaten any plants today, anything with like a good amount of nutrients in it. How much of my move my body today? How long have I been staring at a computer screen? Do you start going through those things and you're like, hmm, maybe this is why I feel like an asshole.

  Ali: 6:36

  Question mark, right. And the thing is, you and I go through that checklist and our thought process leads us to okay, I'm eating like an asshole, I'm not actually taking care of myself. These are the common triggers, or these are the factors leading to that result, right, whereas the hard part is for a lot of women, they don't know what they don't know, and so when they're stressed and or they're emotional, or they're overwhelmed or they have anxiety right, the easy coping mechanism, the thing that makes you feel good right away Food is one of the top options. They go towards food. And then, when they calm down a little bit, they go oh, my God, I feel so guilty because I just ate food because I was stressed or I was emotional or whatever the reason, and then they've been taught that, well, that's bad, so I'm a bad person. So, nothing is not eat. I need to avoid all of the things that I need, simply because I need to magically find this balance that someone once told me I was supposed to match Right Like it doesn't make sense.

  Jess: 7:34

  It's a complete shame spiral and shame cycle that we go through Absolutely.

  Ali: 7:39

  And we wonder why our relationship with food is so screwed up and so complicated.

  Jess: 7:44

  Yeah, that's something too that in conversations I've had with, like, my dad or with other men in my world, where there isn't the same entanglement of emotions in food, it's so interesting. So, going back for a second where we're talking about like, when I asked you if you were anti-diet, I am reading this book right now. I forget the exact title, something about like, regaining body trust. I feel like part of this. So, stepping back for a second like, not just this book, but in order to get a book published, you need to have a pretty strong opinion, oh yeah, or strong facts or strong whatever, in one side or the other. And I think that this book started out really good and its concept. So, in regaining body trust, and they talk about losing the connection with self. Right, because we're doing all of those things as compensatory factors of can I control food, can I control exercise, what can I focus on? And I get that. But then a whole section of this book is how hugely anti-diet they are. Then it even goes into well, why does it matter if you pay attention to what you eat? So much of your health is determined by genetics and your environment and socioeconomic factors, which, yes, those play a part. But if you're just going to be like my health is all up to that and leave the rest, I'm like I have so many questions right now.

  Ali: 8:56

  Body trust isn't just saying I'm going to eat like an asshole all the time and then wonder why I feel like shit and that's where, when I said I live in the gray space, when I first started coaching and I was trying to explain what it is that I was trying to deliver on, a lot of people were confused because they're used to the two buckets of either the pro diet, following macros, there's a specific number calculator or something that you have to follow every single day. That mentality of like the fitness industry, and I could go down a rabbit hole of how unhealthy the fitness industry is. Right, yes, same. And then there's the other bucket, that is body positivity, and it is the pink washed version of body positivity Right. Let's be clear yes, you see the side of it that says I love myself for who I am and I don't have to change a single thing. I can do whatever I want. I don't have to worry about the outside factors like what you were just saying, right?

  Jess: 9:50

  This is why.

  Ali: 9:51

  And I live in this beautiful gray space that says, yeah, you can totally love who you are and still want to take care of yourself better.

  Jess: 10:00

  Yeah, that's to me like taking care of your body and nourishing it. I'm going to say nourishing right, Like I eat cookies almost every day, as you should, but I also know how my body feels when I make sure to eat foods that have lots of micronutrients. Exactly, it's that both and piece of if I respect my body and I want to take care of it because it is my forever home. Yeah, because that body positivity piece is like I accept my self and my being and all of those things. In fact, a couple episodes ago in our podcast we talked about, is body positivity the answer? And that was kind of the conclusion of like it doesn't matter what you identify with body image. Wise, because the definition of positive body image is very similar to a lot of body substance, body neutrality and those pieces. It has just gotten so taken over by social media A buzzword, yeah, and it's very like I love myself no matter what. But then it's turned into this Therefore I don't have to take care of me.

  Ali: 11:00

  Or it's either, therefore, I don't have to take care of myself, I can just do what I want and everything will just magically work out, or, therefore, I do this extremely strict thing because it makes me like because I'm taking care of myself. It's the almost toxic health trend. Yeah, versus. What you and I are saying is there's a difference between respecting the only body that you will ever have and forcing it to be something that society expects it to be Right.

  Jess: 11:31

  Exactly.

  Ali: 11:32

  We think of health. The hard part for most of us is that our mindset is so accustomed to seeing health as a flat stomach, as a size four, a size six, as being smaller, as being small Right Versus. Something I challenge a lot with my own clients is I'm not a small girl, but I'm also not a big girl. I'm pretty average sized. Right, I'm like a 10, 12 on any given day. But then that's also saying fashion likes to have vanity metrics, which also means you don't have any clue what size you are. No, exactly Right. But knowing like I have no idea what my weight is, I couldn't tell you. I haven't weighed myself in years.

  Jess: 12:10

  The only reason I know is because I compete in a sport that has weight classes Exactly.

  Ali: 12:14

  That's the only reason that has been. One of the most interesting challenges is that we're almost seeing, like the health and fitness industry, shift into the mentality of I'm supposed to train and eat and act like I compete, rather than I'm supposed to train and eat and act like I'm a human being.

  Jess: 12:33

  Like I'm taking care of myself to live my best life.

  Ali: 12:36

  Whereas I would just say, like we over consume so much of the mentality of aesthetics and performance, performance, performance. I want to look like her and we're not taking into account, like you said, yeah, genetics play a role. They don't play a huge role, but they play a role. It's more of like what you do with them. I, genetically, am not going to be six, five. I'm not going to be a supermodel, I'm five, seven. It's not happening Genetically. I'm built to lift heavier shit. It's just how I'm built. I'm not built as a runner. However, I would challenge that.

  Jess: 13:07

  I would challenge that.

  Ali: 13:08

  If I wanted to run right, I totally could, and you can, and the key word is if I wanted to. That's not something that sparks joy with me, and that's okay. Exactly Not a train to what works for everyone else, and instead figuring out like what actually makes us happy, healthy, confident, respect who we are and finding the joy in life, because that's something too.

  Jess: 13:31

  When I talk to people about being a run coach as one of my, you know you talked about like not knowing how to define yourself as a coach I'm like, yeah, I'm a run coach, I'm a strength coach, I'm a mindset coach, I'm a nutrition coach. I can go down the list.

  Ali: 13:42

  So, whatever you have, I can help you.

  Jess: 13:44

  Yeah, right, I've come to me it's fine, but run coaching was my original coaching modality and people are like oh, you're a run coach. I just I hate running and I'm never going to like running. That's great, that's fine. I'm not a run coach because I think everyone should be a runner. I wish that everyone could experience the joy that comes from getting out on a trail and being able to just like let everything else go and getting done with that run and feeling like your brain is completely untangled, like a ball of yarn. You know, I wish I could impart that joy and contentment and peace.

  Ali: 14:12

  But running isn't for everyone and I completely respect that and what I find interesting I was just thinking about, as you were saying that is that's a very common statement to hear from, especially from women. Oh, I hate running, I hate cardio, I'm not a runner. Do you think that comes from diet culture? Because we've always been taught you have to do cardio to lose weight, to be skinny, to be happy.

  Jess: 14:32

  I think there's definitely a factor in that. I think another point of it, too, was I had a client come to me and they said Jess, I hate running, but I have a half marathon on my bucket list. I want to run a half marathon and I want to see if I can not hate running anymore. And the thing that they hated was that they weren't good at it. That was the part that they hated. That running was really freaking hard for like three months of just embracing the suck, getting out of your comfort zone and letting yourself grow, because, as an adult, being bad at something, is the worst.

  Ali: 15:00

  It's so hard You're like it's terrible, right, but it's also where all the growth happens.

  Jess: 15:05

  Yep, but that ended up for them and that's a lot of the conversation I end up having with people is like do you hate running because you just the modality of running seems boring? Is it because it's something you haven't developed skill in? What about running that you just like, oh, I hate it, but diet culture, that's a really good point. That's something that I haven't had much conversation around, and that cardio bunny piece.

  Ali: 15:26

  Yeah, a lot of the conversations I have stem from not only their own experiences when it comes to health and fitness and their relationship there, but also what they heard growing up. So, as humans, a lot of our habits, our behaviors are learned. Most of the things that we, like, dislike, are scared of, are not things we were born with. I love to ask my clients the question when they first start. I'm like what are the two fears that you think we're born with? And it's always like oh, a fear of being alone, or maybe it's a fear of, you know, disconnection, like not having community or not being loved. We have this innate fear. The only two fears that we were born with are falling and loud noises. That's it. Everything else is a learned experience, and so maybe it's that they grew up with a mom that said, like you have to do cardio, you have to run in order to lose weight, because you're unhealthy or you're too fat or whatever it was. They heard that time and time again. Or maybe they saw a parent, a friend, who and this is just an example, obviously, but like who ran every single day and was a smaller bodied human, and so they associated those things together. Maybe they don't have the same body type and they've tried, or they already have a fear of starting because it's associated with that past belief. Those beliefs are so powerful oh my gosh, yeah, especially around our bodies and food and what we're capable of doing.

  Jess: 16:46

  It's interesting too because, as a coach, I'm like trying to think of how to word this right now. So many people don't have any awareness around what those beliefs are. I've had many conversations when we talk about body image and people learning to identify, kind of where they sit with, how they feel about their bodies. Our body image story is written from the time we were a child and the first time we were aware that we had a body or that people reacted to how our bodies appeared and being able to go back and see how that story was written to then say, oh shit, that's why I believe this thing. I have no idea.

  Ali: 17:18

  I see, actually the very first question I ask women when they get on a call with me. I always ask, like what's your story? And they're like, well, what do you mean? What's my story? I'm like I want you to think back to when this started, when you started to notice your body or when you started to think about food. When did that actually start? Because it didn't just start yesterday, it wasn't recent, right? If you feel deeply about this, this started a long time ago and probably earlier than we want to admit. I openly tell clients like I started tracking my food in sixth grade. I knew the macro breakdown of every food that I ate in middle school because I grew up in a fitness family and in their perspective, it was oh, I'm giving you education to learn to take care of yourself. Well, as a middle school female, in the culture that we have, I saw it as it's a tool to fix myself so that I'm small like my friends, and then I'm happy, I'm accepted. Boys like me, right, All the good things that were promised if you're just a smaller body.

  Jess: 18:18

  Did your family present it to you in a way that was like here's information, here is factual things, because that's one thing that I find really interesting. When you talk about learning macronutrients or learning breakdowns of foods or what a food contains, that's just information, that's factual. There is no emotion attached to that at all when I tell you that peanut butter has more fat than protein in it.

  Ali: 18:40

  Answer your question. No, the intention was education. The delivery was emotional because, as I've gone into this work and decades have passed, me and my mom have like really in-depth conversations about this stuff, because now that I'm a coach and like so passionate about it, she's understanding why she said the thing she did or how they came across differently than how she intended. And now it's making her have a better relationship with her body and a better relationship with food, because my mom has been a fitness instructor, has been a personal trainer, owned a gym my entire life. She's extremely well educated, knows her shit. However, she's still a woman with a body who has had negative experiences with what she looks like and used food to control them. And so you live with a lens of. This is my experience, so this must be true. So, as a middle school girl who's already taller than all of my friends, I'm already curvier than all of my friends. I got my period in sixth grade, so I'm already like becoming a woman, however you want to phrase it, and I'm not being taught to embrace those changes. I'm being taught. Well, you're not hungry, drink water or you don't eat french fries at lunch. I'll take you on a shopping spree. Oh yeah, if you weigh yourself during your period and you're really good this week, you'll probably lose weight because you gain weight during your period, right, and these are things that like. As I repeat them back to my mom now, she's like there's no way. I said that and I'm like you totally did. But I understand where it came from. It came from the lack of knowledge or her own experience, because now, as adults, we talk about the relationship her and my grandma had with body image and with food, and so I went all through high school restricting my food during the week because I truly believed if I ate less and I moved more while I was a dancer, I went to the gym every single day, I was in show choir, right Then I would magically be smaller and happier. But the kicker was that never happened. And even when I'm you're like that constant chasing pursuits, yes, and constantly exhausted and angry and frustrated, to the point where I was lashing out at my mom and blaming her for it, when all she was trying to do was help right, it just wasn't the help that I needed.

  Jess: 20:46

  It came from a good place with good intentions.

  Ali: 20:48

  I mean, I've heard those things and if we asked our moms who we maybe have a great relationship with, they would probably say, oh, I said that because that's what I learned, or I learned something else and so I thought this would be more helpful. Right, we're all in the best that we can with the tools that we have, but if we don't heal our own shit first, we don't like shift the beliefs that we have. All we're doing is more damage, no matter how many good intentions we have.

  Jess: 21:13

  So I was raised with a mom who had she had anorexia for well over 20 years and my mom and my two sisters are 510 ish and naturally very thin and I am 5859, depending on who you ask and not thin I never have been and have been. I was that sixth grader with curves and that whole scenario too, and it's so interesting talking to my mom as an adult and the same thing where I can relay conversations that we had in middle school where it came from good intentions but then it turned into spirals of controlling food, of trying to control my body and the size of my body. It's powerful just building that story, like going back and reflecting on what shaped why you can't have a better relationship with food, where I'm sure the people that come to you and seek your coaching, like I've tried all these things.

  Ali: 22:02

  Well, it's become so ingrained in them and I always challenge someone when they say, well, nothing works for me, I've tried everything. And I always say, yeah, so did I, but we were doing the same shit different day, expecting a different result. Yeah, when we say we've tried everything, it usually means we've tried every diet on the market, we've tried every you know different type of workout. But the thing is, we haven't tried is actually healing our relationship with how we see food and how we see our bodies, because we don't see that as part of the problem. We see that as this is just how I've always felt and if I do these things, then I won't feel that way anymore. Right, rather than if I be different, I feel different, than my results will change, we're just doing it backwards. I love that, mic drop.

  Jess: 22:46

  Yeah, I like boom. This is great. Do you have any tips at all for our listeners on improving relationship with self or improving their relationship with food? Anything that you give us like a direction for someone to, I don't know, maybe journaling prompts or things to think about, because, right, it's not like when someone's like Jess, what's a good tip for beginner runners, you know, and it's like start low and slow, find good shoes, like right, it's not that simple, step by step kind of thing.

  Ali: 23:15

  Yeah, totally, and I always laugh when somebody asks me these kind of questions because people are expecting like okay, so what's the quick answer we're so used to like quick and instantaneous, that's not how exactly.

  Jess: 23:26

  That's what I say. That is one thing throughout every one of these podcast episodes so far is the titles that get more downloads for podcasts are like three quick tips to solve your life.

  Ali: 23:37

  And it's like I said oh yeah, but you don't solve your life in three quick tips.

  Jess: 23:42

  No, it's not how any of it works. So the things that go on to enrich and improve our lives in ways that last take work, take time, take a lot of energy, I tell my women.

  Ali: 23:53

  When it comes to coaching and being in a space where you're like I don't know what to do, I don't know what my next steps are, and you're thinking about working with a coach, right? The biggest factors are consistency, accountability and support, none of which are quick, easy or instantaneous. Those involve time, they involve effort, they involve putting your heart and soul and sweat into something and a lot of self reflection. So much so like to even answer your question. One of the first things I start with my women on is not instantly shifting your mindset, right? Because if you're right now looking at yourself in the mirror and saying like, I hate my hips, I hate what my stomach looks like, I need to lose 10 pounds, I'm never going to be happy, right, all of the very negative things. You're not going to magically walk into the bathroom after this podcast, stripped down naked, and be like, wow, I am the hottest person I've ever seen. I love me so much. I love myself, right? You're just not, and if you do it, you're not going to believe it. And so I challenge my women to just start journaling down what and how you feel about yourself and why. What experiences taught you that? Who taught you that? Because the more we can get clear on where those beliefs came from, the more we can recognize they were never ours in the first place.

  Jess: 25:09

  That's just essentially bringing awareness. Bringing awareness around our thoughts and our thought processes and patterns, bringing awareness around that self-talk of how do I talk to myself, because that's something, too, that some people don't even realize the words that they say to themselves.

  Ali: 25:23

  Exactly. It's funny. I posted a reel this morning and probably no one will see it because Instagram hates me sometimes, but that's okay. But I basically said, like hypothetically if someone were to tell you you are ugly, you're fat, you're worthless, no one cares about you and they said this to you every single day how would you probably feel Really god-awful and you'd probably believe those things. The problem is that someone is usually you, and our brain grabs onto our own voice 10 times more than it listens to anybody else. So if it's hearing it in your own voice and it's believing it to be true, your thoughts create your feelings. You probably feel like crap, right, it creates your actions. You're probably not doing a whole lot of things that make your body feel good, that are very nice to you. We're probably restricting, we're probably punishing, and then the end result is you're definitely not getting what you want. You're not going to feel any better.

  Jess: 26:11

  No, Right and all of those things, our thoughts, our feelings, our actions, and that's eventually what turns into belief.

  Ali: 26:17

  Exactly, A belief is just a thought that you have thought so many times that you believe it to be true. That's it, yeah.

  Jess: 26:25

  I just lost my train of thought too, because.

  Ali: 26:27

  I'm like yes, all of this. Yes, keep telling me, allie, bring it on. I'm like you know what, if a belief is just a thought that you keep thinking, right, then the entire way that we shift, that is to think something else. Right, it's not to stop thinking, because good luck doing that, right, like, especially as a woman, good luck stop thinking. Your brain doesn't process negatives. So even if you told yourself don't think about that, all your brain hears is think about that Obsess over. Yeah, you can't think about it, right? So instead of saying okay, I'm not going to think about food or I'm not going to think about my body today, replace it, replace it with something positive or neutral or something different. That's going to give you the result that you want.

  Jess: 27:06

  Yeah, one thing that I found really interesting in reading about body image, about confidence, about all of these things that people want to improve. We will never get rid of all of our negative thoughts. They're never going to go away, whether that's negative thoughts about our body, about food, about any situation in our lives. But the point should never be to get rid of all of those negative thoughts, because they're still going to happen. We're still human. It's how do we cope with them? How do we handle them when they arise? How do we react to them? Is it something where you can hear it and you're like, oh gosh, this is my judge. Want a voice coming in again. Can you name?

  Ali: 27:41

  it. Oh girl, we name our egos in my program.

  Jess: 27:45

  I love that because I have my renters name the voice in their head.

  Ali: 27:48

  Yes, it's the same thing, right. It's the piece of you that says you're not good enough, you can't do this. It's judgmental, it's harsh, right? She's not a nice person and I always tell my clients I'm like name her because that's how you are, Ask your ego trying to protect you or trying to keep you safe or trying to say here's all the scary bad things that could happen.

  Jess: 28:10

  Let's perpetuate the beliefs that you have that haven't been healthy ways of coping.

  Ali: 28:14

  Exactly, and by naming it you almost get to I don't want to say detach, but you get to disconnect. It gives you a level of objectivity.

  Jess: 28:23

  Yes, exactly, I love that because it's so. I feel like saying it's really powerful seems kind of buzzwordy, but it can be when you can allow yourself to almost disconnect from those thoughts as they come up, in a way to say, like this thought comes up and I can take it out and look at it and say that's kind of crap.

  Ali: 28:40

  Okay, we learn to respond rather than react. You are not your thoughts. The things that happen inside your head could be true, not true. They could be an idea, they could be something that someone said. It could be just a random song that pops into your head. Right, you are not your thoughts. So if you're not your thoughts, we should be able to be objective and say, okay, this isn't about trying to control or trying to understand every single thing that comes into my head. It's about saying, okay, do I have a healthy enough relationship with myself, with my beliefs, that when those negative thoughts show up, can I hold them out and go okay, what do I need in this moment to shift out of this? You're going to live in it because you're bringing the light and dark of life. You have to have both. You have to. I tell you, we can't get away from it. The goal isn't light all the time, it's to read your vibration so that your dark is not as dark.

  Jess: 29:35

  I like that.

  Ali: 29:35

  So that we're not falling into the depths and getting stuck there. Agreed.

  Jess: 29:39

  So the takeaway is self-work is work. But, it's the most worthy work. Yeah, it's the most worthy work you'll ever do. I think every single episode now of Sturdy Girl. I have said that the work on ourselves is worth it because our relationship with ourselves is the longest and most intimate relationship we'll ever have. So when you talked about if someone were to say to you every day, like you're fat, you're ugly, you're worthless, we'd start to internalize those right. So, looking at our relationship with ourselves, we wouldn't stay in a relationship if the other person every single day was telling us all of these negative just like you're worthless, you're not good enough, all the things that give you. Start paying attention to what we say to ourselves. You would never stay in such an abusive relationship.

  Ali: 30:26

  If you knew a friend was in a relationship like that, you'd be like pack your bags, I'm going to light that person's house on fire and we're getting out. Yeah, or at least I would. But what we say to ourselves, we come up with all of these reasons that they're true and the other piece of this is we try to use those things we say to ourselves.

  Jess: 30:43

  As I'm going to use air quotes motivators.

  Ali: 30:46

  That's going to say that as motivation and discipline.

  Jess: 30:50

  Yeah, the words I can't stand and being on this end of things and being able to see that now and so recognize it in myself. Right, Because I will get dressed and I will stand in front of that floor length mirror and those thoughts will pop up in my head and you're like what?

  Ali: 31:06

  No? And I think the full circle back to even what we were saying at the very beginning is in that moment because we've done the work, we're capable of taking a step back and go. Okay. What are all the triggers that are making me feel this way? Well, yeah, I see plants today. I didn't drink any water, I've been sitting at a screen. This outfit actually isn't my size and doesn't actually fit me. I'm trying to either hide my body or I'm enclosed that I've outgrown. These are all play factors to how we feel, but who you are is not the problem, and your physical appearance is not the problem.

  Jess: 31:38

  Oh, like usually, what's going on up in your head that reflects outwards, for you to start taking all those things apart. I think for me, with that head between the knees moment earlier this week, stress impacts body image. Stress impacts our relationship with ourselves and how we process things and I'm not sleeping well, not eating well, not hydrating. All this stress, too much computer time, not enough self reflection time, and then it all just culminated and I was like I'm a hot mess, yes, and for me, I noticed that happens when I don't have enough genuine deep connection.

  Ali: 32:09

  I do a great job of eating foods that make me feel good and foods that I like to say like, nourish and satisfy. Yes, your girl loves, I love sugar. I love it. I'm never going to not love it and that's okay, right. Same, I drink water daily and I get enough sleep, but I still notice now, oh, if I'm not getting enough like social interaction, I'm not pouring back into my cup enough, right? There's so many other factors that have nothing to do with your body or with food. Great Mike Trump said it down this is. I love him Exactly, Heather. This is great.

  Jess: 32:42

  This is such a good bounce off conversation. I hope listeners are enjoying it too, because I'm just over here like nodding along. This connection has been so good.

  Ali: 32:50

  We're like we could just talk for two more hours. Who wants to listen to us? Yeah, yeah.

  Jess: 32:54

  The whole point of this for myself and for Allie, like what we want for listeners is to have a good relationship with ourselves, an improved relationship that, like you mentioned being a food freedom coach I like that terminology where it's being able to nourish and satisfy our bodies to be able to have that relationship with ourselves. So you realize that how you look really at the end of the day has nothing to do with the quality of your life. Yes, you are letting your physical being hold you back from doing things, saying things, like I talked about confidence last week on the podcast and so many people mistake confidence for actually like part of it is how they're feeling about their bodies and letting that determine their level of confidence that day and how much that plays into it.

  Ali: 33:36

  Confidence is not something that you can buy, borrow or steal. It's a skill. You can't achieve confidence because of a smaller gene size or because of something you ate or didn't eat that day. It's innate. I like to tell people. It is when you are your truest, most authentic self, that is when you're confident.

  Jess: 33:54

  It's also a skill. I mean, that's a big piece of it too. We talked about getting uncomfortable and the work involved in improving our relationship with self Confidence is one of those things that you have to step out of your comfort zone and get uncomfortable. Building a skill, building that confidence in whatever if that's like building confidence in your deadlift.

  Ali: 34:12

  And to your point, I think it's about feeling secure in yourself.

  Jess: 34:16

  It's trusting yourself with the ability to execute this task with a major of self efficacy.

  Ali: 34:22

  Yes, because confidence again similar to, like we were saying positive body image looks different for every single person. I feel confident walking into a bar by myself, looking like I own the damn room. That's not alley Ready. Oh yeah, I walk around like I'm a six-five man. It's fine. Can we hang out? This is great, absolutely. But like that's not confidence to everyone, sometimes being the quiet person in the room is confidence to someone they're secure in who they are.

  Jess: 34:50

  Oh my gosh, I put out a question box about what is confidence to you? What does it look like, what does it feel like? How do you develop it? Like I just kind of put out this broad strokes and I have three different people that are like confidence is not based on looks, it is not based on your physique. And I got this super long paragraph message. I did it as an anonymous link so I don't actually know who sent it. So I'm not hating on anyone, but it was one of those things that I'm like. But you know how to recognize confidence when you see it. And that was more. My point is you understand, when someone has that secure connection to themselves, you can see that whether that is walking into a bar solo, feeling like you're a six-five man who owns the place, or it's someone who is the quiet sort of confidence that just knows who they are.

  Ali: 35:29

  I use it as an example with my clients of like, a lot of my clients are fearful of wearing a bikini or like swimsuits. Yeah, and I say it of okay, you could be the smallest person at the pool, but if you're sitting there with a towel wrapped around you, you don't want anyone to look at you. You won't get in the pool because you're worried about what you might look like. Right, you're hiding. And then you've got the curviest, loudest, you know most voluptuous woman walks into the pool and she's rocking a bikini, she's laughing, she's having a great time, she's jumping in. The difference is not just yet. You have different body types. Everyone does. If you look around a pool, everyone has a different body. But the reason people gravitate to the other woman is her confidence, her authenticity, fearful and not hiding that's what people gravitate towards and I personally think that is so much more attractive than anything that someone could look like.

  Jess: 36:21

  Agreed. It's their relationship with themselves showing outwardly. Okay, I think that this is a really good place to end this conversation, but I could keep talking for hours. Beautiful, beautiful, full circle Agreed. Thank you so much for this conversation. I mean, the world had a great time. I'm so glad that I was here. Yes, thank you, and we will be in touch soon. I feel this conversation continuing, whether this is on the podcast or otherwise, but thank you, I girl, I'll show up every week, if you want me. I might take you up on that. We could have some fun conversations. But I'm going to go for a little self-care and get a manicure.

  Ali: 36:54

  I love that for you.

  Jess: 36:55

  Okay, I'll talk to you soon, friend. Bye. If you enjoyed this podcast episode, please feel free to follow, subscribe, like whatever the heck you do with podcasts. As always, stay sturdy, friends, and we'll talk to you next week.

Episode 7: Six Things I Unlearned in my Health and Body Image Journey

The way society has long perceived body image has had a profound effect on many individuals, creating insecurities and false beliefs about their worth. The recent episode of our podcast aims to debunk these societal misconceptions and challenge the idea that smaller is better. The media often distorts our views about health and size, creating an unhealthy correlation between self-worth and appearance. We are firm believers that there are no hard-and-fast rules when it comes to diet, exercise, or how you live your life.

During the podcast, we delve into a deeply personal journey of accepting and altering one's body. Gaining muscle mass can be a transformative chapter in one's life, leading to a celebration of the body rather than criticism. There is a prevalent misconception that one has to choose between loving and accepting their body and wanting to change it. However, it's important to understand the significance of introspection and the need to step out of comfort zones before choosing to change one's physical appearance.

The conversation takes a turn towards building confidence in our bodies, health, and fitness. Unlearning unhealthy and harmful messages that are often perpetuated by the media is an essential step towards body positivity. Sharing our journeys and talking about our experiences can significantly help build up our confidence. It also encourages others to do the same and promotes a sense of unity against body-shaming norms.

Throughout the podcast, listeners are reminded to remain sturdy and steadfast in their journey towards body positivity. They are also encouraged to engage with the podcast by following, subscribing, or liking it. This episode serves as a call to action for listeners to begin their body positivity revolution.

Finally, the podcast ends on a hopeful note, with the belief that every individual has the power to redefine their body image. This redefinition is a journey of self-acceptance and transformation that begins with the individual and extends to the community, fostering a more inclusive and accepting society.

• Full Transcript

  Jess: 0:01

  Hello friends, 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 the 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 seven of Sturdy Girl. You get a solo episode today. It's just me, myself and I as we dive into things that I had to learn and unlearn while improving my body image and self-confidence. I want to keep this a shorter episode, a fun episode, one that can help you reflect on, maybe, your journey or some of the things that you had assumed or believed and have worked through and realized what the heck was I thinking? We all have those, we all go through those, and I will say this as a preface for this entire episode. We are forever a work in progress. We are forever learning and unlearning things throughout our lives, so this isn't a compilation of all my life lessons. These are the big things that I have learned over the last decade or so, and mostly, I would say, in the last seven or eight years, so let's dive into the first one. Smaller is not better. Look, we know this. We've heard it. We know that media is so focused on smaller equating to healthier. We've heard that, but have we actually internalized the fact that smaller isn't better? Because that's something that I feel like we continually have to work on. For me, learning that shrinking my body did not improve my body image. The focus on making myself smaller only made me spend that much more time and energy and brain space on diet and exercise, when that energy could have been spent on living a more intentional life. It could have been spent on living out experiences that had nothing to do with how my body looked. I spent so many years as a runner trying to quote unquote look like a runner, lose five pounds, because my running coach at the time told me that I would get faster if I just lost those last couple of pounds. And along these same lines. Health does not have a size. So keep that as food for thought, because maybe there is a better quality of life to be had in your case from losing a few pounds, from changing your body composition, but most of the time, we get so caught up in the vortex of needing a flat stomach and a big butt and a smaller than pant size, smaller waist size, all of those things when that doesn't lead to any health benefits. So that was lesson number one smaller is not better. The next thing that I unlearned was that performance does not equal worth. I equated my worth to my performance. I was a runner for over 10 years, everything from 5Ks to 50Ks and my worth and my sense of self came from my performance. Believing that my body has to look a certain way to be that kind of athlete to try to get smaller, right To be a quote unquote better runner, to look more like a runner. Equating the checked off workout as a reaffirmation of my self worth, of my value as a human. Eating, sleeping, living my life around performance metrics. Now, most of you listening, if you have some kind of pursuit of sport running, lifting, hiking, rock climbing, whatever it might be you're probably a recreational athlete versus, say, someone who is semi competitive or sub elite or something along those lines. We have lives outside of whatever sport it is. We're doing so. Eating, sleeping, living your life around that performance metric probably isn't the place we want to focus. Our worth doesn't come from our performance. Our worth doesn't come from how hard we worked out or how much we focused our life on that performance piece. Now, if you are training for a marathon, there is a component of performance where you look at nutrition, where you look at your training plan for improved performance right, there's a place for that. But your performance, in whatever sport you are doing, should not affect your self worth. Your self worth is inherent, it's innate, and it's so hard to separate those things because we're so used to being human doing instead of a human being. The next thing that I learned in my body image, fitness, self confidence journey is that there are no rules. Now hear me out. A few years ago, I was watching a movie with the hubs and I think it was called Pacific Rim and it's like robots battling monsters and I'm sorry if you love this movie and I'm totally watching it forgive me, but we're watching this movie and these crazy stunts kept getting pulled in this movie and I started laughing and I'm like, oh my God, there are no rules. And it became this joke of when things were out of control or you had a crappy week or something was going on and we just exclaimed there are no rules. And then we were watching the movie everything everywhere all at once and there's a part where these humans get turned into rocks and then there's little speech bubbles above them and part of them. They say there are no rules. So I had to include that in this episode Because, honestly, there really are no rules to how you live your best life. Truly, there are no rules when it comes to how you need to eat. There is no one perfect diet. Screw all the fad diets. Food does not have morality. There is no one right answer for how you should live your life. There's no one perfect exercise modality. You get to choose how you want to live, what kind of choices you want to make. Sure, we can look at things on an informational basis and understand that for our bodies to thrive, there are certain nutrients, micronutrients, macronutrients that are needed for body processes to go smoothly, for us to have energy to feel good. But you can choose how you want to eat. You can choose how you want to move your body, because there is no one perfect way to move your body. Now, are there guidelines for frequency and intensity of strength and cardio training to maintain muscle mass, for metabolic health, for those kinds of things throughout your life? Yes, there absolutely are guidelines, but, again, there are no rules and you get to choose what you want to do, and I think that there's something really empowering in that that there's no one right way to live. If you want to be the person that trains for an ultramarathon every year and then in your off season you're rock climbing, and maybe you're the person that hikes year round and wants to make sure to eat a cookie every day in your diet, great, what brings you joy and satisfaction and allows you to thrive and live the life you love. Live the big rad life you deserve, because that's what sturdy girl's about, right? I have to laugh as I'm recording this right now because I get so excited. I feel like I'm full on on a soapbox for this whole episode. To just be like friends. There is so much more to life than spending time and energy on exactly how much you eat and exactly how much you move. Movement should feel good and enjoyable. Food should be enjoyable. It's not just a set of nutrients. There's so much more to it. Okay, I think the biggest thing for me that I have unlearned in the last few years is that my stomach tells others absolutely nothing about me. I spent so long, so long with my stomach as the source of shame, the source of my shame. I tried in middle school, high school, to learn belly dance and embrace my stomach and it did work for a time. And it took me many years and actively working on my body image to realize that my thought process was if someone saw my stomach and saw the visible fat and rolls and the cellulite that exists there, that I would be seen immediately as a failure. That my quote unquote inability to have a flat stomach meant I wasn't disciplined enough or dedicated enough to live this particular lifestyle as identified as a runner, a lifter, a coach, a human being trying to live my best life. For me it felt like such a source of shame, a source of failure, because I couldn't achieve a flat stomach, couldn't get rid of all of those rolls. And, honestly, if I had to pinpoint one thing, that was the turning point for me because, again, to be honest, I'll probably struggle with some form of this my whole life. I don't think those negative thoughts are ever going to fully go away. But the big turning point for me was getting into powerlifting, and I'm not saying you have to get into powerlifting to work on this yourself, but the shift away from the obsession in the running world of becoming smaller which that conversation has shifted a lot but getting into the powerlifting space. Powerlifting is not about your size. It is going out there and giving your best effort, testing your strength, seeing what you're capable of, getting curious for how much of a challenge you can take on. It helped me embrace how your body changes when you gain muscle. I remember reaching out to my coach at the time when I first started I think I was about eight or 10 months in. We were in the thick of training for my first powerlifting meet and I remember messaging her and saying oh my God, alyssa, my pants don't fit anymore, my scrubs are too tight in weird places and this is really overwhelming and realizing that my clothes didn't fit the same way they used to because I had gained muscle mass, clothes were fitting differently. And being able to accept that that added muscle mass allowed me to pick up 150 more pounds off the floor, that that muscle mass allowed me to feel so much more strong and confident, and was such a turning point for me to realize that the answer isn't getting smaller, the answer isn't trying to make my stomach flatter. In fact, my waist has stayed exactly the same size while adding on muscle mass over the years with powerlifting, but my core strength has increased exponentially and now there's so much less energy and thought given to how my stomach looks when I get dressed. Yes, I focus on the clothes that feel good, that I feel comfortable in, that I like, but I don't obsess as much now about how much does my stomach show in this. Do I want to wear the crop top today? Does it feel good? Because my stomach is no longer my source of shame, it is no longer a source of anything. It is just part of my anatomy that I have come to accept. And you know what? Honestly, I still don't love my stomach, but I don't really care about it in the context that I used to, and I think that's my big point here, because the showing my stomach tells people absolutely nothing about me. And while we're talking about bodies, let's go into the fifth thing that I've learned in this never ending journey, and that is that you can do both. Now, if you're an OG human who has followed me on social, you will remember that the original tagline to my coaching to ever wild was you can do both, and that was in context of being a hybrid athlete, of running and lifting, both. But in this case I'm talking about being able to simultaneously accept your body as it is body acceptance and want to change your body. Because there are these camps that seem to exist that say, if you want to love and accept yourself, you can't be trying to change your body as well, you need to learn to accept yourself as is. That's it, the end. And then there's this other camp that says, if I love and accept my body as it is and don't have the desire to change it, then I've given up. I can't accept it as is, because then I'm gonna lose the momentum and motivation and discipline or whatever other term you want to use to keep working out and keep moving my body. You don't have to belong to one of those camps. You can accept your body, whether that acceptance is body love, body appreciation, body positivity even, but that acceptance piece of I accept my body as it is. I accept that I am a human that is so much more than just a body, but I also want to change my body composition or something about my body. There is nothing wrong with doing both. Now we've talked about how much our body image is internal brain work. It's beneficial to do this work first before delving into wanting to change our physical appearance, because, again, changing our appearance isn't going to magically change our life or how we feel about our body. Right, losing the weight, gaining the muscle, changing our bodies does not automatically improve our life. Now, again, context there are some people whose body composition is such that decreasing fat mass can improve their quality of life. Suddenly they're able to keep up with their kids, go on the hikes, they want to do the things in life that they want to do. But just because we want to change our bodies doesn't mean we can't, at the same time, have a healthy relationship with ourselves. That's my point, and that, for me personally, is still something ongoing. It's something that I continue to work on, but it's something to grapple with, because a lot of books that you will read about improving your relationship with yourself or improving body image talk about diet culture and talk about being anti-diet, talk about dismantling those pieces and not subscribing to any of it. But there's a gray area and there's a place to be in the messy middle of both, of being able to say yet diet culture is bullshit and I don't subscribe to any of the fat diets. However, your relationship with yourself is so important. It's worth taking the time to treat your body with respect, to nourish your body with the foods and the activities that you enjoy and that are sustaining. Okay, we can do both. Don't think it has to be one or the other. The sixth and final thing that I have learned is that doing the hardship helped the most. Now I could say the whole. The magic happens outside your comfort zone, and it's true it really is. But doing the things that didn't always come easy is what helped build my confidence the most. It's like getting stronger in the gym. The more reps you put in, the stronger you get. The more you're showing up the frequency, the consistency, the amount of weight on the bar, getting uncomfortable, challenging yourself, working in those end-rep ranges. That is exactly how growth works in the real world. Building confidence requires practicing the thing. If I wanted to go become a public speaker, the more I practice public speaking, the better I'm going to get. Doing the hard things, the scary things, the things that put us outside our comfort zone showing up, deciding for me showing up, and deciding to create a podcast recording myself, editing my voice for hours afterwards you guys, I get so tired of hearing my own voice. So I'm so glad that you enjoy listening to me but showing up putting in the reps, because if we go back to that episode, if you haven't listened to the episode on building confidence, I highly suggest going back to it. We learn that confidence is a skill. It's a skill that's developed by being willing to try, being willing to take that risk, being willing to take action. Confidence is built in action. So what are you going to do? That's hard and puts you outside the comfort zone. And those are all six things, major things that I have learned through building confidence, through working on body image, through my fitness and health journey. I feel very buzzwordy saying that, but just to recap, smaller is not better. Performance does not equal worth. Three, there are no rules. Four, my stomach tells others absolutely nothing about me. It is not my source of shame any longer. Fifth, you can do both. You can work on a healthy, flexible body image and want to change your physical appearance. And, lastly, doing the hardship helped the most. This was so fun. Okay, before we end this episode, I do want to go over some of your submissions on the things that you had to learn or unlearn in your own journeys. I had a number of you submit that learning that foods were not good or bad was a really big component in your journey, learning that foods had no morality. And then I had probably a dozen different submissions that were variants of saying that it was learning to be okay with not being a huge fan of certain parts of your body, but that those parts don't cancel out the parts that you do like. I really appreciate that, but at the same time, the reminder that you are so much more than just a body. You are so much more than the sum of your physical parts. And then, lastly, I love this submission they said one of the things that they learned was understanding why they want to improve their body. Is it for me or for others' attention? And yes, so much yes to this, because If you can develop that awareness around why you've set a goal or why you want to change, it allows you to do some introspection, to say, did I decide that suddenly I want really big shoulders or I want to lose X number of pounds because of something I saw while reading the news or schooling social, or my friend so and so posted about some new fitness thing that they're doing. I don't know I'm trying to think of a specific example here but oftentimes, if we can figure out why we are desiring that change in our bodies, having that why can be so powerful and so important, because maybe that why is something that means a lot to you. Or you've done the work on your body image and, yeah, great. If you say, jess, I want to build bolder shoulders, we're like heck, yeah, let's do that. You're allowed to want to change your appearance and change it in ways that you like and enjoy, just so long as you're not doing it for other people, that you're doing it for you. Such great submissions. Always happy to start conversations on Instagram at sturdygirl underscore if you want to talk more about any of these things, if you want to share about your journey, things that you have learned or unlearned, building confidence in your body image, in fitness, in health here for it, love it. Hope you enjoyed this solo episode. As always. Thank you so much for tuning in and I will talk to you next Wednesday. Stay sturdy friends. If you enjoyed this podcast episode, please feel free to follow, subscribe, like whatever the heck you do with podcasts. As always, stay sturdy friends and we'll talk to you next week.

Episode 6: Breaking Down Diet Culture: A Conversation on Body Image, Self-Compassion, and Balanced Nutrition with Gillian

Diet culture, body image, and the way we perceive ourselves and food are complex and multifaceted issues deeply rooted in our upbringing, society, and personal experiences. Our latest podcast episode with Gillian, a nutrition and body image coach from the Bite Size Nutrition podcast, takes an insightful look into these matters, revealing the profound influence societal messages have had on our adult lives and choices.

The conversation opens with a discussion about the profound impact our childhood experiences have on our relationship with food and body image. It is during these formative years that messages about food and dieting from parents and society shape our views and behaviours around food, often leading to a complicated relationship with eating and body image in adulthood.

An essential aspect of breaking free from these damaging narratives is self-compassion. Understanding and internalizing the concept of self-compassion is key to moving past the harmful messages we may have internalized about food and our bodies. It plays a crucial role in learning to trust our food choices again and overcoming the guilt often associated with certain foods or eating behaviours.

Understanding the concept of metabolic health can also greatly impact our decisions about nutrition. We also delve into the power of physical activities such as powerlifting in fostering a healthier body image. These activities help us appreciate our bodies for their strength and capabilities rather than just their appearance.

The dialogue further extends into the territory of setting focused goals, normalizing hard work, and harnessing motivation in a healthy way. A key takeaway is the power of values in changing our body image and the process of rebuilding trust with food. We explore the concept of stages of change and how to narrow down goals to focus on one thing at a time.

The episode wraps up with a thoughtful exploration of the concept of a fat loss phase with the understanding that it does not define our self-worth. We discuss how to combine internal and external knowledge when it comes to food choices, and how to find equilibrium in our relationship with food and our body image.

In conclusion, the conversation with Gillian underscores the power of self-compassion, trust, and balance in our relationship with food as potent weapons against diet culture. By changing the way we perceive food and our bodies, we can revolutionize our self-image and overall well-being.

• Full Transcript

  Jess: 0:01

  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 the podcast where we shift the focus away from your appearance and on to living the big, rad life you deserve. Hello, my Sturdy friends, and welcome to episode 6 of Sturdy Girl Today. Before we dive into this awesome interview, I want to take a moment just to introduce who you're going to be listening to. Jillian is from the Bite Size Nutrition podcast. She is a nutrition, body image and mindset-focused coach who supports clients in rebuilding trust with food and their bodies. Listen, she is our kind of girl. I'm so stoked for you to listen to this interview, for our rambles, for the moments where she and I both at the same time, were like, yes, we understand, we're going to hear more on self-compassion, like you do in every episode, moments of yeah, this is the Sturdy Girl mindset, but Jillian focuses on clients or women who want to live full, meaningful, fun lives and want to focus on health and well-being. That doesn't rely on macros, restrictive diets or progress photos. Jillian spent most of her life wishing she could fix her body and sound familiar, and many years jumping from diet to diet until she realized that her health was suffering. She hadn't had a period in years and her life revolved around her diet and her training schedule, and you'll definitely hear more about that inside this episode. Jillian works with a broad range of people amazing human. If you want to learn more about her, you can find her on Instagram, at Bite Size Nutry, or on her website, bitesizees. Once again, megan is not joining us for this interview. She is legitimately on a bike somewhere in the Pacific Northwest rainy weather getting real muddy. She will be back with us in a couple of weeks, not next week's episode, in fact. I'm going to do a little segue for a second before we dive into Jillian and my interview. I have a request from you, my favorite listener. I want to hear from you. I want to hear about things you had to learn or unlearn in your body image journey, your health journey, your fitness journey, whatever you want to call it. What were some of the crazy things that you believed or didn't believe? What things have you had to unlearn in the process? Was there something crazy? Did you only eat rice cakes or only eat green foods, or believe that white bread was bad for you or any of those things that we've had to unlearn. Was it something that you understood about your body or your appearance or how you were perceived by others? Because I'm going to be doing an entire episode about my journey of unlearning all the things about body image and self-confidence, I'd love to hear from you. Drop me a note on Instagram at SturdyGirl underscore, or an email Hello at SturdyGirlco. Okay, let's dive in friends.

  Gillian: 3:00

  You know, those memories that you have that are half-formed. We have flashes. I have this memory of being in a high school classroom or something, that it was a Weight Watchers meeting with my mom. I was born. I don't know if I'm an elder millennial or if I'm right in the middle. I was born at 87.

  Jess: 3:17

  Okay, yeah, you're an elder millennial, because I was born in 90 and I'm considered an elder millennial. What I don't know?

  Gillian: 3:25

  All right, whatever, I'm an elder millennial, I guess I'll own that. This was the early 90s and I was homeschooled, so my mom would take me everywhere with her, and that was, oh, homeschool kids. We'll probably have to touch on that later. I agree, yeah social skills. I mean, yeah, social skills. I'm a big nerd. Probably why I like science fiction and fantasy so much because it's just like creating whole worlds, because I wasn't exposed to like being with other kids in kindergarten. Really, yeah, yeah, wild, anyway continue story.

  Jess: 3:56

  Sorry to interrupt yeah no, no worries.

  Gillian: 3:58

  My mom passed away when I was nine and this is like come out in like stories. When I talked to my grandmother before she passed and stories that my dad would tell me, it came out that my mom had struggled with her weight her entire life and I was this like four year old kid. I didn't have any idea. So I would do all these fun things like go out to lunch with my mom and go to frozen yoga and have those amazing memories, but also have this very distinct memory of going and my mom got on a scale, because I think at Weight Watchers you used to have to get on the scale and weigh yourself, like in front of everybody. Yeah, that is a shame trigger. Yeah, I think so. There's a show I only watched a couple episodes, but this is us which was a really big show, and they show one of the characters who's in a larger body and she went to I don't know if it was overeaters or like one of those things and they weighed them in public too. I remember seeing that and it was funny because watching that episode of that show kind of triggered that memory of like, oh my God, I saw this happen and so it's like, okay, it makes so much sense why, as I got older and then at some point I started fixating on this very specific weight number, yeah, going to those meetings at four years old like were those.

  Jess: 5:06

  those are some of your earliest memories.

  Gillian: 5:09

  Yeah, but it was so interesting and I've done a lot of thinking about this because I actually launched my first body image coaching program three years ago and I didn't yet have the education or the experience like an understanding, the psychology behind it and all of that to like actually make it as effective as I wanted to. Then this year I launched another one and it's completely different, but as I was like delving into all of the content when I developed both of those programs, it was so interesting because I started to really understand the connection between hey, we've been told all of our lives that food is this thing that is supposed to be enjoyable you should be carefree, it's like fun and pleasure and all of this but it's also this thing that is meant to be a tool to control our bodies, and so it's no wonder that we all have these very on and off like huge pendulum swings from like fuck it, I just want to enjoy what I eat to like, oh my God, I need to heavily control everything that goes in my body. Because even as a kid, I remember going with my mom to restaurants and I always get grilled cheese and french fries and we enjoy food together and she loved desserts, but then it was also the flip side of it was she was constantly on a diet which as a four year old I couldn't fully imagine. But I do have that memory of the Weight Watchers thing. So it's wild because from a young age we're fed two very distinct messages.

  Jess: 6:21

  Yeah, did she ever say anything to you about food, or was this more like your observation?

  Gillian: 6:27

  I wish that I knew the answer to that because I think a lot of it. I was just too young to fully grasp but like I have these memories of so many holidays where we would bake sugar cookies and I'd be on the counter eating cookie dough and my dad was very much always the like sugar is bad for you, like sugar is going to make you fat, sugar is going to kill you. And my mom was very much like we need to enjoy food, like food is pleasure. But also she secretly had I guess not so secretly, I was just too young to get it but she also had this other side that was like but I need to control what I eat. Yeah, my body isn't good enough. And then, after my mom passed and my dad, of course, was like the main parent and he grew up in a very fat phobic household and was like overly obsessed with quote unquote health foods, Would be like no, you can't drink soda, that stuff's going to kill you. And criticizing overweight people on the street. So yeah, lots of crazy stuff going on there and I know the sad thing is this story sounds extreme and makes so much sense why I had body image issues, but it's also not unique. Like no, I was going to say it doesn't this sound?

  Jess: 7:29

  this tracks with other people's body image stories that I've heard and it's something to you know. You're talking about doing the research for your course, doing the research for the podcast. For me was looking at research on positive body image and finally understanding that positive body image definition wasn't what I thought it was, because social media kind of took over positive body image and pink washed everything. I love that term, that's the easiest way I can think to explain it, because it's like positive body image is an opposite of negative body image. And just looking at all of the research and looking at people breaking down what their body image story is and you know how, like you go to therapy and you talk through things in therapy that are big, like with your mom passing away or with all these big traumatic things or something that happened in elementary school or middle school or whatever and you're talking through all these like life changing things. And then when you go back and you look at your childhood from a frame of body image, it brings up such different things, such specific experiences, that people are like, oh my God, that's why I still can't put creamer in my coffee. This is why I still fear eating bagels, those things that don't tend to come to mind and you realize those are the experiences that help shape you. Or when you know so and so, said in elementary school that this was really bad for you, and you still took that with you into your adult life.

  Gillian: 8:46

  Yeah, totally. It's wild, the things that you latch onto as a kid or in those like formative years. Yeah, and you realize I have been avoiding like this brand of bread because someone told me it was higher calorie than that one, and I don't even know if that's true.

  Jess: 9:02

  So for me, a decade ago maybe a little over, when I first got into running, I was really into health food, right Of like what do you call it? Clean eating. I was a clean eater. You know, it's like fruits and veggies and you just shoot anything. That wasn't that right, and it was just this whole thing. I remember being so proud of myself and I'm pretty sure this was an Instagram post at some point. We could like scroll back to the archives and find it and it was like 10 random facts about me and one of them was I've never eaten white bread and I was like so it's like a proud thing. Yeah, it was like a point of pride, like I don't eat white bread. No, if I'm going to eat bread, it's going to have lots of fiber and grains, and it was just so cringy to think back on that. That wasn't even that long ago. That wasn't even like childhood shaping, it was adult life. This was, oh, I'm making healthy choices. No.

  Gillian: 9:49

  Yeah, and I think here is like hearing all of these stories. It's like, yes, we could dig into every single individual one. But then we want to also be able to see somehow, if I work on my body image, like how do I actually see a change in how I feel about myself in a relatively short period of time? Because that, I think, is the challenging thing, because we could go back with a fine tooth comb and look at every single instance of some comment or something that got me to where I am. But it's also like and this is maybe a controversial opinion, and I think that if you want to go back and overanalyze everything, it's fine. But also so much of this stuff. I think we can move past it when we actually really delve into a practice of self compassion.

  Jess: 10:29

  Absolutely Self compassion has been something in every single episode so far. It was like three tips to improve confidence, three tips to improve your body image and self confidence is like star, star, star on everything. I agree. I think that there is some importance in reflecting on how did I get here? Not in the intensity of going to therapy and working through traumatic events, right, but in the context of understanding like, oh, I do actually fear that food. Oh, I've actually been avoiding that. I was thinking about that. I have my coffee in hand and I was like I like drinking black coffee. And as I'm sitting there thinking about it, well, years ago I guess I used to drink coffee with creamer in it. And I was thinking about the people that I know that are like oh no, I only drink black coffee, but they don't actually like black coffee. It's because they fear the calories that go into creamer. I think that there's value in learning that and to also help you figure out your why. I think that there is a piece of that to understanding yourself. But I agree, I don't think you need to nitpick everything and go through experience by experience, but it does play into like for me. Growing up, my mom was anorexic for 20 plus years and I would say she's in recovery now. But that was my growing up, was she weighed herself three times a day, always had a full face of makeup on, was very, very particular about her food. And I have two sisters and like my mom and my two sisters were always very thin naturally and I'm more curvy and always have been, and so it always made for these like body shaped comments towards me growing up. So that helped me to kind of reflect back on like oh, this was the lens with which food was shaped was having a parent that was going through an active eating disorder.

  Gillian: 12:11

  I cannot imagine how challenging that must have been and also how confusing.

  Jess: 12:14

  Very.

  Gillian: 12:15

  Because you probably noticed a lot of things and you're like is this really what I'm noticing?

  Jess: 12:20

  Yeah, like grandma would take us to fast food every once in a while and you're like, oh, don't tell mom. Oh, my God, it was a whole thing. We had a huge garden and when we go to the grocery store it was always fresh fruits and vegetables, all of your whole grains, and if we had any packaged food at all hidden underneath the vegetables on the grocery belt, I think that for me, when I realized later on my whole obsession with clean eating, I'm like, oh, that's just kind of what continued for when I was a kid. So I have a question for you. Yeah, what?

  Gillian: 12:47

  Because I think about this a lot sort of like when I became aware that controlling my food could control my body. Because that sort of was the like spark that led down a road of essentially like I actively was dieting in some way what we refer to as like a diet mindset, pretty consistently for about 11 years, except for like a short period where I was traveling, and even part of that I still had a diet mindset because I was convinced that I needed to be gluten free, because I thought gluten was unhealthy Me too, yeah. And so I remember when I realized, oh my gosh, if I control what I eat, I can also control my body, and if I control my body, I can, to a certain extent, hopefully, control other people's perceptions of me. When did you notice or can you pinpoint? That's a great question.

  Jess: 13:36

  I don't know when I necessarily could pinpoint that. I think pinpointing that in two parts First one was probably like eighth grade and we had this is going to sound kind of woo and weird and this is just a glimpse.

  Gillian: 13:49

  I was raised by people who's literally like their name was Chelsea and they're like my name is Fern. Now, that was my upbringing Excellent.

  Jess: 13:57

  I was raised home of school and a Jehovah's Witness, so, okay, all right, same same, but different, yeah, yeah. So my mom was very anti-doctor and she totally listens to this podcast. I'm like I love you, mom.

  Gillian: 14:08

  I really do, but my childhood upbringing was weird but it made us the colorful humans that we are today.

  Jess: 14:15

  You know exactly, that is like all the experiences. There's no animosity towards any of these things. There's no negative Like you learn from it. I was 13 and we had moved into a new house about a year prior and we were all having very random colds and sinus issues and all of these things and we found black mold in the house. So we had to get rid of the black mold in the house and as a part of that, it was like oh, black mold is in your system, so we need to go on a diet. And that was my personal first introduction to like an actual diet, beyond like seeing my mom's struggles. That was when I got introduced to rice cakes. That's when I got introduced to like oh well, let's not eat Ritz crackers, let's eat Triskits because they're whole grain. Let's focus on these things. And then it was like actually we're going to cut out gluten, actually running, cut out all white flour. Actually we're going to cut out, you know, like, let's have a, let's have all these yes and no foods and help you feel better. I lost weight doing this diet. Now, the diet wasn't supposed to be to lose weight, it was to clear the black mold from my body. But I remember being like oh my gosh, my genes are loose and other people had made comments about how I look different and I'm like food makes my body look different. That was like the turning point was doing this eight week diet or whatever to get rid of black mold and then realizing like, oh, okay.

  Gillian: 15:31

  It's wild because I think that probably so many people listening can relate to this is that like the slippery slope into diet I don't want to say diet culture, because I feel like that word now is thrown around so much it's becoming kind of buzzwordy. Yeah, it is becoming very buzzwordy. I feel like the slippery slope from health into how do I control my body. It's really blurry where the line is, because for me it was like in college I realized I was like I'm living on all food. That is beige, because it was the first time that I was out of my dad's house and I didn't have anyone telling me that sugar was going to kill me. So I was like fuck, yeah, I'm going to live off of Starbucks coffee cake if I want to. I remember in my freshman year of college, someone worked at Starbucks and gifted us like an entire tray of Starbucks coffee cake and that was literally all I ate for like five days College life. Oh my gosh, exactly, exactly. And then I realized this might not be healthy. I should maybe eat some vegetables, and it was the first time I actually got to choose if I eat vegetables or not, instead of them being forced on me. And so I started experimenting and I was like, oh, I don't dislike them. I actually just didn't like people telling me what to do, like my dad trying to force it down my throat. And so, the first time I could really make autonomous decisions about what I ate, I started eating more fruits and vegetables and I also noticed oh my gosh. I remember one day I was like wearing an outfit that had fit me and all of a sudden I put the shorts on and they were like falling off and I was like, wait a minute, this is how. Like wow. And it went into like, at one point, all I ate, I would just eat five bananas a day. And it wasn't like it wasn't consciously a diet thing, it was just like I have connected eating vegetables and fruit makes me thin and I like that and that is healthy. And that went down the slippery slope of like, ok, well, how do I actually continue to do this? And I got really into all these fitness blogs and, like the mommy, lifestyle bloggers there was so many that I followed that would post every week. They'd post that what I eat in a day, right, and I would like compare what I eat in a day to them and look at their body type. That was the first thing that got the wheels turning of like how do I find the perfect diet to get my body to look like the way I never could? Because I got bullied for my weight. I got made fun of when I was 15. My dad asked me if I was pregnant once. I was like what are you even talking about? Just like wild stuff, but like four teenage me. And then it's like I'm sure that you probably have a similar point where it went from kind of dabbling and like how do I find the right diet to like I'm going to hardcore, do it.

  Jess: 18:00

  Yeah, from that portion of being a teenager and that initial dabbling into diving in was I ended up having a crush on a guy who was vegetarian and nothing wrong with being vegetarian or vegan, but I 100% became vegetarian because I realized it could allow me to control what I ate even more with a label on it. So people understood yeah, it was such an interesting for a and I mean that lasted three or four years.

  Gillian: 18:28

  That's so funny. I was vegetarian for a couple of years too, and then at one point I remember smelling chicken and being like I want to eat that and I just ate it. I was like I guess I'm not vegetarian anymore.

  Jess: 18:37

  That was exactly what happened to me too. I don't know Three or four years I don't remember how many exactly and we were grilling chicken outside. I'm like, oh my God, that smells really good. Ok, I'm going to eat it.

  Gillian: 18:49

  So I have a question. I don't know if you've covered this on the podcast before, but I know that sturdy girl came from like your uncles, making a comment about you being like a sturdy girl, and where were you in your body image at that moment and how did that comment make you feel?

  Jess: 19:06

  At that moment, I was in a pretty good place. I will say I spent about a decade running. I ran everything from five case to 50 case, like a full disclosure. My body image space when I first started running was when I run, I can control my body. That was also the second part to the whole. When did you realize you could equate food with controlling your body was in my early 20s. I was having some very weird health issues and decided to do like an elimination diet, take things out and then add back in and see how they affected things. And it was like oh, I have a gluten intolerance. Oh, I should be having dairy, oh I shouldn't whatever, and cut everything out except fruits, veggies and lean protein. And then had some beans and some nuts. But that was my like clean eating episode, right, and went into that. But that was also when I started running. She had this mind set of like well, runners need to be smaller, and I spent a lot of time in that space and started really working on body image stuff. A few years into that running journey, In 2020, I pivoted pretty hard and went from I ran a 50 K and then the next week I hired a powerlifting coach. So it was just like right turn and I'd lifted for years but not serious heavy lifting or anything and powerlifting was probably the best thing I ever did for my body image.

  Gillian: 20:14

  There is some really interesting research that, I have to admit, I have not read. I saw it came out and I was like I gotta read that on how power of powerlifting is effect on body image because it is so function based, yeah, and yet at the same time it's like very function based, but it's also a weight class sport and so it's like it's it is a mind fuck. Yeah, it is Olympic weight lifted for a while and it was probably one of the darkest times for my body image, maybe ever, and that's something too that, if I try to think as little as I can about the weight classes to be honest with you.

  Jess: 20:47

  But the rest of powerlifting I mean it was fantastic. But as far as that lunch with my great uncle, like making the comment about my body, I was in a decent place I will say that I went from running 40 ish miles a week on average to taking it down to running 10 to 15 miles a week and powerlifting and I love powerlifting but my body changed. It's that both and of. I love powerlifting, I loved getting stronger, but my clothes started to fit differently. The eating requirements shifted a little bit from running. Running will, like your body will scream at you that you are hungry. The hunger cues from running are so much different than the hunger cues from strength training. And so personally, I mean research says also, but like, personally for me it was hard to understand the fueling and like figure that piece out for myself for the body change and I was used to getting closer to having a quote unquote runner's body and then to start strength training and suddenly I'm like, oh my God, my scrubs, like scrubs, are meant to be loose, my scrubs are tight. Oh, I'm gaining muscle in my shoulders and my back, to the point that I have to go up a size in my scrub tops and that piece of it. And when that happened for me was when I was actively working through, like I'm OK with my body changing. I'm getting stronger, I love what I'm doing, I am metabolically healthy, but still that piece of I look in the mirror and I don't see the same body that I saw year prior.

  Gillian: 22:10

  Yeah, and no one really teaches us like in a real way. I think a lot of us say it and maybe see it on the internet. Well, I hope we see it on the internet. I'm realizing that we're very much in like a tiny little echo chamber and there is a lot of craziness on the internet that we just don't see it because you and I are in this bubble of people that kind of get it. But there's still some fucking wild stuff out there.

  Jess: 22:34

  Just get on TikTok. Just get on TikTok and search anything and you end up down that rabbit hole of like there are still so many crazies in this space.

  Gillian: 22:44

  Yeah, I think we're never taught that bodies are meant to change. That. Similarly to like, you learn new things and your brain changes and you now have new skills that you didn't have before. Like, your body also changes. And there's very much this rhetoric of you're supposed to find this ideal body and then somehow just like, preserve it forever. That doesn't make any sense at all. I mean, if you think about it, you wouldn't expect your relationship with your partner to stay the same forever. No, you wouldn't expect your hair to stay exactly the same forever.

  Jess: 23:14

  But somehow we expect, yeah, yeah. Nothing is static like that. It's insane to think about how much that is indirectly ingrained in us that we can achieve the perfect body or the dream body or the whatever, and get to that point and then it's just going to stay and you're going to stay away forever.

  Gillian: 23:30

  Exactly. I know we are going down so many rabbit holes here, but there's also this very much false belief that you're going to get your quote unquote ideal body and then, all of a sudden, everything's going to be great, you're going to reach this goal weight goal, body goal, physique whatever and your insecurities that you've held all of your life, that are probably something that started in childhood because of what you saw your parents do, or because of getting bullied in high school, or because of reading 17 magazine and like seeing all these completely unrealistic body types. It's like you're going to get this like quote unquote ideal body and then, all of a sudden, all of those insecurities, those are just gone.

  Jess: 24:03

  Right, think about movies. Think about how many movies were like they changed their face or their body or their whatever, and then they got the perfect life and the perfect guy. Yeah Well, I love the Princess Diaries growing up Like I read all the books.

  Gillian: 24:18

  My grandpa is in that movie, by the way. Sorry, that's so random. My grandpa's in that movie, that's awesome.

  Jess: 24:24

  So what you think about that? They gave her a makeover and then suddenly she looked like a princess. Yeah, yeah, you think about how many movies there are about making people change their bodies and then their life got better.

  Gillian: 24:35

  Yeah, and as millennials, like that is what we grew up with. We grew up with the skinny, good looking girl, like she was the one that got the super hot, muscular dude and all she needed was to not wear glasses or not have braces, or like all of a sudden she started working out and lost weight and even like mean girls one of my favorite movies ever. One of the things that they do to make Regina George like not hot anymore is feed her so that she gains weight. Definitely. What the fuck. I love that movie so much I know, but it's one of those things that, when we think about it, like I would imagine that probably a great bulk of the people listening are millennials. Like whether you're elder millennials like me or younger millennials like other people that are younger than us, you probably were exposed in a huge amount to the TV shows, to the movies, to the magazines, and I think this is where, like circling back to the self-compassion conversation we need to be really clear that self-compassion is not just being like it's okay that I don't need to change my body, so I'm just going to eat donuts all day, like that is absolutely not it. But I think that, especially for millennial women, we have a very big misunderstanding of what it means to practice self-compassion, and we also were brought up with this idea of like we need to be super hard on ourselves in order to shape our bodies, because that will get us what we want.

  Jess: 25:55

  I agree, and it's one of those things that self-compassion, it's not giving up. It's not saying like, oh well, I'm trying to be compassionate towards myself and I'm like, oh, I'm just not going to work out or I'm just going to eat all the foods. It's like, no, the self-compassion piece is taking care of you, it's making sure you're making the best decision for your entire being. And it amazes me too when I think about for myself and my fitness journey. Like, if you will, I was just safe and as loosely something like powerlifting, lifting, running, all of those things. So much of that journey was that I have to be disciplined, I have to be motivated. Like no days off. Because, reflecting back on my own point, I was dating a guy who is a total like meathead and end up getting super shredded and super low carb diet stuff.

  Gillian: 26:37

  But I have one of those in our past.

  Jess: 26:40

  Oh, absolutely. It taught me so many things. I was lifting six days a week, I was running four to five days a week my God, 30 to 40 miles, and I was eating a hundred grams of carbs a day.

  Gillian: 26:52

  Oh my God, I'm surprised you didn't break something I really am too. I mean, I guess well, never mind, did you have just one like crazy.

  Jess: 26:59

  I got a stress fracture in my right to be a. Absolutely not surprised at all, but it was always like oh, I'm so disciplined, I'm so motivated. Now I'm so proud of myself for being so motivated and getting up early on Saturday and Sunday, both for my runs and like yeah, well, but here's the thing is like.

  Gillian: 27:17

  I just wrote a post about this today that it was about like we need to stop normalizing all of these things that are actually not normal. We are glorifying the like. I need to work super hard, I need to be more disciplined, I need to be super consistent. We glorify this so much that there's no space left for context. And also two things can exist, like for some people, macro tracking is not a path to disorder and for other people, macro tracking is a direct route to disordered eating. Yeah, but I hear like the nuance is not. I think, one, it's not well understood by the individuals that are guiding people there, and two, I think that there's not a lot of understanding on how to gauge. Is this the right decision for me right now, at this point in time? Yep.

  Jess: 28:09

  I just signed on a client recently and we had this conversation because they were like I want to run, I want to lift, I want to work on my nutrition, I want to work on my body image, I want all the things, all the change, all the right now. And at this point the person was doing none of those things. So the excitement and the readiness to change right, we can go back to talking about like stages of change, the readiness to change and the excitement for that piece. That's all you need to get started. And then it was like all right, how do we narrow this down and focus on one thing at a time? Let's break down the nutrition piece, let's have a lot more conversations around that to decide where we're starting with that, where are we at with that, so that we're not giving you structured macro tracking. Because that was like. The first suggestion was like let's track macros and it's like that's not the place to start because we don't know if that's a trigger or not. Where do you go from there? But then when you have to be like, hey, you want to go from doing nothing, fitness wise or nutrition wise, I say nothing. That makes me feel bad, but like there's no focus on any of those things to.

  Gillian: 29:13

  I want to run and lift and do nutrition and I'm like, okay, okay, sorry, but my answer is no, we have to take it one thing at a time, yeah, and I feel like as a coach, one of the really challenging things is how do we harness this motivation to want to do things and also balance that with really clear expectations of what it looks like to build a skill, and anyone that follows me on Instagram or has heard any of my podcasts or anything knows that skill building is probably the thing that I talk about the most, and a lot of it, I think, when it comes to food and our body, comes from this idea of like I should know how to do this stuff already, so I should be able to go through it really quickly. Right, it's like, oh, I hire a coach for nutrition, but like I should know how to eat. I've been eating my whole life. I should be able to figure this out super quickly. And it's actually, if we look at it, any skill. If we look at it like learning a language, like even if you've, like, lived in Germany for six months, you would not go to one German class and expect to have a full conversation in German.

  Jess: 30:10

  And expect to have a husband who speaks fluent French and go to France multiple times and actually think you can speak French, yeah.

  Gillian: 30:17

  Yeah, exactly, exactly. And this is where I think it can be really, really frustrating. And again we go back to the self-compassion piece, because it's like when you believe that I should know how to do this already, that takes brain space and energy from I'm learning how to do this. It doesn't matter whether I should or should not, it literally doesn't matter because you don't.

  Jess: 30:38

  If we can accept that, you're setting yourself up for the frustration piece Exactly. You're setting yourself up for, instead of like I'm curious enough to go into building the skill I want to learn, it's like why can't I do this? And then you get into that shame piece, you guilt yourself. You look at suddenly, instead of being excited for whatever if it's focusing on the intrusion piece, and you're like why am I doing this? Right, you've come full circle. I love the thought of skill building.

  Gillian: 31:08

  I find that when I coach clients a lot of the time, it's easier to understand concepts when you can kind of like frame it into something that they understand. I talk about values all the time and I think that actually values are an incredible tool for changing your body image and for me, that was a huge catalyst was understanding, like what do I actually value, what's actually important to me, and I realized I'm not doing a lot of the things that are important to me because my entire personality is macro tracking and CrossFit Right. And so here I think where, when we look at like, one of the examples that I use for values is when clients are first understanding like the skill of making values, aligned decisions is I'll talk about it like like shoes, like you have certain shoes that work for certain occasions. You have some shoes that you like better, some shoes that you like less, but sometimes you'll put on a pair of shoes just because it really makes sense for like the thing that you're doing, right, yeah, yeah. And here this is like trying out values, aligned decision making. You might try on a pair of shoes and be like I don't know if they go with this outfit, but I'm going to give it a try, right, and you don't beat yourself up because you chose the wrong shoes one time. You're just like next time I'm not going to wear these. But some people do beat themselves up. They're like I chose the wrong shoes, I look terrible, everybody's judging me. That is not. That doesn't actually help you make a different decision. That just makes you feel bad for the decision that you made, which you already made, the decision. You can't do anything about it.

  Jess: 32:23

  Yeah, I like that and I love the values based living. That's something too that I have conversations with clients a lot in regards to like we're training for a race, you're getting ready to run a half marathon and you have kids and over the weekend you got in most of your long run but realize you were out of time because you had to make it to your kids soccer game. You feel guilty because you didn't get in all of your mileage and you're beating yourself up because you don't feel like you're going to be prepared for the race. You know, and you go into the spiral of like I didn't complete my planned runs perfectly Until. Then it comes back to the conversation of what are your values. One of your biggest values in life is family and you were there for your kids soccer game because that is what is most important to you. Missing a mile and a half off of your long run is not going to make or break your training. There's nothing you need to change. There's nothing you would have done differently. If you pull back and pull out of like I didn't execute perfectly on my training plan this week and look at what's most important to you when you put your number one value is family and the second one is connection. What are you doing? You are living your values based life Like that is the most important thing, and it has become such a cornerstone of coaching, is having those conversations, because at first I don't set it up necessarily for any education around values. It just comes up naturally through through coaching, right, and so at first, like clients are like my values, I don't, I don't know Like what are you talking about? Like their first thought, especially if they've worked in corporate before, is like mission, business values, like that kind of thing. And they're like corporate, what?

  Gillian: 33:57

  It's so funny Cause I was actually just talking to a friend of mine about this, because for me it's very much like a pillar for my life and this was understanding values I genuinely believe was like one of the big things, like a few different components of my life that got me out of the cycle that I was in with food and fitness and all of that. There were two main things. One was like one was values and recognizing that like I'm not living in alignment with my values at all, because all I'm ever thinking about is how I look. And then the second thing was also having people to talk to about it, and I actually just got this question recently on Instagram. It was like, how did you do it? And I talk about it a lot, but I guess I never really went into the fact that, like I had two other female coach friends who were going through the exact same thing I was going through. We got to talk about recovering our periods together. We got to talk about letting go of macro tracking. We got to talk about like hey, I used to be obsessed with peanut butter and now this is how I'm building it in, so I don't feel like I have to eat the entire jar anymore, and that is why I chose to do body image coaching as a group, because having people to talk to about the things that felt really challenging and knowing that other people thought the same thing was so fucking powerful. I love that.

  Jess: 35:10

  And I love that you had people going through it at the same time. They're so awesome.

  Gillian: 35:15

  And it's unique because most people don't have that opportunity. But that's why I think, as coaches, we can create that, and so it's like I'll get people that are like, no, I would rather do one on one. And I'm like you don't know how much more powerful and probably better this experience can go if you open yourself up to speaking to other people about it, Even if you start like with the least triggering things to share. I see this in my nutrition. That's why I have the confident eater, which is like my food mindset program, and I see the group and how they're interacting and it's like understanding that someone else is going through something very similar to you can be motivating for both of you.

  Jess: 35:51

  Well, isn't that one of the parts of the definition of self compassion is like, yeah, common humanity, knowing that you're not alone in your struggles and your experiences.

  Gillian: 36:01

  Yeah, and I think that one of the biggest factors for staying stuck in a cycle of negative body image or disorder eating, or even eating disorders like one of the things that perpetuates the cycle, is feeling like I don't have anybody that can understand what I'm going through and also I'm ashamed to share because there must be something wrong with me.

  Jess: 36:17

  Yeah, I'm like just nodding my head over here I agree.

  Gillian: 36:20

  Yeah, all of it. Yeah, I mean, I think probably, if anybody takes away anything from this, it would be to explore the idea that self compassion is not necessarily going easy on yourself, but you might need to be going a little bit easier on yourself to move forward, in a way that you can't hate yourself into change.

  Jess: 36:39

  Yeah, and here's the thing Restrain yourself into a motivation.

  Gillian: 36:43

  I think so many people would completely agree 100% with that statement and also be like yeah, but I don't know any other way, yeah, and so they can be like yeah, I know that I can't, but I also don't have any other tool or skill to use in this case.

  Jess: 36:59

  And this is where it's like it's such that all or nothing right. It's either like I'm disciplined and I'm motivated and I'm pushing myself, or it's I'm going to sit and eat the whole bag of chips in one sitting.

  Gillian: 37:09

  Yeah, which is also not self compassionate because, like, your future self is probably not sitting there, being like I'm so glad I ate that entire bag of chips, my body feels so great right now. Like maybe sometimes you do feel good eating the whole bag of chips. Maybe you're like oh my gosh, I'm traveling, I don't have access to food and eating the whole bag of chips is like the self compassionate decision because it's either I eat the whole bag of chips or I don't eat anything. Right, likely eating a handful of chips and then be like you know what, if I want some more later, I'll have some more later. That's probably, in most cases, the more self-compassionate decision.

  Jess: 37:41

  And that's another skill to Bob. I love that it's come back to self-compassion, because that has come up in every single episode of the podcast so far.

  Gillian: 37:49

  I think the common humanity element is, like, really, really important when it comes to body image, because the fact of the matter is, even though, like your body and my body probably look totally different, but like the thing that we have in common is, like our bodies are different and that's normal, right, yeah. And so it's like we feel like I need to look like this person. Like this person runs the lifts. I want to look like that person, and part of the self-compassion piece is recognizing that your body and her body can do similar things and they will never look the same, and that's a good thing.

  Jess: 38:17

  Absolutely, and I think that, too, the common humanity piece is really important, because we have media of all types that show you what the I would say common humanity, but what we're supposed to look like or what everyone else looks like everyone else like air quotes looks like. So, when you can form connections with other people who are working on their body image in a healthy way and you are able to connect and say we are working towards similar goals, but we look completely different, it helps you explore the idea of what a healthy body image looks like, what a healthy relationship with yourself looks like, because that's something, too, that I keep coming back to in every episode. It's not just body image, it's how you think and feel about your appearance, but it's also looking at your relationship with yourself, because that's 100% right. That's guiding your decisions in nutrition, in how you take care of your body, how you feed yourself, how you move your body, how you think about your body, how you talk about your body, what kind of relationship do you have with yourself. And that just comes full circle.

  Gillian: 39:14

  So I have to hop off in a minute, but there are two things. One, it has to do with the celebrity thing and then one other thing about how powerful like changing or working on your body image can be. So there was a post that I saw on Instagram a couple of months ago and it was like Megan Fox comes out and says that she hates her body, or like is insecure about her body, or whatever Something about Megan Fox having bad body image and like. If you're listening and you don't know who Megan Fox is, you would see a photo of her and she is sort of like the idealized body standard, right Like big boobs, flat stomach, looks, fit, claims she never works out, whatever. That's not the point. The point is is in the comments of that post, where people being like this is bullshit, like there's no way. This is true, she's just making it up. If she has bad body image, there's no chance for the rest of us. And I dove into the comments and I left a very lengthy comment being like look, this is actually something that we need to realize that body image and appearance are not related. You could look at someone that you think is objectively gorgeous and what is going on in their heads as far as their own body image maybe not congruent whatsoever, and so this is where I think part of like going back to that common handy humanity piece is we need to remember that everybody, what's going on outside, what's going on inside is very different, and we cannot assume that when you look at someone, they believe, like you could look at someone that you think is horribly ugly or someone that you think is incredibly attractive, and what is going on in their own heads as far as their body image is likely not what you expect. Nope, someone's outward appearance has nothing to do what goes on in the head, that's, but I think we have this belief of like yeah, but if my outward appearance was better, my body image would be better, and that's where it's like we end up with this. It's two separate things. No, no.

  Jess: 40:56

  I was just gonna say it's two separate things. Yeah, it's body image and it's physical appearance. They're, you know, they're obviously like our own body image and our appearance. Get there right. That's all body images. But like, working on your body image is a mental thing, working on your appearance as a physical right.

  Gillian: 41:11

  So it's a separate thing. So yeah, improving your appearance, your body, is not going to improve your body image, you have improving your body image can improve how you feel about your appearance, which is like I'm sure you've said that on every single podcast. Yeah, but the point that I wanted to make that I think was really interesting for me is I thought that I had social anxiety. I'm a fairly outgoing person. I have my introvert moments. Like an introverted extrovert, you never know what you're going to get really. But for a period of like three or four years I believed that I had social anxiety, like actually was telling people oh yeah, I have social anxiety. I didn't realize until I started actually doing specific work on my body image that my social anxiety was tied to how preoccupied with my appearance I was. So now I can easily go into a situation in which I do not know people or I don't necessarily feel comfortable around people, and I can still have a really good time in the situation, and so much of that is attributed to the fact that I am no longer sitting there wondering what other people think about my looks.

  Jess: 42:10

  That's amazing. It's wild, it's something for people to consider too. That will go into situations feeling like they have social anxiety, and you wonder how much of that is tied to how do I look?

  Gillian: 42:20

  I do know people that like it's not related. I have a friend who has generalized anxiety and her social anxiety didn't necessarily change when she worked on her body image, but for me specifically, as someone who does not have generalized anxiety, like that was just a manifestation of insecurities. The beautiful thing about that is like it's not some chemical imbalance in my brain. It is literally like I can change what I think, feel, do and believe about my body and in doing so I get to change my experience in the world.

  Jess: 42:50

  That's really powerful and something that I don't think is considered often enough that working on the skill building of improving your body image legitimately can improve your life and the way that you experience the world 100%.

  Gillian: 43:01

  I should go to improv class.

  Jess: 43:04

  Go you. That is awesome. I was gonna say this is probably a really good place to wrap things up, Blake. A couple years my husband did improv class and I went to like their performance or whatever.

  Gillian: 43:14

  Just props. It's so fun, it's like it's so fun and it's also it's so interesting because it's one of those things that, like, I knew that I wanted to get back into it, because I did it when I lived in San Francisco and I put it off, and I put it off. And I put it off because I was worried about how it would affect my eating schedule. Before the pandemic, which was like a lot of the work on my body image, started around like 2019. And so I probably looked at improv around like 2018. I remember thinking, oh, I can't do that because it interferes with my eating schedule.

  Jess: 43:43

  The priorities have shifted. Oh God, so much. That is awesome, Learning the power of yes and it's so much fun.

  Gillian: 43:50

  You show up and everybody is all awkward and by the end you're like I'm a chipmunk living in a gas station in the middle of rural Nevada, Like here's my story. It's just wild, the shit that people come up with.

  Jess: 44:01

  Okay, side note, the imagination that's required for that. I just finished a book about the science of play and how important it is, even as adults, to learn to play and use our imaginations Like. I love that so much. That's awesome. Well, thank you for this. This was awesome. This was so much fun. One question, and you can think about this answer later. I have been reading a book and I'm just curious to know your perspective. I'm reading a book called Regaining Body Trust. It's really interesting because it talks about undoing diet culture and reconnecting with our bodies and all of those things. But it's very, very, very anti-diet, it's very anti-changing your appearance and those things. And I like a lot of the learning to take care of your body, learning to re-listen to the cues that your body gives you on how to take care of yourself. But I'm curious your thoughts on how do you marry the unlearning diet culture and relearning body trust and all of these pieces with like, you don't necessarily have to be anti-diet, you don't have to hate all of those things, because basically they're trying to point research to this. They're like, yeah, there's nothing you can do to affect your body size, like it's all genetics, it's predetermined, it's all of these things. So, like you do, it feels good to you, it doesn't matter.

  Gillian: 45:10

  Yeah, I would say I'm anti-diet in the sense of the traditional diet, but I think that, like, it's all gray area right, and so anything that is on either end of the spectrum is probably something that we want to be a little bit skeptical of. I'll hear people being like you cannot trust your hunger. We live in an obese-genic environment, and I'm like that's not correct. But also, if you wake up every morning and you're like I guess I'll just eat what I feel like seeing like, even in intuitive eating, one of the principles is gentle nutrition. So gentle nutrition, you can apply that and simply being like I'm going to nourish my body in a way that I know feels really good. But I think also, when you reach a point of like being pretty neutral with food and also noticing, hey, I might prefer my body a little bit smaller, but like, I am totally fine with it if it's not, I think when someone reaches that point and you're like, hey, I'd like to approach a fat loss phase and just like see how it goes, but also not be tied to the outcome, yeah, I don't see any problem with that, and that's a conversation that I actually have with clients because they'll be like, look, I really want to lose weight. I'm like let's do work on body image, let's do work on mindful eating and finding a place of balance first, and then let's revisit this conversation, because if you're still like, hey, you know what, I'd really love to see a little bit more muscle definition, but you're also not like myself confidence hinges on this body change then I don't see any problem with it, with someone pursuing a body change when they have a clear understanding of this isn't affecting myself, worth at all.

  Jess: 46:34

  Yeah, no, I like that. Thank you. Yeah, it's just interesting. I don't feel like it feels like anti taking care of yourself. I'm like you can't just be like, oh well, genetics determine that this is what my body looks like, so I'm just gonna eat whatever I want and do whatever I want. I'm like that's not.

  Gillian: 46:47

  And here's the thing is that, like I do very firmly believe in choice where it's like hey, if you really don't want to put a lot of thought into what you're eating and you don't necessarily want very unbiased education on, like this is a protein, this is a carb, this is a fat, that feels damaging or like triggering to you in any way, like cool, that is 100% your choice. I think here is where and I talk a lot like in the confident eater I talk a lot about internal wisdom and external wisdom and finding the balance between the two of like hey, internally, if you do go into fat loss phase, like you're going to feel a little bit of hunger, that's your internal wisdom. And also externally, you can take it into consideration Chicken breast is a lower fat protein source than salmon. Like that's in. That is information, that is unbiased information. Now, can we take that information in and use it to make choices that don't make us feel like good or bad or superior or worse or whatever? Then great. But I think probably this book and this is something this is like a theory that I have is that usually with movements, things want to swing way to the other side before settling in the middle, and so I feel like the anti diet movement is like very heavily pushing for, like I want to snag all of the people that think that diets are killing them or whatever, but we don't necessarily have a really, really strong voice in the middle yet of. You can care about your physical health, you can care about your nutrition, you can want to see results in the gym or whatever it is, and also not hate yourself until you see those things.

  Jess: 48:08

  Are we going to become the strong voice in the middle? Yeah, I hope so. We're going to become the strong voice in the middle. I love it, I love it.

  Gillian: 48:15

  Well, I'm going to go eat my extraordinarily early dinner so that I don't get really hungry three hours into my improv class Sounds good.

  Jess: 48:22

  Thank you for this.

  Gillian: 48:23

  It was so nice to like see your face and chat with you.

  Jess: 48:27

  If you enjoyed this podcast episode, please feel free to follow, subscribe, like whatever the heck you do with podcasts. As always, stay sturdy, friends, and we'll talk to you next week.

Episode 5: The Secret Tool to Building Confidence

Confidence - it's not just a feeling, but an action that has the power to push us into unfamiliar territories. In a riveting conversation with Megan and Jess, we unravel the intricate facets of confidence, distinguishing it from the domineering shadow of cockiness. We learn that confidence isn't about dominating conversations, but rather it's about fostering a sense of control over our own lives.

Our discussion ventures into the concept of the 'confidence competence loop', an encouraging feedback loop ignited when you dare to do something before feeling ready. The process of acquiring a skill is intricately linked with building confidence. The willingness to try something, to step out of your comfort zone, acts as a prerequisite for gaining confidence. As we gain more competence in a particular area, our confidence naturally increases, creating a positive feedback loop.

Resilience is another critical aspect of confidence. By bolstering our self-confidence, we improve our resilience, our ability to bounce back from challenges and adversities. The role of resilience in our lives can't be underestimated - it enables us to handle life's unexpected hindrances, such as fear and accidents, without allowing them to dent our confidence levels permanently.

Intriguingly, we also spotlight the concept of the 'future self'. This concept encourages us to envision our ideal version of ourselves, acting as a guide on our confidence-building journey. This focus on our future self underlines the importance of focusing on effort rather than results, a cornerstone in building resilience.

Megan beautifully encapsulates the essence of self-belief, emphasizing that no one can motivate you better than yourself. The key to confidence is to start the journey, to take that first step, even if it's into the unknown. It's the willingness to try something new, to push our boundaries, that truly builds our confidence.

As we delve deeper into the realm of confidence, we also address potential derailers. Media, appearance comparisons, and repeated failures can all act as blocks to our confidence. Developing self-awareness around these potential derailers is crucial in maintaining and enhancing our confidence.

Confidence is a skill, and like any other skill, it requires practice, preparation, and a lot of patience. It's a long game, and the journey towards confidence isn't always a smooth one. But with each step we take, with each risk we dare to take, we're getting closer to becoming a more confident version of ourselves. The willingness to try is your first step towards a more confident future.

• Full Transcript

  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 the 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 five of Sturdy Girl. Megan has rejoined us this week. Hello.

  Megan: 0:29

  Today we're going to talk about confidence.

  Jess: 0:31

  But first Megan. How was life, how was training, how are things?

  Megan: 0:36

  I've really just been out riding my bike, walking. My dog cleaned up my house. I did some yard work. It's been great. I did trail work on Saturday. We were out there for four hours just packing berms. It was pretty fun playing on the dirt. But yeah, there's a fairly big showing of some ladies out there, which was really cool to see. That's awesome it was fun.

  Jess: 0:55

  But what about you? Life got lifey. I have been in dentistry for 16 and a half years and I threw my back out last week at work, came home crying and so I got one and a half lifts in last week and we're recording this on Monday before the release, and I feel like we were just talking about this before hitting record. I know that there is no decrease in skill.

  Megan: 1:20

  Yeah, but that time on.

  Jess: 1:23

  My confidence is in question of how well I'll be able to perform the lifts or the weights.

  Megan: 1:29

  But it'll be fine. It's so funny because it's not even that much time off. No, but it feels like forever yeah.

  Jess: 1:36

  No, I'm I. My neck and back are feeling better. That's good. It was the scariest thing ever. I came home and went right to bed and had to end up like taking the day off work because it was so like neck and shoulder and like we're so just jacked. I don't know that's the worst.

  Megan: 1:57

  How long did it take you to start filming?

  Jess: 1:58

  Normal. That was Tuesday last week. I would say by Friday, but it's still kind of touchy and I still don't have like the full range of motion when I turn my head and part of it is obviously. This podcast is all audio, but there's something in dentistry with your non-dominant hand called chicken wing, so when you're attracting the cheek or something, your elbows very low with your shoulder and that is what kind of triggered it. I think was doing too much of that chicken wing in weird positions when I was working. So I am still working through that and becoming a lot more aware.

  Megan: 2:30

  Yeah, Well, I mean, that's a long time too. I feel like dentistry is one of those things I'm like nursing, like you're constantly on your feet.

  Jess: 2:38

  Yeah, well, it's a lot of repetitive motion. Yeah, I mean, 16 years is a long time to go in a profession and have this really be the first time that I've had any pain? I've had my hands or arms will get tired from long weeks, but in general, like this is.

  Megan: 2:52

  You've had a pretty long, pretty good going at it, pretty decent career so far, yeah.

  Jess: 2:55

  Yeah, I'm looking forward to getting back into lifting this week. So, yeah, yeah Sounds like a good sign. Yeah, yeah, it's been good. We'll see how these lifts go this week, but They'll go great. Thank you, okay. Should we talk about confidence? Yes. So one thing I want to ask before we dive into confidence is what would you do differently if you had more confidence? Would your life look different? Would your daily activities look different? Are there things that you would do? Say, try, start thinking about that as we start talking about what confidence is? Okay. So what is confidence? What does it look like? If you look at American Psychological Association defines it as a belief that one is capable of successfully meeting the demands of a task. So kind of like believing in yourself. It's feeling sure of yourself and your abilities. You accept and trust yourself and feel like you have a sense of control in your life.

  Megan: 3:48

  I love that, a sense of control.

  Jess: 3:51

  I'm not going to read too much into that, but here's the thing Confidence is not a feeling, it's embodied in action. Mel Robbins defines confidence as the willingness to try, and that is the definition that I identified most with, especially where we're coming at this with a sturdy girl lens, where we're talking resilience and we are looking at confidence as a skill, so embodied in action, the willingness to try. It's like that. Have you seen that social media video going around and I can't remember what the audio is specifically on it, but it was something like my life changed when I started to do the things I said I was going to do, or confidence came when I started doing the things.

  Megan: 4:32

  I was going to do. Yeah, it was like a trending audio, yeah.

  Jess: 4:36

  That is partial definition of confidence, and you do the thing.

  Megan: 4:39

  So yeah, trying the new things that make you uncomfortable, exactly.

  Jess: 4:44

  And we often think of confidence as kind of that swagger bravado the person who talks the most in the room. But it really has nothing to do with needing to talk the most or prove anything. The most confident person in a room is often not the person who talks the most.

  Megan: 5:02

  Yeah, I want to get confidence mixed up with like cockiness 100% yeah.

  Jess: 5:08

  Yeah, but I think that those things, like in the conversations that I had with people earlier, I posted on social media to ask what is confidence to you? What does it mean? How do you develop it? And a number of people were like I know what overconfidence is. Yeah, that was the thing people kept saying. I know what overconfidence is, but I don't know that I know how to define what confidence is.

  Megan: 5:27

  But no, when you talk about like the overconfidence and like the cockiness, it kind of reminds me of when you see someone who is trying to dominate the room or dominate the conversation or something. You're like wow. Sometimes people might think like, oh, they're so confident.

  Jess: 5:40

  But it might not even be the case at all. Honey, what are you trying to make up for? Yeah?

  Megan: 5:46

  Why is your truck so big?

  Jess: 5:48

  Oh my God, I grew up on the Oregon coast.

  Megan: 5:51

  You grew up semi like oh yeah, that's right, you grew up in the country. Yeah, horses yeah.

  Jess: 5:55

  Yeah, when we talk about confidence. I love when you Google how to build confidence and the things that you come across. What does the average person who just puts it into Google machine and what do they see first? Yeah, yeah. And so many of these articles were about the power pose. Did you ever see that? Ted talked from like 2011, 2012,. Amy, what's her name? She talked about Improving confidence. Amy Cuddy yes, improving confidence and power posing. So you power pose for two minutes a day and it's supposed to increase testosterone and decrease cortisol and improve your confidence. And then they did more research and were never able to replicate that. Yeah, and they said that the actual act of stretching your body, sitting up straight, squaring your shoulders, improving your posture, making yourself bigger, physically bigger, take up more space, but that momentarily can improve your confidence in whatever you are doing in that moment.

  Megan: 6:52

  And that makes sense, because you're just changing the way you physically are Can make you feel better for the time being.

  Jess: 6:59

  But it's not going to make you a more confident person overall. Yeah, it's in that moment.

  Megan: 7:05

  I think there is something good to be said about having good posture regardless, just like portraying confidence and like if you can portray it on the outside sometimes I think it actually can kind of help you feel it on the inside. But again, in that moment In the moment. Yes, right.

  Jess: 7:19

  Yeah, yeah, absolutely. But another thing when you Google how to build confidence is positive self-talk. That's another big one that comes up. This could be a whole podcast episode on its own, and actually self-talk is going to be a future episode, but in this context they're talking about the look in the mirror. Self affirmations, yes, but the sticky notes on there find the ways to tell yourself how much you love yourself, like along those lines of being able to look in the mirror and say I'm confident.

  Megan: 7:47

  Yeah, and there was a big phase with that.

  Jess: 7:49

  I felt like there really was yeah, and there can be value in certain types of affirmations and we'll talk about that more in another episode but for these you're basically lying to yourself, because if you look in the mirror and tell yourself something about you that you don't believe, you're lying. You're getting this level of cognitive dissonance between who you are and who you say you are Like yeah. So that piece of it is hard, because there is a lot of benefit from self-talk that can help with confidence, but it's not the positive, overly effusive, whatever, right. Another thing that they talk about in building confidence are all the other little things that are basically pillars of health. They're not something that actually helps build confidence. So things like self-care, your diet, how you sleep, are you hydrated, are you exercising these are things that go ahead.

  Megan: 8:42

  No, I was just going to say these are things that we've talked about too, and like they're things that kind of make you feel better, maybe not in a confidence way, but like you know.

  Jess: 8:52

  Yeah, and that's the thing right. There's importance in nourishing your body so that you don't eat like I don't feel great when I eat dairy I get bloated.

  Megan: 9:00

  It doesn't make me feel good when.

  Jess: 9:02

  I put my pants on, so then that could translate into when I don't feel as good in my body. That could change the level of confidence that I'm able to portray right. So I get the connection. Yeah, I get that. When you move your body, when you sleep adequately, god, if you sleep enough, think about how much better your cognitive processing is. Yeah, so you're able to handle and go into situations and be more confident, I get it. But sleeping enough doesn't improve your confidence. No, not in itself. My point is that when you Google and try to figure out how to build confidence, all these things are supportive of confidence, confidence adjacent and they're like the health aspects of confidence.

  Megan: 9:46

  Yeah, these are all great.

  Jess: 9:48

  But we already know that those are pillars of health that help us feel better in almost all arenas. So here's the thing Confidence is important to our health and well-being. Research says that it can even help us live a more successful life in relationships, financially. The confidence also exists across different domains. So you've heard us talk about growth mindset before, and you can have a growth mindset in different domains of your life. You can also have confidence in different domains. So you can feel confident in your ability to cook a delicious meal and absolutely not feel confident at all parallel parking your car, mine's the opposite. Oh see, this is me. I don't love parallel parking. I can do it. I am not proficient.

  Megan: 10:32

  I love parallel parking. All those years in downtown Portland have trained me well. I was like Blake loves it.

  Jess: 10:38

  And this man gives me such a hard time because I can't execute it with my eyes closed like he can, and so he's like oh yeah, you hate parallel parking, You're not good at it, and I'm like excuse me, how often do I do it?

  Megan: 10:51

  Yeah, I mean, I lived in an area where I had to do it every single day. Anytime I moved my car, I had inches to work with.

  Jess: 10:58

  It's insane.

  Megan: 10:59

  Anyways.

  Jess: 11:00

  I digress Anyways, self-confidence is a skill, not a feeling, and you have to have. One of the prerequisites to confidence is courage. There's actually a lot of C words in today's episode.

  Megan: 11:13

  I know I feel like I'm going to get really tongue-tied. That's OK. You've got this.

  Jess: 11:18

  And then, lastly, confidence and the willingness to try can improve our resilience, which resilience is the ability to bounce back from challenges or adversities, unless leads us directly into the meat of this episode, talking about confidence being a skill. So we talked about all of those supporting things for confidence the sleep, the exercise, the self-care, the diet. So, with confidence being a skill, there is something called the confidence competence loop. Competence is being able to do something successfully or efficiently. This is a positive feedback loop and it happens when you decide to do something before you think you're ready. So you keep trying at that thing, and every time you do it you're gonna be terrible at it or you're gonna be great at it, but each time you do it you're learning something and you're effectively increasing that competence which, over time, is how you gain confidence. Going back to that definition of confidence is the willingness to try. That starts this positive feedback loop. I am terrified of heights not as much anymore, but I was when I was a kid and we used to go up river every summer and all the kids would jump off the rocks into the river. I was so scared and I finally worked up the courage to try, the willingness to try and I jumped off that freaking rock and I almost peed my pants.

  Megan: 12:40

  But it wouldn't matter. You're gonna say that the water it's fine. No one would have known.

  Jess: 12:44

  And then I did it again and again and I built competence. Not that there's a lot of skill in jumping off rocks, but bear with me right, yeah. And they got to the point where I wasn't as afraid. And then you are excited and you have that adrenaline rush. And then next thing you know you're like jumping off the tallest rock possible. But every single time you're trying it you're decreasing the resistance in your brain to do it again.

  Megan: 13:08

  And it reminds me a lot of jumping. I mean, I know that some people won't understand this, but there's such things as gap jumps when you're biking, and I am terrified of them Can clear a table, no problem. You take away the middle part and it becomes terrifying. So there's like having to practice over and over.

  Jess: 13:26

  Okay, so there's like a gap, I'm assuming. Oh yeah, but you have to jump it to get over it, correct?

  Megan: 13:31

  You have to make it to the other side of the how big are these gaps? Oh, you know they're not big, maybe like five feet, but still, yeah, just just baby, you could die. Baby gaps, that's what I call them, baby gaps. Okay, but it did remind me of something, because I felt like and I know that we'll probably talk about this when you lose quote, lose confidence, I feel like I was on a roll where I was getting progressively better and challenging myself and trying and doing the thing and then I crashed real hard into a tree and that knocks that confidence. Oh, 100%.

  Jess: 14:05

  I mean we talked about this a little bit before hitting record, like for you with confidence in those jumps and your skills. Yeah, when you say it makes you question your confidence, it just meant that you're blocked from that feeling of trying. You're blocked from that feeling because you stopped trying, right. So yeah, you're not knocked down you failed and it might take a little bit to get yourself back up and try again.

  Megan: 14:28

  Yeah, and then you reestablish that confidence competence loo to keep trying, yeah, and the skill didn't necessarily go away and accidents are gonna. I mean, it's kind of a running joke with bikes, it's not if you're going to crash, it's when. Yeah.

  Jess: 14:45

  Which is also why I don't think I've gone biking with you just yet I need to up my disability insurance, since I work with my hands.

  Megan: 14:54

  Yeah, I definitely make sure to get the best insurance I possibly can.

  Jess: 15:00

  So this is the main point of this whole episode is confidence being a skill and being willing to try, willing to try these things, whatever that skill is? I obviously relate most things to running. So for the purposes of the rest of this episode and as we get into kind of tangible takeaways, let's create a fictional runner who decides that they were gonna run their first marathon. Yeah, they want to gain the confidence as a runner. So the willingness to try is getting the shoes, setting foot outside or on the treadmill or on the trail, doing a few miles, doing the big scary thing yeah, making that first step. And every single time they lace up it's a little less scary. You talk about consistency or frequency. The more frequently you do it and they're not advocating for your run streak, but you get into it and you're running two days a week and then a couple weeks later you add three. That's also increasing that self efficacy, you're increasing your competence and you're increasing your confidence in that skill. Yeah, but, as any runner or anyone who has run or decided to improve their running, improvement comes so slowly? Oh, it does. That is another big point here too. When we're talking about improving skills, it's not saying that next week you're going to be confident at a certain skill.

  Megan: 16:17

  Yeah, and you're going to have setbacks. Yeah, it's inevitable. You can't run a marathon in a week. I mean you could, it would be real hard.

  Jess: 16:25

  Yeah, zero to marathon in one week. Maybe that's my new promotion. Another big piece of building confidence is also self acceptance and self awareness, and they won't go too deep into this, but we're talking about playing the long game. Then we're also talking about like, let's say, you have the willingness to try something new and you try it, and you try it and you just don't like it. You can stop. You have the self awareness to say this isn't for me, it's not my fun activity. Yeah. Or you try something over and over again and the skills not improving and it's self awareness to say, wow, either this is a really slow improving skill, or maybe I can find a coach or someone to help me, or maybe there's a different approach I can take. You have that self awareness or the self acceptance to say, oh my God, I am really bad at this.

  Megan: 17:17

  And that's OK.

  Jess: 17:18

  But how hard is that as an adult to say how hard is that as an adult, to go start a new hobby. Oh, it's so fun. I got rollerblades last summer. Oh, my goodness. Oh, ok, so not summer 2023, summer 2022. Ok, I got rollerblades. Yeah, I have not been on any kind of skates since middle school. We used to go to Skate Wave on Thursday or Friday night. Oh, yeah, I remember, but I had quad skates and yeah, they're way different. And I could skate backwards and do all sorts of crazy shit. I cannot do that anymore.

  Megan: 17:52

  No, so when I bought my rollerblades.

  Jess: 17:55

  I had the self awareness to know that I needed knee pads. I would have to add wrist pads and let me tell you, I am still not good at rollerblading. I can do it. I can do it, nothing fancy.

  Megan: 18:07

  So, like the building, the point of view.

  Jess: 18:09

  I was kind of terrified to put those rollerblades on because I'm like I'm going to suck at this. I'm being an adult and sucking at something.

  Megan: 18:16

  It's very, very hard.

  Jess: 18:18

  It's so humbling, yeah, and as adults, we think that we need to be good at everything that we start doing. Mm, hmm, I think that's part of our willingness to try. Yeah, is not there when it comes to that. Ok, I think we said a pretty good base for confidence as a skill. Mm, hmm, what are some things that derail our confidence?

  Megan: 18:35

  I think we know the big one here.

  Jess: 18:38

  It's like, oh God, big fat, evil media Always. But it made me think about body image disruptions, on the things that derail our confidence. Yeah, media scrolling, comparison, even repeated failure, right when we talked about you crashing on your bike. You crash and know it's a part of the process, but it's still muscles in the brain, it's still like a distraction yeah. But to the point of this scrolling and media and that comparison piece, so much of our self doubt, the opposite of confidence.

  Megan: 19:10

  Mm, hmm.

  Jess: 19:11

  Comes from spending too much time on things that don't fucking matter. Yeah. No, I do you think about like I do it too and I'm not saying this to be blameless at all. Yeah, all. In fact, I was doing notes for this episode and caught myself all of a sudden how many of I'm in scrolling.

  Megan: 19:26

  Oh, what am I? When did I even open Instagram?

  Jess: 19:30

  So can you catch yourself Because that's one piece of this self-awareness in your daily actions? Can you be curious and catch yourself when you're making appearance comparisons, when you're on that hard scroll, and think about what you neglect to consider when objectifying others, because you're seeing our highlight real or what they choose to share, mm-hmm? And actually I had an interview with another mindset nutrition coach and we were chatting earlier about how we have done a really good job of curating our social medias to support the people we want to surround ourselves with. So I don't see as much of this, but I I start to see the comparison stuff come up when it's like, oh my god, they're on another vacation. I wish I could be on a vacation. Oh yeah, people that show videos of their homes. I'm like we're in our 30s and I start seeing that comparison and I'm like what am I neglecting to consider about this person? Mm-hmm, that they're not sharing that they're sharing. It's maybe they are sharing their home because they worked their ass off for years to earn this and I'm sitting there going. I wish I had a kitchen that would like that.

  Megan: 20:33

  Oh, I, yeah, I do that all the time.

  Jess: 20:34

  Social media is a tool and you get to choose how you use it, but it's developing that self-awareness around how you're using it and not getting sucked into those pieces of comparison or doom-scrolling or those things that could effectively block that feeling of confidence. Mm-hmm, that's case in point. So those are kind of the main things that derail confidence. Yeah, we asked us at the beginning of the episode and I want to ask it again what would you do if you had more confidence and you can decide in what area? How is confidence going to help your life look different or better? Would you take more risks, say notice something or say yes, would you set better boundaries as a conversation you'd have that you've been avoiding. What would more confidence in your life allow you to do that you're not already doing? These are the questions ask yourself because, like we talked, talked about, confidence is a skill and it's the willingness to try. So when you envision these things, they are within your reach. So it's figuring out. You have this willingness to try. What is the first small action towards those things? Taking those small actions is how you build Competency. That builds confidence. I feel like I'm going off in a tangent here and Megan's over here just nodding along.

  Megan: 21:44

  You probably want to hear drop your mic moment. One thing that really stood out and I love it is setting better boundaries. I feel like so many people struggle with that, but when you think of like self-confidence, it wasn't something I thought of immediately.

  Jess: 22:00

  Just thinking no. It is one of those things like if you don't have the confidence in yourself to say no, yeah, I won't take on all this extra work. It's setting boundaries. It's being able to say no or say yes where you need to. It's a big part, right, and then you can talk about the other side of dreaming of what your life would look like and all of those pieces being willing to embrace that risk Stepping outside of your comfort zone. As I was reading for this episode, I was like man, this isn't the fluffy, nice puzzle, self-talk, fuzzy things that make you feel like, oh, I'm gonna take action. That's feels so good. I feel good in my body. I'm saying nice things in my brain. I'm gonna go forward. I'm like, no, get out of your comfort zone.

  Megan: 22:46

  This is the only way to build Kind of sucks, guys, I'm sorry, take risk Take risk do the hard things comfortable being uncomfortable, but there is something so important in that I feel like get comfortable being uncomfortable.

  Jess: 23:02

  Yeah, and if there's, there's something that you have said, your sights on building confidence and, let's say, becoming a public speaker Mm-hmm, there's preparation that has to go into that. Mm-hmm, and join toast masters to improve your public speaking skills and just go pull this pull speech out of your butt in the moment. That's called improv. That's not what they do. You would prepare, you would take the time to put something together and so saying take the risk, make the jump, start taking action. There's also preparation. There's practice. There's things that go into that, because the more you practice, the more competent, the more confident you are. So, now that you are envisioning what you do if you had more confidence, I want to introduce something called future self. I want you to think about this Do you like the person you're spending your entire life with? Do you like you? Do you like the relationship that you have with yourself?

  Megan: 23:53

  And that kind of goes back to what you've been saying this whole time and all your episodes. Your relationship with yourself is the most important. It is in the longest it really is. It's the longest Intimate relationship you ever have?

  Jess: 24:07

  yeah there's a study that shows that if you create a vision of a future you, it can give you distance from the you who's never done Whatever it is that you are, you know, creating this vision towards what you want to do. It gives you a certain sense of Objectivity so that you can often make more future-oriented big picture choices. So if you look at who do you want your future self to be when you sit and actually envision and maybe we give this as homework but that future self, what do they act like? What do they do? What is your favorite version of you look like? And I noticed I didn't say what is the best version of you look like, because you could decide. Your best version of you looks one certain way. Now Like the best is subjective, but what is your favorite version of you? What kind of qualities do they display? What kind of values do they have? How do they act? Because if you can take the time to really assess that out, that's going to help you decide what areas of your life you want to build confidence in. I wanted to talk about goals in this section and I wanted to talk about setting goals and how that helps build your confidence. But there's a lot to be said about just taking the time to think about how you want your future self to look. That is often more valuable than setting specific goals, and this is coming from the person who I love goals, sits down and loves to take a goal and break it down into tangible, day by day steps. But there's something to be said for taking the time to dream a little bit and think about who you want to be, because oftentimes we get so focused on achievement, on the achievement of those goals. It's like who do you want to become in the process? Yeah, do you want to become as you get there? Because does that person look like they're confident? What are they confident in? What are they confident doing? You know, we could talk about that person that wants to run their first marathon. If they're looking at their future self, that future self is a marathoner who set themselves up to maybe run two marathons a year and a marathon on all 50 states. I don't know. Yeah, but that person is a confident runner. Then you break that down into what does that feel like? What are their daily actions look like? When does that person feel comfortable saying I am a runner?

  Megan: 26:36

  Asking yourself those questions.

  Jess: 26:37

  What is your favorite version of you look like? Because right now that favorite version looks like a marathon runner. But what does that?

  Megan: 26:44

  mean to you.

  Jess: 26:45

  Exactly, and you get to decide that. That's what I like about this exercise of mapping your favorite future self. Yeah, there's no right or wrong answer. Yeah, and it can change, but if you are letting your values drive this, you're not going to go wrong. Yeah, I love it In all of this. When we talk about your relationship with yourself, you have to focus on you. No one's coming, no one's going to do this for you, no one's going to be able to motivate you. No one's going to be more excited about the future version of you than you are. There's no one to give you the pep talk. I mean, maybe you have a good coach and they're going to help you with the pep talks and guidance and those things, but you need a good relationship with you. You need to focus on cultivating that growth mindset and the willingness to try and try and try again.

  Megan: 27:33

  Yeah, that's that perseverance, yeah.

  Jess: 27:36

  Exactly. The big thing about this is, too you're measuring yourself by effort and not results. I think that was another part where I'm like we talk about goals. But if we talk about that future version of yourself we're talking about, are we still trying? Are we still getting out there and trying?

  Megan: 27:49

  Yeah, well, and I think that when you see people that are constantly trying new things or putting the effort out there, a lot of times you look at them and you're like they must be really confident.

  Jess: 27:59

  Yeah, I think that when I see people out there doing things that might seem scary to me, yeah, and it's also that piece of I wish I remember what it's called but the acceptance of failure as part of the process. Yeah, because I feel like so much of our society gets insulated from that. Yeah, that we're not used to trying shit and failing. And maybe it's a physical thing, like falling off your freaking bike and hurting yourself, like I did this weekend, right, trying something like launching a podcast and being like, oh my God, what is going to happen? Yeah, what's going to happen is you're going to spend a lot of time figuring out all kinds of crazy tech stuff and you spend more time editing audio than you do recording, and it's fine.

  Megan: 28:42

  And shaking your dog out of all of it.

  Jess: 28:43

  Oh my gosh, exactly, it's a skill. Yeah, and that is that is the whole episode, right there. Confidence is a skill. Get out of your comfort zone, try the damn thing. I'm sorry, it's not soft and fluffy, it's work. But fun work, willingness to try yeah, competence leads to confidence. Those are tools in your tool belt for building confidence, mic drop. And we're done. Okay, as a listener, I want to say thank you so much for taking the time to listen to our banter and our fun conversation on confidence. I would love to hear from you what area of your life are you going to work on building confidence in? Send us a DM sturdygirl underscore on Instagram. I want to know what does your future self look like? What are your values? This is the stuff that I get so excited by. Thank you again for listening and we will talk to you next week.

  Megan: 29:43

  Goodbye.

  Jess: 29:45

  If you enjoyed this podcast episode, please feel free to follow, subscribe, like whatever the heck you do with podcasts. As always, stay sturdy, friends, and we'll talk to you next week. Goodbye.

Episode 4: Confronting Body Image Issues and Eating Disorders: An Interview with Jen Scott, Dietitian and Run Coach

The societal obsession with weight loss and ideal body images has taken a toll on many of us, leading to unhealthy behaviors and even eating disorders. The podcast episode offers a deep dive into these pressing issues.

The guest of the episode, Jen, is a certified run coach, clinical sports dietitian, and an accomplished endurance athlete. She opens up about her personal struggles with body image issues and eating disorders, including her battle with anorexia and orthorexia. Her journey towards self-acceptance is both heartfelt and inspiring, highlighting the resilience of the human spirit.

One of the key themes of the conversation revolves around societal health standards and our unhealthy obsession with weight loss. The discussion brings to light the complex dynamics of body image during different life stages, such as pregnancy. This highlights how societal pressures can significantly influence our perception of our bodies and potentially lead to harmful behaviors.

A significant part of the discussion is devoted to exploring the world of running and its impact on body image. Jen debunks the harmful misconception that 'lighter is faster,' emphasizing the importance of focusing on overall health and performance instead.

In the context of eating disorders, Jen shares valuable insights on breaking free from restrictive behaviors. She emphasizes the importance of focusing on the overall quality of life and the dangers of ignoring our body's hunger cues. These insights are particularly crucial in a society that often equates thinness with health and success.

As the conversation wraps up, the importance of body acceptance and listening to our body's signals is emphasized. Jen shares how she redefined her relationship with food and her body, providing listeners with a beacon of hope and resilience. Her story is a powerful reminder that we are more than our reflection in the mirror, and that self-acceptance is an integral part of our well-being.

In conclusion, the podcast episode provides an enlightening and thought-provoking perspective on body image, eating disorders, and self-acceptance. Through Jen's personal experiences and professional insights, listeners are offered valuable strategies to overcome their body image struggles and embrace self-acceptance.

The journey towards self-acceptance is not always easy, but with the right support, understanding, and perspective, it is indeed possible. As Jen aptly puts it, it's time to start focusing on the quality of life we are living versus the kind of life we want to have. It's time to embrace self-acceptance and start listening to our bodies.

• Full Transcript

  Jess: 0:01

  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 the podcast where we shift the focus away from your appearance and on to living the big, rad life you deserve. Hello, my Sturdy Humans and welcome to episode 4 of Sturdy Girl. Before we get started, I just want to say thank you for listening. This was our very first Sturdy Girl interview, our very first experience with recording on Zoom and Zoom Audio, so thank you for bearing with us. The audio is not my favorite, but still a fantastic episode. The second thing I want to mention is that Megan is not joining us for today's episode, but she will be back next week as we jump into everything about self-confidence and, let's be honest, she's probably off riding a bike somewhere right now anyways. So today's episode is all about body image, eating disorders and disordered eating. It is a fantastic episode and we are joined by my friend, Jen, who is a clinical sports dietitian of almost 20 years, a certified run coach and an accomplished endurance athlete with multiple Boston marathons under her belt. Okay, I think that concludes all my little notes before we get started. I hope you enjoy the episode. Let's dive in. Hello Jen, welcome, Hi, thanks for having me. I am so stoked that you get to be our first Sturdy Girl guest. Jen and I have been on a podcast before together. I guess it's been like a year and a half ago.

  Jen: 1:31

  Gosh, I can't even remember everything, since COVID is a blur.

  Jess: 1:34

  So I don't. It was somewhere in that COVID timeline. So I'm like, yeah, that was it. I would love to have you talk about your body image story. If you want to talk about running, you start us off wherever you want.

  Jen: 1:47

  Okay, it's kind of all tied together. So, yeah, as our story ends up being right. So when I was 17 is when I really started to struggle with my body image. I think most teenagers do. I had gained some weight, like after the tennis season. I was playing tennis and I know on one of your Instagram posts you posted something how we all have that experience where someone made some comment about our bodies Mine was. My best friend's older cousin said that I was built like a brick shithouse and I don't know if he met that good or bad. Right, because some people are like, well, that probably was just a compliment, but I did not take it that way.

  Jess: 2:27

  That's akin to like the well. Aren't you just a sturdy girl, right yeah?

  Jen: 2:32

  So in my brain I process that as oh, I'm getting you know, chunky, I look like a brick shithouse.

  Jess: 2:38

  So how did you even internalize that? Because I've heard that phrase at this point many times. I've had family members call me that, but the first time I heard it I was like what does that even mean? Okay, I'm sturdy, I'm large, I'm smelly, I'm what? Like what is that? Yeah?

  Jen: 2:57

  So in my head I automatically just pictured myself as being this big rectangular shaped like port-a-potty, like that's what my body looks like, and that's not a very pleasant, positive image, right? That's not an attractive thing to feel like. So I remember I spent that summer between my sophomore and junior year like running every afternoon in the summer. And this isn't like in Phoenix. I grew up in Arizona, phoenix heat. I'm really desperately trying to lose weight and I didn't really lose that much weight that summer. But my junior year of high school started. I had tons of AP classes, totally stressed out, my stomach hurt all the time and I stopped eating because my stomach hurt. And there was no connection there in my head that if I stopped eating because my stomach hurt I'd lose weight. But that's what happened. And then I started to get a lot of positive comments from peers and adults, my PE teacher, and it was like oh, so I lost weight.

  Jess: 4:01

  This is what I'm supposed to be doing, yeah.

  Jen: 4:04

  If I'm doing these comments, I wasn't eating. Yep, I was sick and I lost this weight. Now I'm getting positive comments, so I just need to maintain this, and that means hardly eating anything at all, and that is where my eating disorder came from, and I ended up with having anorexia nervosa, which also became orthorexia, because with that interest, you know, I became obsessed with nutrition. So when I went to college, I decided I wanted to major in nutrition, and orthorexia, which is the obsession with eating perfectly healthy, became part of that as well. And so, from the ages of 17 to 23, I had an active eating disorder all through college, where I was going to school to be a dietitian and there's actually some research on that. They say 10%, but I think it's much higher than that of people going to school to be a dietitian have an eating disorder.

  Jess: 4:59

  I was going to say that that tracks, because then your mindset, while you're going to school and you're obsessed with nutrition, then you're saying like I'm obsessed, it's healthy, I'm making good choices and almost perpetuates it yes, yeah, yeah.

  Jen: 5:17

  But I ended up my senior year of college I was like I need help. So I called an eating disorder center. I was like hi, I want to start treatment. And they were like what? Because I guess people don't usually call themselves in. So yeah, I went through intense outpatient treatment and through that I had to deal with a lot of the mental part of it and that's what I think helped me a lot later as a dietitian to realize that an eating disorder isn't just about eating, it isn't just eat more. People always will say that when they say people have ears, can you just eat more? Can't you just stop that? And it's not that easy because a lot of it is mental, it's very ingrained, it's the neural pathways, there's the reward system. It's all connected and it's definitely connected to body image. And that was the hardest part for me was trying to disconnect my worth from my weight and my body image, because it got ingrained when I was 17.

  Jess: 6:19

  Yeah, when you have those comments made about your body after you've been trying these basically extreme measures, right, was there something that happened that made you ready to dial that number to start going through treatment? Or was there a catalyst? Or was it just one day that you're like how did I get here?

  Jen: 6:37

  I think, yeah, I was pretty aware I had an eating disorder by my sophomore year of college and I just kept trying to. I can fix this myself. I have the knowledge, I can do this myself. And I couldn't do it myself, I would start to you know.

  Jess: 6:51

  Even if you had the knowledge, it's one of those things Blake calls it being inside the fishbowl, or you can't read the label from inside the bottle, right? So even if you knew oh, I can, I know how to get myself out of this you don't have the same tools and levels of support to actually do it. Yeah, yeah.

  Jen: 7:09

  So I was just tired of going around in circles and it being what consumed like all of my internal dialogue and my thoughts.

  Jess: 7:17

  That's huge. So you were saying you went through treatment realizing that a lot of it was undoing kind of your perception of self, body image, all of those things. So when you went through that outpatient treatment, do they help on that end of things with body image and a lot of?

  Jen: 7:32

  those components. Yeah, so I had a dietician I checked in with once a week, but then I had a therapist I saw twice a week and that's what her and I worked on was just trying to replace the internal dialogue in my head and everyone's different, so it was just different techniques, different things, and a lot of it was just doing it because the big fear was, if I gain weight, then people aren't going to love me or like me, and it was reminding myself that that isn't true and I just need to do it, whether or not I believe that. I feel like that's the hardest thing about eating disorder treatment is that we have to do these things that we don't believe, and that's a really hard thing to do. Like, if I gain weight, I'm that's one thing I hear, even with my clients who have eating disorders Well, what if I can't stop gaining weight? What if my body gets so big? What if I get, you know, yeah, fat and there's like, well, what if you do? Your worth isn't connected to that, but it's really hard to believe that until you start doing it and you often just have to do it, scared, and Do it even if you hate it and don't want to do it. It's really weird.

  Jess: 8:45

  That's such an interesting perspective too, because I think about from the perspective of just body image, whereas eating disorders are are much more compounded in their complexity. But thinking about just body image, of that sometimes cognitive dissonance Between where you are and what you believe, and then telling yourself these other things when you're like I don't believe that yet, or the the rationale of Logically I know this is true, but right now, emotionally Absolutely not, and trying to reconcile the two. I think that's such an interesting point too. And then talking about what if I gain weight? And then that that response because I I've heard this too in just my own coaching clients of well, jessica, if I stop restricting, if I Change the way I eat so I'm not tracking every single macro and weighing everything, I'm just giving up like isn't that just me giving up? Aren't I gonna gain a ton of weight? What if I gain a ton of weight? What if you do? What if that happens? Are you gonna be any less of a person? Are you gonna be able to still do the things you enjoy? Show up for yourself, the way you want to engage with your family and friends, the way that matters to you? Mm-hmm, what's more important? What quality of life are your current choices giving right versus like? What kind of quality of life Do you want to have? Mm-hmm?

  Jen: 10:03

  Yeah, and a lot of it too, is just in society, everything is geared towards weight loss and being lean, not over eating, restricting. That's everything you see on social media. The most popular posts right are the people who are lean, muscular. They're commended. So of course, everyone's afraid of not looking that way or not being that way, and I totally all for being comfortable in your body and feeling strong in your body, and I'll get clients who will be like I don't fit in any of my clothes and I can't afford to buy a new wardrobe. Totally understand that, and I think there is ways to change your body composition and to do those things in a way that is healthy. I feel like I should put a warning on that because I am really careful with screening people before we go that way about their history. Yeah.

  Jess: 10:52

  I mean, and that's that's just saying essentially, you are not anti changing your body, not anti, right? It's looking at the perspective of weight loss. Body comp changes are completely separate from Healthy body image, from body image growth, and I think that that is such an important thing to recognize that if you don't feel good in your body, it's examining that I don't feel good in my body. It doesn't just have to do with your physical appearance. A lot of it is adjusting that relationship with yourself. Right. I completely resonate and agree with what you're saying because I think it feels like in in the media not just social media, but media in general there's two camps. There's anti diet, anti changing your body, anti everything on that end of things. And then there's the people that are huge proponents of losing weight and smaller bodies or better bodies and having that middle ground of If you can track food in a healthful way, great. If weighing yourself on a regular basis is something that helps you to have more Information, to make informed decisions about your health, great. But if those are triggers for you, maybe don't do them having that differentiation, because that's something where I'm like I don't fall into either of those camps. There's a middle, there's a both, and here yeah, and I always too.

  Jen: 12:07

  I don't ever tell anyone what weight I think they should be. I think a healthy weight is whatever weight you can maintain by eating a good amount, being able to enjoy Social gatherings, being able to hang out with your family and enjoy desserts and not beat yourself up and then still be Active. Have a healthy relationship with exercise.

  Jess: 12:30

  Absolutely. It isn't a specific number, it's being able to have those relationships with food, with exercise and something that's sustainable. I think that's one thing too. I have a good friend who's doing a pretty Restricted diet. You let them make their choices and I'm not here to judge, but the type of diet that they're on is super low carb and they're on this specific meal plan to lose weight and have they lost weight? Yes, but then my question is when you come off that, is it sustainable? Like, right now, energy is low so they're not working out, or if they are, it's very limited and I'm like how is that sustainable? You're not able to engage in the activities that you love or enjoy. You're not able to consistently go and eat at gatherings the way that you enjoy. When you get off this diet and you return to whatever sense of normalcy you decide to engage in, are you gonna gain the weight back that you lost? Like is it?

  Jen: 13:20

  sustainable. I think a lot of people go into weight loss or restrictive diet thinking it'll fix their body image and it usually doesn't. The root issue Right is your body image and how you perceive an experience and what you tell yourself about your body.

  Jess: 13:36

  Exactly, that's exactly. It is in that relationship versus your actual physical appearance. Now there are cases, too, where maybe your physical appearance and your size and body composition is Impeding your ability to run a race as comfortably or have the endurance that you want, and changing body composition could improve your body image. There's cases for that, but more often than not, it is improving your relationship with yourself and your body image. That's the answer versus that restrictive diet. Okay, this is awesome. I'm super enjoying this discussion so far, thank you. So going back to your journey through high school into college eating disorder, going to school to become a dietitian, putting yourself through treatment and kind of coming out with probably a really diverse tool belt of skills to help your own clients.

  Jen: 14:26

  Mm-hmm, I think we just went way off when I was talking about gaining weight, right? Yeah, I know, sorry so it's really easy to go in so many different directions, but I ended up gaining quite a bit of weight in recovery and actually was a good amount over my Weight before I even started trying to lose weight. So that was mentally Really hard. I think that's where the body image and learning how much body image and what you think and tell yourself I really, you know came to understand that a little bit better because even though I went through recovery and all those behaviors were gone, I was now in a body that I hated and I didn't feel comfortable in. And, like I was saying, with eating disorder, people are afraid what if I gain weight? What if I keep gaining weight? And that's kind of where I ended up. But the other thing was internally I didn't like the way I looked, but nothing changed in my relationships. My husband at that point you know his attitude, his love for me didn't change. The way my friends interacted with me didn't change. Nothing changed externally. It helped me more with the internal dialogue that it doesn't, it doesn't matter, and it also helped me kind of come more to the Inclusion that I don't have to like my body but I need to respect my body.

  Jess: 15:41

  Yes, I like that. Would you put yourself in any particular like body image Camp as far as body acceptance, body neutrality, body positivity, anything Like those that resonate, or is it just kind of like it is what it is?

  Jen: 15:58

  I think probably mostly neutral.

  Jess: 16:00

  Yeah, that makes sense. I just came off of recording episode 3, all about whether or not body Positivity is the answer, and with you cluing in and saying at the end of the day, it's about body respect and that is something that comes across in every single type of body image. Every bit of research on body positivity, acceptance, neutrality, body image, flexibility, every single one of them is like at the end of the day, you have to respect your body. You have to appreciate and care for your body, nourish it, give it the rest it needs, hydrate those things, that self-care piece. You don't have to love it. Yeah, so I appreciate that. Where would you say your journey is at now or where did it take you? I mean, you are such a badass runner. That's technically how we met, right? So Instagram? like yeah yeah, all of our. All of our running posts all the time. Do you feel like did your body image Flexuate or change through your running journey, or do you want to share anything about your running journey at all?

  Jen: 16:57

  Oh yeah, I started running around the same time 16 17 with my dad. My dad was a marathon runner and I would do some of his shorter runs with him. But then my running definitely got entangled in my eating disorder. As a way to keep an energy deficit it was something I would use to make up for maybe eating more than I thought I should have. It definitely was not a positive relationship until I went through recovery and then I was able to have a relationship with running where I was doing it because I wanted to and because I enjoyed it and the idea of burning calories off or trying to maintain weight just totally went out the window. And that really changed my relationship with running in a way, positive way, way more healthy, because before I had to run every day and I didn't. Then I stress out major anxiety and after it was like oh, it's fine, you know.

  Jess: 17:55

  I miss a couple days work. That is huge. Now, when you were going through treatment and through the initial parts of recovery, did you stop running to be able to work on that relationship with how you came back to it?

  Jen: 18:09

  Yeah, probably. Let's say six or eight months I didn't run an exercise was pretty limited.

  Jess: 18:14

  That must have been such an interesting journey in so many ways that I don't want to minimize any of that. But just thinking about what running means to us now and how and how we use that, that would be such an to to go through something where I don't know about for you, but for me, running for the better part of a decade was such an integral part of my identity. Yeah, that too.

  Jen: 18:36

  I will share with my eating disorder clients a lot. They'll talk about how hard it is and I'm like I totally. I mean I had suicidal thoughts. It was not easy because all of a sudden my running's gone, I'm gaining weight. Everything is bad quote, unquote bad. That is happening. It was horrible at the time but it was necessary to break that connection that my birth is tied to my running that make my water, yeah, and so and it totally gives me empathy to like. Eating disorders have the highest morbidity mortality rate.

  Jess: 19:11

  People die more from eating disorders than any other mental illness and I totally can see why it can feel like living hell when you're going through it, my mom struggled with anorexia for the better part of 20 years and that's kind of the environment and when we talk about how our body image story is shaped, that was a big part of it. For me was was seeing her struggle so much of it, through so much of it and to see, even as a kid, understanding that it was something that she could control, how much that control piece comes into play and being able to work through changing those thoughts. And that's not that you're taking away control, but there's other decisions to be made and there's ways to nourish your body and show you can be in control of the food you're eating. But is it taking care of your body as well and being respectful and nourishing in the same space? It's so much more than your comment earlier. When people are like, oh, just eat more, why don't you just eat more? Oh, what is eating disorder recovery? Is it just people making you eat food and you're like there's so much mental health component to that because it's behaviors, it's the piece of I think you might have said this before we started recording just about it being like trauma as kind of the trigger to that and being a big part of it.

  Jen: 20:20

  I definitely found and I think it's pretty common people who have experienced trauma. Often we see people who have experienced like abuse as a child or sexual abuse or sexual assault at any time, and eating disorder often will follow. And it's the person's kind of their way of trying to take that control and also because that was something that happened to their bodies, it's something they're trying to do to protect their bodies. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense, that protective behavior. And then it's like most eating disorders do. The behavior start with trying to protect your body or control it, and then it gets connected to body image and then also with the trauma, right, if you start to gain weight, then is that going to make you vulnerable again? Or if your body starts to look at certain ways, that going to make you vulnerable again, and so that's a whole nother level of things to work through too. It's not just now eating disorder, recovery and undoing those thoughts and, do you know, trying to work through the trauma.

  Jess: 21:21

  It's working through what's the root of all of that, because that eating disorder didn't just spring up right one day. It came from somewhere, whether it was a series of events or a particular trauma. Yeah, I was just thinking about that whole experience and learning to undo, because you're talking about protecting your body, but I was thinking too, when you talk about the trauma piece of it, how much of it is a responsive, like control. But also I don't want to think about or process or cope with what happened. It was huge, it was big, it was overwhelming and instead I'm going to focus my energy on food how much, when, where, what and putting my energy into that.

  Jen: 22:00

  Yep, that's exactly what happens. I've seen people who are trying to do go through trauma therapy. They'll have a hard session and the way they deal with the heightened anxiety and the heightened feelings is to double down on the eating disorder behaviors, because that's what their body has come to connect, a way to restore peace within themselves or to the cold. Yeah, on healthy way, but a way to cope. Yeah, and I've also found that if they're triggered by trauma, working through trauma therapy or something traumatic happens, there will automatically start to feel uncomfortable in their bodies, which will then trigger the restriction. And so that's really interesting to how your brain will automatically trigger the discomfort in your body in order to trigger you to restrict. It's just this whole neural pathway to protect yourself.

  Jess: 22:51

  I like that you said that, because one of the things that I've talked a lot about is body image disruptions. So not necessarily people with an eating disorder, but a person in a body, good body image, healthy body, bad body, whatever. There are disruptions that come up from scrolling social media and the comparison piece crap that our family says to us putting on clothes we're going to be getting all our pants back out soon as the weather gets cooler and their sweaters and maybe putting this on and they feel a little bit differently and those feels that arise. These body image disruptions are. How do you respond? It's like swimming in an ocean and those disruptions are like waves. It's always big waves. How do you learn to like effectively swim or surf and ride those waves? And one of the big ways that people respond is those kind of self protective measures of well, I'm feeling this way, so if I take an action, I can fix it. So that action can be like starting a new diet. Maybe we're doubling down and we're restricting that diet. It's buying new clothes, it's getting a new hair style. It's like quick fixes. But I never thought about how that could eventually extrapolate into when you're struggling with an eating disorder that turns into that quick fix behavior is like, okay, I'm doubling down on this diet. Such an interesting connection, thank you, yeah, yeah, Now you've worked with athletes, with runners, with all of that. Have you seen any connection or correlation or I don't know what you want to call it with runners and body image, cause that's something that I can totally speak on, but I'd love to hear from your perspective too.

  Jen: 24:17

  Something I experienced, too, when I first returned to running was the feeling that I'm too large, my body's too big, I don't look like a runner, I'm too big to be a runner. And thinking of the elite two and a half hour runners, we just automatically compare bodies or think, you know we need to know the certain way.

  Jess: 24:35

  Yeah, I mean, they give you the statistics, right? Your elite marathon runner is five, seven and 130 pounds. So there you go. There's your automatic starting point for comparison. Right? It's like I don't look like a runner, I'm not boat like a runner.

  Jen: 24:47

  Sometimes people tell me that they want to be in a smaller body so they can be faster or feel more comfortable in their bodies, and often what the first thing I'll do is just see if they're even eating enough first.

  Jess: 25:00

  Yeah, and you're like I appreciate your thought, but I have questions.

  Jen: 25:04

  first, yeah, what I found is, once we start working on feeling better and they see that they can actually feel better by feeling, by eating more, and they actually get faster that way, usually those thoughts go right out the window.

  Jess: 25:19

  I had a coach that told me exactly this. I was a couple of years into my running journey and I'd started running around the same time that it also started a fairly restrictive diet. There was concern over having a gluten intolerance and whatever else I did, like a food sensitivity test, which is a whole nother load of whatever. But I had lost 50 pounds over the course of a couple of years. Changed diet, changed a lot of my helpful behaviors in life, so a lot of good changes. But I definitely had put running in the place of like. This is what I have control over. This is my healthy lifestyle piece. Loved running, completely identified as it. So I hired a coach. It had been going well and I had been talking about ways to make improvements. Now, a lot of times, that coach is going to say okay, jess, you have a half marathon on the books and we're working on these types of speed workouts and balancing out the easy runs here, and that let's look at how's your recovery, how's your sleep right, those kinds of things. But the first thing this coach said to me is well, jessica, how much do you weigh? Let's talk about changing your diet so that you can lose, like I don't know, seven to 10 pounds and then you'll get faster. No discussion about anything else. No conversation about tweaking your programming or anything else. It was just straight to maybe it's time to lose some weight Now. Granted, you're talking about not looking like a runner. I am not the like a runner. Like we talked about having the family members that calls brick shit houses, mm-hmm, that was a really big struggle for me too, was it was overcoming that? But yes, I had the exact same words, like I want to lose weight, to get faster, because mainstream media tells you that the less you weigh, the faster you'll go. Yeah, but then you have to ask it what cost, right?

  Jen: 27:01

  So I've had a couple of cross country high school girls that I've worked with and I had one who she came to me relative energy deficiency, menstrual dysfunction, underweight weight and she wanted to get better. Within the first month she implemented everything, gained the weight back that she needed to, her period came back Like she was all in it. Totally pretty amazing, right. I usually don't see people go in and take it and all of it. Yeah, and she was feeling good. It's pretty rare that people exgold and do really well like she did. But then she had two races where her time was slower and then even slower. The coach, he calls her mom and says we noticed that she's gained some weight and I think this is what's making her slower. So then the mom calls me and is really upset, like did we do the right thing? And I was like of course you did the right thing. He's wrong. Internally I wanted to say all sorts of really horrible things about this person. I wanted to punch a wall. I was so mad. I was like, if she's fatigued and running slower and she said her legs just won't turn over, let's get her tested. Let's get her iron levels tested.

  Jess: 28:11

  There's more to the story here.

  Jen: 28:13

  Yes, yeah, and guess what? Iron deficiency Got her on iron supplement. Eight weeks she ran a 17 minute 5K, maintained her weight, eating everything else. I was like shove it up your butt, coach. Yes, you know, and so that thought lighter is faster. I mean in cases of professional male athletes, that the data was done on, sure, but I think across the board.

  Jess: 28:45

  If you're training at some kind of incredibly elite level and you have looked at every other factor under the sun, sure, maybe that's the key to your extra 0.01% improvement. But for your recreational athlete, for Gen Pop doesn't even enter into the equation.

  Jen: 29:03

  And it's what A matter of seconds Like we're going to destroy our relationship with food in our body just so we can have a couple seconds. I don't think it's worth it. I won't ever think it's worth it.

  Jess: 29:15

  One thing too when you're talking about working with high school athletes, I have read so freaking much about body image lately and body image struggles start with kids as young as five, which blows my mind and thinking about this high schooler. So they've had some time for body image feels and perspectives to develop, but they're still young enough that they took what you said and were like I want to be healthy, I want to improve here and implemented. I'd be so curious to ask that person about their body image and that perspective. I'm just like thinking aloud. I would love eventually to get into middle schools or high schools and have conversations around body image, because so much of these conversations on this podcast so far and going forward are unlearning so many things that we have been taught or internalized about our bodies that if you get ahead of that in middle school or high school, how much more of a badass and resilient human can you be? How much more time and energy would you spend on things that you love, impacting the world in positive ways, versus the time and energy we spend worrying about our appearance or fitting in or looking like a runner, looking like a power lifter, whatever. So total side tangent. But there's three girl goals. I'm just putting this out there.

  Jen: 30:31

  When I went through recovery, I didn't feel like a runner, or I looked like a runner, and so I didn't go to races or anything for a long time.

  Jess: 30:39

  I had my first and second kids during that time too, and so it was really hard to go out to races and working and a parent, also another like big body image piece, though too, I would assume, going through having kids and having your body change through that period of time.

  Jen: 30:54

  There's seeing eating disorder behaviors increase in pregnancy and pregnant women and again, I think it's partly due to what we see on social media. Yes, see women who are pregnant, who don't even look like they're pregnant. Every single person's body is totally different. I think we need to respect that in your body has its own individual needs, its own individual way. It's going to carry a baby or gain weight or be healthy yet so anyways. But for me it was actually was even more healing to see my body get big and pregnant and then see it change. Yeah, I don't, I just helped me be more comfortable in my body.

  Jess: 31:30

  I guess Do you feel like there was more appreciation. I think so, and they were like holy crap, look what my body can do.

  Jen: 31:36

  Yeah, and just that your body is going to be different sizes through different periods of your life.

  Jess: 31:42

  Absolutely. Our bodies are constantly changing. They're made to change. Our body image perspective is also going to change too with the way our bodies change. So when I asked you about what kind of body image resonates with you most, some seasons are neutrality, some seasons are acceptance, some seasons are learning, the flexibility of showing up in a way that says I don't really like my body right now, but I can still do the things I like.

  Jen: 32:06

  I learned to after all, that just how much, much more free time I had when I wasn't trying to count all my calories, worry about what I ate, worry about when I was going to run something miles I needed to to burn something off, and I think I just wasted a lot of my life during those years worrying about those things. I think it helped me enjoy running even more and to be able to focus more on the performance or maybe having other goals and running like chasing Boston qualifying times or trying to break 20 minutes on a 5k. It's a lot easier to focus on those things when you're not bogged down with all of the negative, disordered eating thoughts, says the person with a Boston marathon poster behind you.

  Jess: 32:50

  I love it when you can turn towards those mastery and performance related goals that aren't tied to body image. One thing when you're talking about figuring out how many miles you need to run to burn off the food you ate, it wasn't that long ago that social media all the time would be like you know, you need to run 73.6 minutes to burn off this cupcake, like it was a thing, and I entered running in that period of time and that's one positive I guess I can say is I don't really see that Maybe I've curated my social media fates not to see it, but actually that's not as prevalent in the social media space. There's more of the conversation around eat the food to fuel your body and go for the Jesús right back. That's a nice shift to see.

  Jen: 33:31

  Yeah, I always see it come out again around Thanksgiving. Oh, that's true. Well, I have an anti that message on my Instagram that I throw up everything's good. Ok, we'll be sure to share it far and wide when we get there. My gosh, I still get comments that like, yeah, but if you don't, then you're going to gain weight and be unhealthy. I'm like it's way bigger than what you eat on one day. Shut up and that and always like it's water retention. You didn't gain five pounds in one night. Sorry guys, it's not the way it works.

  Jess: 34:04

  Yeah, it's water. Let's talk face like metabolism. I agree Exactly. Do you have anything else to speak on as far as your running journey, or body image journey at all?

  Jen: 34:15

  The thing I thought of was when you were talking about middle school or high school, is just how much the environment we grow up in and like there's been research that shows that the way the mother talks about her body, your kids take that on, your kids hear that and they take that on and I don't know. I just think about my 17 year old and how she has no body image issues and it's really weird for me. You're so on the back when you're like look at this healthy human that I've raised. I remember when she was in middle school I'm like how do you feel about your body? She's like I feel great and I was like what does that feel like?

  Jess: 34:52

  Like for real. Tell me how that feels. I need to know more. Yeah, that's something too that I think, when we talk about how our body image is shaped. There is a body image workbook, I think is the title of it. It came out probably 12 years ago, but the very first thing you do in this workbook is you learn about how your body image is shaped. So it takes you through where there are standout moments in your childhood. What was your mom's body image like? Did she talk about her body? What was your dad's body image like? Did he talk about his body? Were there kids at school? Were there friends? Were there comments? Were you teased about appearance or personality traits and like takes you through that to help understand. Oh, that's why I always thought of myself as being way bigger than I really am. I mean for. So for me, I have my mom and my two sisters, and I have two brothers too, but they're, you know, they're boys. So you would actually like compare yourself to your sisters right. My mom and my sisters are five, nine, five, 10 and thin, naturally smaller in stature and it's not to say that I am overweight in this current body. But growing up, I mean, I was called a Butterball Turkey. Through middle school I was always more sturdily built and now I see this as a good thing and I feel strong and I feel solid and there's so many healthy things. But growing up it was so hard because the three of them, they all shared clothes and for me I'm like, yeah, I kind of grew out of that size too, in sixth grade.

  Jen: 36:17

  So I think, even as adults and if you have kids or are starting to have kids, to really think about what you say out loud, what you say out about your body. That was something I was really careful about, Like because even now do I like my body? Meh, Do I respect it? Yes, but I've never said those things out loud in front of my kids and I was very vocal and I think most people who in my family whatever very vocal about we're not talking about bodies, diets in my family in front of my kids and they've respected that and I think all of that helped a lot protect my kids from bad body image and just respecting their bodies and feeling good in their bodies, Absolutely that speaks volumes.

  Jess: 37:02

  That's awesome. Do you have anything input on? Because we talked about eating disorders? So the more specific clinical diagnosis eating disorder and body image. Do you work with athletes at all that it's more displaying behaviors of disordered eating? Yeah, and that translation into body image, Because I feel like for me on the recreational athlete and there's a lot more discussion on recognizing disordered eating and those certain behaviors, Because sometimes those behaviors can be used in a constructive way of if body crumples are on the table or if you're trying to do certain things, but then you look at how quickly they can become disordered.

  Jen: 37:44

  Yeah, disordered eating is definitely much more prevalent and common. I think it's a really small amount the population actually meets all the criteria for a diagnostic eating disorder, but the disordered eating is very prevalent and I think a lot of people don't even realize they have disordered eating behaviors.

  Jess: 38:03

  And especially when eating behaviors are learned from people around you, or maybe you know family, so yeah, and it's definitely connected to body image, a common thing I hear, especially with runners.

  Jen: 38:16

  I have half marathon runners. It's like you got to eat more carbs and in their head they've heard over and over again carbs are bad. And then they'll start to eat more carbs, but now they feel uncomfortable in their body, not that it's causing GI distress, but that they feel like they're bloating up or getting bigger. And I think that's a really common thing. I see, and again it has to do with the messaging and what we hear and what we believe and I found it really interesting that what's really common is like if we have a bad body image day, we'll perceive our body as being bigger or our clothes feeling tighter, and that's not even actually happening. It's just you're on high alert and so you're sensitive to those things, even though nothing has actually changed. And I think we talk about that enough that the way we perceive our body, our experience, our body isn't even accurate all the time.

  Jess: 39:09

  Speaking about that like body dysmorphia, right, and that's not saying you have body dysmorphic disorder, that's a whole other set of criteria. But looking at how often our perception of our bodies is an actually reality, our bodies don't physically change drastically from day to day, but our feelings about our body can change so much. So, like yesterday getting dressed and I'm like, oh hey, I think I might see an ab there. Oh my gosh, this definition, whatever. Has anything changed since from yesterday morning to this morning? No, but I look in the mirror this morning and I'm like what happened to your body? It's not as flat. Where's the definition that you saw yesterday? But nothing changed. Right, nothing changed. That's something that I don't think is talked about often enough. Is those thoughts about our bodies not necessarily always being true, right, yeah?

  Jen: 39:56

  Yeah, and that's, and feelings aren't true.

  Jess: 40:00

  That's one big thing too, depending on the type of body image you identify with. I don't know how familiar you are with acceptance and commitment therapy or act. That's one of the main tenants of it is like letting thoughts and feelings come up, acknowledging them and not having to accept them as true. It's such a powerful skill that I have been learning in my own life and it's also made me so much more aware of my thoughts and so much more aware of like, oh, that thought came up. That's absolutely absurd and that's not true. But okay, I'm just going to let it go Like wow, where did that come from? And not having to let yourself get hooked on it, because those feelings will come, those thoughts can come, yeah, and then they go away. Yeah, they might stay a while and it might be crappy, but learning to work through them.

  Jen: 40:44

  Yeah, I think that's a super important and helpful skill to have, especially was dealing with body image, or if you're trying to work on improving your body image. I ended up having that conversation a lot with a lot of my clients. Another thing that we talk about doing is keeping sticky notes like on their bathroom mirror or on their fridge something they see a lot of things that they like about themselves that have nothing to do with their body, things that they're proud of that have nothing to do with their body. Just trying to get the focus off of your body and on what really matters, what your worth really comes from, because really it's just, it's a meat sack, right, yeah that's.

  Jess: 41:26

  I love that so much. That's what I I just that's so good. I like the thought of putting sticky notes on a mirror that are affirmations in a way, right Of I am worthy because I am a human, and finding the things that you like about yourself that aren't appearance related, but putting them on the mirror where you are looking in the mirror and you're able to have appreciation for this meat sack that allows us to experience magic in the world, but you're also finding that piece of appreciation too. For that you can find the things you like, because that's something too. I haven't done enough research on it yet to say definitively one way or another, but I have trouble with people who talk about affirmations and the context of like you're beautiful just the way you are and love your body and love your fat rules and all of these super like positive affirmations that just feel so disconnected. Yeah, don't help you to connect to your body more. They help you to disconnect even more.

  Jen: 42:24

  And I think what I have a problem with with that is it's still focused on appearance.

  Jess: 42:28

  Yeah, Yep, and I think there was a shirt that was really popular for a while. That was like the way you look is the least important thing about you, and it's something that a lot of times we rationally know but we fall back into so quickly of forgetting.

  Jen: 42:42

  What can be hard about body images? It's so appearance focused. And how do we? It would be wonderful if we all just stopped having anything to say about our appearance or any focus on appearance. I think that would make everything a lot better. But that's not the world we live in right?

  Jess: 42:58

  No, it makes too much money on appearance, fixing weight loss, all of these things, for it to ever be anything different.

  Jen: 43:07

  For convincing you. There's something wrong with your appearance that you need to.

  Jess: 43:10

  There's something you need to change always yeah, there's too much, yeah, and that's not something that I mean. I'd love to look at it like dismantling capitalism or whatever else and like have that discussion that it's the powers that be and it's the system and it's the media and it's all of these things. But it's, how do we weather that storm and how do we be resilient and respond with self protective factors to continue to have that healthy, respectful relationship with ourselves? To say, actually, it's not about my appearance, I can have a healthy body image, I can be body neutral, body accepting, without this obsession on having a good appearance. Right, right, do you have any other thoughts? In the realm of being a dietitian, having worked with athletes and worked with humans across such a diverse background when it comes to body image and food and all of those things, I think one thing that I see a lot, especially on the clinical side.

  Jen: 44:10

  What I often will see is that kind of going back to weight and body size. Doctors will just see a BMI or a weight and then, just without asking about background, asking what the person's doing anything, will just automatically tell the person to lose weight and to just try an Atkins diet or keto diet. I hear this all the time and they go to the doctor and that happens and they call me and they're crying.

  Jess: 44:35

  Doctors don't have very much education in nutrition.

  Jen: 44:38

  No, no, and I don't think they have a lot of education on how to lead those conversations, but just kind of at that point that even when I work with my clients, like I said, I don't ever tell them they have to be a certain weight, that they need to lose weight. I think what's really the most important is just remembering that your body is its own individual thing with its own individual needs. And just because some person can be healthy at 12% body fat, that doesn't mean that your body can very well need to be at 25% body fat to get your period to be healthy. Everyone's body is really different and that can't be measured with numbers, no matter what your doctor says, no matter what a chart says, that there's a lot more things to consider I love it Two things on that.

  Jess: 45:27

  One BMI is bullshit. You know, maybe there's still some validity from a population basis, looking broad scope, or whatever, but BMI is bullshit. And I hate that there are so many conversations that people have around BMI with their providers that have no basis, because research on BMI, on people's body sizes, show that negative health outcomes don't start until you've more than entered what they consider morbidly obese. So it's wild to me that that's still just such the prevalent conversation and it is. I've had it happen to me. Every person I've talked to has some kind of provider story where they said I was training for a marathon and I got told that my BMI was too high and I needed to change how I ate so that I could lose weight.

  Jen: 46:12

  You know like it happened to me at the end of my recovery. I had been stable for a little bit and my BMI was overweight and provider told me that and I was like you know, I just like spent a really long time going through eating but no one asked.

  Jess: 46:27

  No, of course not. The other thing that I was going to speak to is you're saying every body's individual are healthy weight, healthy body fat percentage. What we need to eat and how we take care of our bodies is individual. But there's also that piece of learning to listen to those body cues and I think that that's something that we get so far away from. If we are down that path of disordered eating, if we crossed over into eating disorder territory, we get so far removed from those hunger cues, from the cues that tell you that it's bedtime right, like not just the eating piece but those self care pieces of. We have gotten so far away from trusting what our bodies tell us because we're told that maybe the thing that we've internalized is we have to intermittent fast and then we get mad when our stomach growls at 830 in the morning because we're trying to intermittent fast until noon Having those hunger cues. And when we get so far and lose sight of that so far down the line, it is so hard and I don't know you probably have seen this in clinical practices helping people come back to that and being able to trust, to be able to hear those cues, listen to those cues but also act and trust that those cues are telling them this is what my body needs and being able to respect that, because that's something that I haven't even struggled with. I'm going to just say disordered eating over the years, just with internalizing, messaging about being a smaller runner and all of those pieces and going and trying different diets and thinking that these are the answers, and then getting mad when I'm like, well, this low carb diet is supposed to help me get like super shredded. So I'm eating 100 grams of carbs a day and I'm losing weight, but I'm hungry all the time and I'm getting mad at my body to just cooperate already because I'm trying to do stuff to make it better and then you're like what I'm not actually making it better. You know, you learn in hindsight right Like shutting down and pushing away those cues for so long and coming back to that's a freaking journey, yeah.

  Jen: 48:31

  And it can take a lot of again unlearning, right that your body telling you it's hungry, it's okay to feed it. You don't have to push through it and ignore it. Yeah, exactly, when your body tells you it has to pee, you don't just push through and keep going, right, you stop and go pee. I mean I guess you could, but at some point you're going to lose that battle.

  Jess: 48:53

  I'm glad you just said pee, because I was totally going like number two. I was thinking that direction. So I was thinking about how many times I pooped my pants during a race before because I legitimately tried to ignore the fact that I needed to go, because I was like, just get a little further. Just get a little further. I know there's a port-a-potty up here, keep going. No, you don't. And I remember actively telling myself, thinking that this would be helpful, like you don't need to go, it's okay, you don't need to go. And then being within sight of this freaking port-a-potty, I'm just losing it. And I was wearing hot pink shorts. Oh no, yeah, sorry, bend Marathon, but you have to get a whole other side of me. But yeah, if you have to go, you have to go, and that's hunger. Cues are the same thing. It's your body telling you something. I feel like I just ascended into full-on runner territory. We made it to the end of this for me to actually tell a poop story.

  Jen: 49:42

  I haven't. I've been running what since I was 17, right, and I'm 40. I'm almost 43. So what is that?

  Jess: 49:48

  26 years I'm just going to poop my pants, just knock on someone.

  Jen: 49:52

  Just keep going. I mean, I made it to port-a-potty. I've been close, but I have thankfully made it to port-a-potty every time. That's an accomplishment.

  Jess: 50:01

  I'm proud of you. Yeah, it's been scary Once during a race, once during a training run, and I've been running for 11 years.

  Jen: 50:09

  My time is going to run out at some point, right?

  Jess: 50:13

  It seems like it happens to everyone at some point Some kind of story to tell. Yeah, is this a good point to wrap it up, yeah, okay, we'll just leave our poop stories here. Jen, thanks so much for being our first guest of Story Girl. Yeah, I so appreciate this conversation.

  Jen: 50:29

  I feel very special that I'm the first guest.

  Jess: 50:31

  I mean maybe I played favorites, I don't know, but I appreciate your time. This has been awesome, really good to reconnect and talk running. So thanks for being on the show. Yeah, thanks for having me. If you enjoyed this podcast episode, please feel free to follow, subscribe, like whatever the heck you do with podcasts. As always, stay sturdy, friends, and we'll talk to you next week. Goodbye.

Ep. 3: Is Body Positivity the Answer?

It's a common misconception that body positivity is the key to a healthy body image. In the latest episode of Sturdy Girl, we explore this myth and delve into the concept of body neutrality and acceptance. The importance of these principles in fostering self-compassion and understanding cannot be overstated.

Body positivity, as it's often portrayed in the media, is not the answer to having a healthy body image. The concept has been twisted and distorted, leaving out the bodies it was originally intended to celebrate. The reality is that positive body image goes beyond merely appreciating your appearance. It involves being attentive to your body's needs and processing appearance-related messages in a self-protective manner.

But what about the alternatives to body positivity? This is where body neutrality and acceptance come in. These concepts provide a space for self-compassion and understanding, allowing for a more balanced perspective towards your body. Body neutrality recognizes that feelings about our bodies change constantly and emphasizes the significance of acknowledging these feelings without judgment.

Body acceptance, on the other hand, is about coming to terms with your body as it is, not just about loving the way it looks. It's about celebrating the existence of your body and promoting body respect, even while tolerating uncomfortable feelings or thoughts about its appearance or abilities. This approach to body image is more peaceful and less focused on appearance.

We also delve into Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), a method that can help us cultivate a body-neutral mindset. ACT involves acknowledging negative thoughts without allowing them to control our actions. It's about accepting these thoughts as they are and continuing to pursue meaningful goals.

Body image flexibility is another crucial concept we explore in this episode. This refers to the ability to openly experience thoughts or feelings about the body without acting on them or trying to avoid them. It's about acknowledging these thoughts exist and continuing to live a values-driven life despite them.

Lastly, we emphasize the critical nature of self-respect and self-care to our body image. Regardless of our feelings about our bodies, they are worthy of respect and care. This means eating nutritious foods, sleeping enough, hydrating properly, moving our bodies in ways that feel good, and finding ways to play.

In conclusion, cultivating a healthy body image goes beyond body positivity. It involves embracing body neutrality and acceptance, practicing self-compassion, and adopting a flexible mindset towards body image. Join us on this enlightening journey as we redefine body image and embrace self-compassion.

• Full Transcript

  Speaker 1: 0:01

  Hello friends, 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 the 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 three of Sturdy Girl. Today we're going to be answering the question is body positivity the answer? I'm your host, Jess Heiss, joined by my co-host, megan Hello.

  Speaker 2: 0:36

  How's training going? Oh, you know, not going. No, it's not bad. I think I got on the assault bike for the first time in months. Yeah, it was painful. I kind of forgot what cardio is like, like that kind of cardio. I was going to say bike riding is cardio. It's completely different cardio yeah.

  Speaker 1: 0:56

  At this point you're kind of an off season. You're biking now for fun, and then you're transitioning back into Olympic lifting.

  Speaker 2: 1:03

  Yeah, and I really shouldn't say should, I shouldn't show it on myself. You would like to be? Yes, I would like to be lifting more consistently than I am right now, but you touched a barbell in the last week. I have not. Okay, fair, it was soon Soon.

  Speaker 1: 1:20

  Are you engaging in activities that you are enjoying?

  Speaker 2: 1:24

  Oh yeah, I think that I haven't been quite as physical like just going out and doing a lot of activities recently. I think I've been decompressing from race, from race season. Well, not even that, just the amount of traveling that I've done the last few months Was it something like race season? The travel, the stress of all of that, yeah, and that's been something in itself. So, no, it's good. I will definitely, I think, pick it back up.

  Speaker 1: 1:49

  I'm going to try to this week, yeah this might be one of them, because I'm in, at least You're on your own timeline?

  Speaker 2: 1:54

  Yeah, and I'm doing some Metcon-style workouts and brutal, it's all I need right now. So good, what about you?

  Speaker 1: 2:02

  I am in a completely new block of programming and I had D-Load week previous week and then this last week. I hit a triple in dead lifts at 315. And I think that was a volume PR. I hit 250 for four in squats and 250 for four.

  Speaker 2: 2:22

  Yeah.

  Speaker 1: 2:24

  Again a volume PR, and I think it was really reassuring because my body was starting to feel really tired and really like am I training the way I should be? Have I been deadlifting enough? Have I been squatting enough at the proper volume, all of those things. And then to just kind of show up with curiosity and extra coffee that always helps I just blow my expectations out of the water was really awesome. Yeah, so yeah, powerlifting is going well. And when is your meet? Nine weeks.

  Speaker 2: 2:59

  Oh, I know, I know it's going to be exciting.

  Speaker 1: 3:02

  Yeah, so that's going well. I got two runs in last week and those were just 45 minutes on the treadmill watching Netflix as a way to decompress. That being said, we've had such cooler mornings the last week that like it's so nice. I've been taking the dogs for a walk, but I definitely should be getting outside. Should Stop shitting on yourself, Jessica I would like to get out and run because this is the time of year, as the mornings get cooler, that's my favorite time to run. I love fall.

  Speaker 2: 3:33

  We're not. It's not fall yet. It will be soon, but it's starting to feel that crispness in the morning.

  Speaker 1: 3:40

  Yeah, that is training for me right now. So we've caught up on our training, caught up on life things. What is body positivity? The answer Megan.

  Speaker 2: 3:54

  I don't think so.

  Speaker 1: 3:57

  We can make this a really short episode. No, body positivity is not the answer, but it can be part of the answer. A preface to all of this the research on body image is relatively new. It's all kind of within the last 20 years and a lot of it focused on negative body image and its characteristics in relation to eating disorders and those kinds of things. Megan, I have a confession. Yes, when I first started researching for this entire podcast, this episode as well, but just the entirety of looking at what sturdy girl meant, what a healthy body image meant, it was actually against body positivity. Yeah, when I started looking at, is body positivity the answer? And I was like no, it's not, no, it's not, and had kind of a fixed mindset about body image.

  Speaker 2: 4:52

  Yeah, well, and what you thought body positivity meant, right?

  Speaker 1: 4:56

  And that's the big thing. Positive body image wasn't what I thought it was. Yeah, social media, media in general has painted this picture of positive body image being something else entirely from what research says. Positive body images, you know, I saw this notion of deeply loving yourself and was like no, absolutely Well loving yourself like I'm trying to think of the best word.

  Speaker 2: 5:25

  Like a fake or not fake, but like a superficial link.

  Speaker 1: 5:28

  Yeah, yeah, loving everything about your parents, or that level of almost cognitive dissonance. Yes, I'm going to look in the mirror and tell myself I love everything about me, but actually there's some level of self loathing and there's things I hate about myself. But by looking in the mirror and saying I love all these things, telling myself how much I love my body, like that's going to be the answer and that's body positivity. Yeah, can that?

  Speaker 2: 5:51

  actually solve the problem?

  Speaker 1: 5:53

  No, no, it can't. And you think about these girls on social media with their little sitting in the mirror side profile views, squeezing their little inch of belly, roll skin and being like I'm normalizing body positivity and body image. So we all have normal bodies, granted, all bodies are good bodies, thank you. But that is not the promotion of that is not positive body image.

  Speaker 2: 6:17

  Yeah.

  Speaker 1: 6:18

  There's such a big canyon between the two of like, if you're coming from a place of negative body image, of that piece, of not liking things about yourself or your appearance, or not feeling like you fit into societal norms, and people are just saying just love yourself, yeah just accept it, just turn, not even accept it.

  Speaker 2: 6:36

  Just say you love yourself, say you love yourself.

  Speaker 1: 6:38

  Yes, put on the bikini, do those things. There's a giant canyon between I'm here in this place of self loathing and you're telling me to go across this enormous canyon and just love myself, yeah.

  Speaker 2: 6:50

  That's not helpful and it's not getting the tools that you need. To cross that.

  Speaker 1: 6:55

  No, it's not even remotely attainable. And that's really, it's almost a level of toxic positivity. Yes, this positive body image movement.

  Speaker 2: 7:05

  Well, in toxic positivity, I think, is such a big part of social media now and I open my Instagram and it's in all different forms. It's with your job, with your life, with your appearance you have to live every part of everything. Yes.

  Speaker 1: 7:19

  Yeah, and that's again what I thought positive body image was, and that's not healthy. Think about how much the social media idea of body positivity doesn't work. When have you looked at an Instagram post that's promoting positive body image, with someone flaunting their body? When have you seen one of those read that caption and felt better about yourself?

  Speaker 2: 7:44

  You know, it's hard because I think that some people could see bodies that are similar to theirs, yeah, and be like this is great and I love this, and I see that and I go okay, they look like me. But I think this can also flip to comparison.

  Speaker 1: 7:57

  Yeah.

  Speaker 2: 7:58

  And maybe someone's doing that. That's how you think that they look so much better than you can obtain or something. And then you end up this ideal that's actually not attainable at all. Yeah, and then you start comparing like well, they look like this and even though they're portraying a message, it's like you should be positive and love yourself and like look at me. And then you're taking that away as like well, I'm not good enough, I don't look like that.

  Speaker 1: 8:22

  Yeah, and that's I mean, that's actually a really good point. It is a both and situation, because I think there's something to be said about seeing other people that look like you doing the things that you want to do Absolutely so, with you being in the competitive racing space, there's not a lot of women, so when you go to races or you see online that there are other females doing, these crazy Enduro races and all of these things doing the things they love, and you're like, well, heck, yeah, I can do that too, and it's almost empowering in a way to see other people with bodies like yours or the gender like yours doing those things and that can be really helpful. But the side of this that we are talking about is more that level of everything is positive all the time. How does that actually help us?

  Speaker 2: 9:15

  Does that actually work, and it's putting a spin on them. That's just positive, instead of actually maybe talking about some of the insecurities that you have around it. The nuance, yeah.

  Speaker 1: 9:26

  And that's one thing. Talking about research, there was a study done in 2019 that showed that body focus messaging on social media, even if it was positive, whether it was neutral, negative, whatever produced more self objectification than neutral, non body messaging.

  Speaker 2: 9:44

  Yeah, and that doesn't really surprise me because, again, if you're constantly looking at other people, there's going to be a comparison and you're going to be naturally going to do that.

  Speaker 1: 9:57

  That's part of being human, I feel like. And going along this line of social media, I saw the statistic that the hashtag body positive recently reached a milestone of one billion engagements.

  Speaker 2: 10:12

  Which, honestly, I want to say that I'm surprised by that, but I'm not.

  Speaker 1: 10:17

  And it just makes me interested, too, in how many people are using this in the context of promoting a healthy level of body positivity, which we'll get to in a minute, or if it is perpetuating that really pink washed, white washed body positivity, toxic positivity piece of. Just look in the mirror and tell yourself you love yourself. Here's the thing when it comes to your body image. You can call it whatever you want, but improving your relationship with your body is the answer. What does healthy body image look like to you? So let's dive in. We are going to talk about body positivity, clearly, we're going to talk about body acceptance, body neutrality, and then we're going to introduce the sturdy girl mindset.

  Speaker 2: 11:06

  Yeah, I'm excited for that.

  Speaker 1: 11:10

  There's my little golden egg.

  Speaker 2: 11:13

  What do they call that when it's? Like dropping hints for the golden nugget. At the end, I'll like and think of it as Taylor Swift. She does that, like in everything.

  Speaker 1: 11:23

  I love it. Okay, I'm owed to Taylor Swift. Okay, what is body positivity?

  Speaker 2: 11:31

  I honestly I thought it was completely with what we were talking about. I didn't really know as far as like the history of it.

  Speaker 1: 11:37

  Go ahead. Do you want me to go into it first and then you can?

  Speaker 2: 11:40

  make your comments. Yeah, yeah, go ahead.

  Speaker 1: 11:42

  So what is body positivity without discussing the origins of body positivity? Its origins were with the fat acceptance and liberation movement of the 1960s. Fat, black and queer activism are on the same time. Civil rights were gaining momentum. Huge, huge piece of this. So it was looking at promoting bodies that were otherwise shamed and pushed aside and were not marginalized.

  Speaker 2: 12:10

  They were marginalized.

  Speaker 1: 12:11

  Exactly, yeah. One big criticism of current body positivity is that it has been co-opted by small, white, able-bodied humans and capitalism and marginalizes the very bodies that it was meant to celebrate, and this is something. As I was doing, the research on body positivity was kind of a holy shit moment, because here we are two white able-bodied, straight-sized humans talking about body image.

  Speaker 2: 12:41

  Yeah.

  Speaker 1: 12:42

  And I didn't want to leave this out because I think it's a really important conversation to have is that the big focus of this podcast is to help people feel more included and trying to make this an inclusive space? Yes, okay, the working definition of positive body image. Let's talk about this. It's multi-dimensional and it has three core components. So the first one is appreciation of appearance and function of the body. It's broadly conceptualizing beauty, so saying there's not just one single standard for beauty, and that it's inner beauty as well as external beauty, so recognizing someone's qualities as well as external appearance.

  Speaker 2: 13:26

  It's kind of like lumped together.

  Speaker 1: 13:28

  Yeah. But this first point, appreciation of appearance and function some of us might get hung up on that a little bit, especially the appearance piece. Yeah, If you lean towards neutrality, acceptance, that side of things. Another part of that appreciation is adaptive appearance. Investment is what they call it in research. So taking care of yourself, that self-care piece of I respect and care for my body, so I'm going to have that reflected in my appearance. And the second component of positive body image is being aware and attentive to the body's needs. So self-respect, nourishing our bodies, self-compassion, all the things we talked about last week about getting through a bad body image day of taking care of ourselves. That is the second part of this positive body image. And then part of that too is perhaps not being responsive to body image disruptions. It's related to that inner positivity, looking at positive image of your body, positive feelings and how that relates to adaptive behaviors.

  Speaker 2: 14:40

  So the third one being it's the ability to process appearance related messages in a self-protective manner. So how do we respond to body image disruptions? So think about it like when we were talking about the waves coming in, yeah, yeah.

  Speaker 1: 14:55

  Disruptions are and how you were responding to that, if it's choppy, which is a plug if you haven't listened to last week episode on getting through a bad body image day. We talk about body image disruptions in great detail. These are like the waves when you're swimming in the ocean and how to get through them. So go listen to episode two.

  Speaker 2: 15:14

  Yes, definitely listen to episode two.

  Speaker 1: 15:18

  So the third part of positive body image is have we developed the skills to get hit with those waves and respond in a way that's self-protective, in a way that when great aunt so and so makes a comment about how you're eating a second helping a pumpkin pie at Thanksgiving, you don't let that ruin your day or ruin your body image or your perception of self, because you've learned how to have space between someone else's words and your response to say actually, I really freaking love pumpkin pie and this is a day for enjoying myself, but thanks for noticing how much I'm eating.

  Speaker 2: 16:02

  And also one thing that I've kind of learned is you don't have to justify your behaviors to anyone. I mean, given, well, there's a little star to next to that, yeah, don't you do in really terrible behaviors, but you don't have to justify your own needs to other people. No, I think that that's kind of. They just reminded me of that when you said that statement of like well, I really like pie and you know you don't have to qualify at all.

  Speaker 1: 16:27

  I think a lot of times with family there's some kind of response that I just don't.

  Speaker 2: 16:33

  I just don't Okay, fair, just blank face. Stare my family as you shovel pie into your mouth.

  Speaker 1: 16:40

  I really aggressively leading a tower of whipped cream Anyway okay, so these three components of positive body image appreciation of appearance and function of the body, being aware and attentive to the body's needs and the ability to process appearance related messages in a self protective manner. Megan, does this jive with how you understood?

  Speaker 2: 17:03

  positive body image. No, I mean not with what I thought about it like positive body image was yeah, same it was.

  Speaker 1: 17:11

  I thought it was the level of everything that you experienced through social media and the conversations in the online space. This definition is a lot more workable for me in that positivity context. Oh, absolutely, because the way I understood it is everything that it's not Looking at like. I thought that body positivity was being highly satisfied with all aspects of your appearance and that look in your mirror and love everything about yourself. And that's not what it is, and that's. I have kind of a couple of things to talk as far as what else body positivity is not, and I think that this helps to round out the understanding of body positivity from a research perspective before we go on and tackle the others. Another piece of body positivity is it's not the absence of negative body image. It's not a continuum with negative body image at one end and positive on the other. No matter the relationship you have with yourself, with your body image, how you perceive yourself, you're going to have negative body image days. You're going to have moments or things that you say to yourself that are negative. We're human, it's normal and that's really important to recognize. No matter whether we're talking about this positivity, neutrality, acceptance, all of these, we're going to have times of that negative body image.

  Speaker 2: 18:32

  Oh, absolutely. I couldn't think of any time where I've always been 100% positive about I mean, I don't know honestly anything but my body image, fair, fair.

  Speaker 1: 18:44

  Another thing that body positivity is not is it's not limited to appearance at the exclusion of other body dimensions like body functionality, what your body can do, and that's something too. I thought that positive body image was all about how it looked and focusing on loving the appearance, when it's a lot deeper than that.

  Speaker 2: 19:02

  I thought it was like all outer appearance.

  Speaker 1: 19:06

  Same, and that's kind of how it comes across on social media.

  Speaker 2: 19:09

  Again, social media is very shallow, so anyway, it's hard to judge anything off of social media.

  Speaker 1: 19:14

  Okay, that was a lot about body positivity. Let's talk about body neutrality. Yay. I like this one, so do I so do I, but that doesn't mean that's my favorite, I just I happen to like this. Okay, yeah, working. Definition of body image neutrality Body image neutrality recognizes that. One our feelings about our body change constantly, so our best, mindfully observed, without judgment, sound familiar from last week. This is mindfulness. Number two, a central focus on what our body allows us to do and appreciating this that will lead us to respect and care for our body. And three, acknowledgement that our self worth encompasses both intrinsic qualities and extrinsic passions and de-emphasizes our appearance.

  Speaker 2: 20:07

  Yeah, and I think that a point of this is it's okay to not love your body right.

  Speaker 1: 20:14

  There's not a focus on appreciation for the appearance of your body, which can be valuable and can be something that you resonate with. Yeah, and I think this neutral approach of not having the binary it's either a loving or a loathing, it's a middle ground perspective, neutral, indifferent. I have a body, I have feelings that come up, but my focus is on myself as a human being, on being mindful, on letting thoughts come up without judgment and acknowledging that our self worth is not just, it's not our appearance, it's not appearance based.

  Speaker 2: 20:50

  Yeah it reminds me a lot of the act. Oh yeah, the acceptance of commitment therapy that we were talking about.

  Speaker 1: 20:57

  That I will say. The more that we get into the season, the more we discuss these things. Act comes up so frequently and it's just such a great series of skills to work on, whether it's body image or other areas of life, like you'd mentioned, with your therapist talking through anxiety and things. It's helpful. Yeah highly suggest. So body neutrality was popularized in 2015 by Anne Poirier and defined it as not supporting the hatred of our vessel or physical structure of our bodies, or the love and adoration of our vessel. She suggests focusing on body appreciation, counteracting negative body self talk with body neutral statements, and focusing on strengths and trends equalities as ways to cultivate that body neutrality. So body neutral statements I'm more than my looks. I'm more than my body. I'm inherently worthy of respect, things like you know, if you have those negative thoughts that come up, it's I don't feel good in my body today, but I'm still able to do the things that I enjoy doing or the things that I need to do.

  Speaker 2: 22:12

  Both and yeah, and I love the statement of just. I am more than my looks.

  Speaker 1: 22:18

  Yeah, and that's hard in this society. That is something that is sure At a surface level. I hear that I'm like, oh, I know.

  Speaker 2: 22:25

  Yeah, but it's very hard to practice yourself that application piece.

  Speaker 1: 22:29

  Yeah, there's not a lot of research on body neutrality specifically. A lot of the research is done on positive body image.

  Speaker 2: 22:38

  Yeah.

  Speaker 1: 22:39

  But again the positive body image definition that we talked about which has a piece of this. It does it really does have it built in. But body neutrality can remind us that we don't have to love our body to respect it, to nourish it, to listen to its cues or have gratitude for its abilities to keep us alive. We can allow things that are perceived as issues or problems when those negative thoughts arise, and allow them to just be.

  Speaker 2: 23:05

  Yeah.

  Speaker 1: 23:06

  To not get hooked by them, to not let it not dwell in our day or change how we react to things. Yeah, it allows you the opportunity to explore the root of those thoughts and those feelings.

  Speaker 2: 23:20

  I love it.

  Speaker 1: 23:21

  So that's body neutrality.

  Speaker 2: 23:23

  Yeah.

  Speaker 1: 23:24

  And I think that again it ties a lot into those act principles.

  Speaker 2: 23:29

  Maybe that's why I love it so much.

  Speaker 1: 23:31

  You're familiar with those pieces. That makes a lot of sense. Okay, so the next piece of this is body acceptance. Now a side note before we go into kind of definitions and discussion. I put up an Instagram story while I was doing research for this episode and I said what does healthy body image mean to you? And I gave the options of positive body image, neutral body acceptance or something else. And out of the almost 200 people that voted, almost 70% of them said body acceptance was a healthy body image. That's what I voted for, and what I found interesting in this is that every single person that voted for positive body image being the definition of healthy body image was a man. Oh, that's interesting. Again, this is a very small sample size of my own social media audience.

  Speaker 2: 24:30

  Yeah, but that's an interesting point.

  Speaker 1: 24:32

  But I really it made me even more excited to have this conversation today, because body acceptance actually falls under body neutrality and actually falls under body positivity.

  Speaker 2: 24:43

  It's kind of like encompasses.

  Speaker 1: 24:45

  It does, and so to discuss this, I feel like, provides even more perspective.

  Speaker 2: 24:51

  So that's not interesting?

  Speaker 1: 24:53

  Yeah, yeah, I wonder why body acceptance, since this resonated with so many of you as the answer to a healthy body image. It's loosely defined as treating our bodies with respect and care, including all of our deepest insecurities and knowing that some days will be harder than others. It's being able to reflect on why you feel negatively about your body and how you can find peace with your body without wanting to change it. Body acceptance isn't about loving the way your body looks or feels. It's about accepting your body as your own, no matter what it looks like, no matter its size, its shape, its weight or physical state. It's celebrating the very existence of your body, promoting that body respects, even while tolerating any uncomfortable feelings or thoughts about its appearance or abilities, sound familiar, very similar. These pieces of body respect, of care, of not responding to those negative things that come up that's body image neutrality.

  Speaker 2: 25:53

  Yeah.

  Speaker 1: 25:54

  That also encompasses parts of body positivity.

  Speaker 2: 25:58

  So they all kind of like overlap a little bit in areas they do they do.

  Speaker 1: 26:04

  I mean, they're each their own domains and have their own definitions, but the amount of overlap and their lens itself to this conversation. When I was making notes for this episode, I quoted a book, so it was like in quotations and I don't remember where this was from, but it talked about body acceptance and it said that body acceptance is not necessarily loud and demonstrative. It's not showy. It can be a quiet, softness, a gradual lessening of negative thoughts, the peace that comes with no longer being at war with your body and its appearance. And that really just stuck with me about body acceptance is that it's not a showy thing. It doesn't feel like the body positivity, movement and internally, your experience of this can feel calm. Yeah, it can feel like a coming home to understanding our bodies, respecting its feelings, your thoughts about your body, all of those things and not being at war with yourself. Yeah, because that's honestly what a lot of us spend so much time doing wasting energy on being at war with our bodies for how it's supposed to look or how we're supposed to feel, or on the days when we don't feel good about ourselves and we try for that piece of neutrality. But we're mad at ourselves and we've gotten to neutrality because we've been conditioned to think that we have to love everything about ourselves and that body positivity.

  Speaker 2: 27:35

  Yeah, we can't have just an accepting neutral outlook on ourselves.

  Speaker 1: 27:41

  Yeah, exactly One little side note and then we'll go into honestly, my favorite part of this episode. The National Eating Disorders Association actually has a body acceptance week in October. It's like the end of October that they promote body acceptance and you have like a little thing that you can pledge online and sign it to work on body acceptance. But what I found really interesting is their definition of body acceptance includes body positivity, body neutrality and even body liberation. So food for thought there when we're making these definitions about body image.

  Speaker 2: 28:18

  Yeah.

  Speaker 1: 28:19

  We get to choose how we define it. And now my favorite part of this episode. We're going to talk about something called body image flexibility, and most of this will sound familiar because it is parts of body positivity, body neutrality and body acceptance. It's defined as the ability for one to openly experience thoughts or feelings about the body without acting on them or trying to avoid or change them. Being able to notice, acknowledge and accept that these thoughts exist. Accept that they're there, openly and with an attitude of self-compassion.

  Speaker 2: 28:58

  Mm-hmm.

  Speaker 1: 28:59

  We're going to talk every episode about self-compassion. Well, it's so important it is. But at the same time those things can come up and we can continue to pursue meaningful goals and other important areas of our lives without trying to suppress those negative thoughts with unhealthy coping strategies like we talked about last week, where we're trying for those quick fixes or maybe it's time for another new diet, or you need to go buy new clothes, or maybe I'm going to try a different kind of Botox, or whatever it is. Quick fixes, punishing yourself even more in the gym, whatever it is. Body image flexibility is being able to acknowledge that those thoughts exist, but we can still do the things that matter to us. We can still pursue our goals, live that values-driven life.

  Speaker 2: 29:45

  Yeah, it really points out to the we're more than our body Like. Again, that's what it comes down to.

  Speaker 1: 29:51

  Yeah, and the body image flexibility is connected to other adaptive psychological processes and relates that to lower incidences of eating disorders, body image issues, mental health disturbances. Yeah, the research on body image flexibility. I was like highlighting everything when I was reading about this because I'm like this is it? Yeah, I don't care if you call it positive body image, I don't care if you call it acceptance, neutrality. Can you learn cognitive flexibility in these moments, in these times that are going to come up for the rest of your life?

  Speaker 2: 30:32

  Yeah.

  Speaker 1: 30:33

  We can't get rid of them. We're never going to get rid of all of our negative thoughts. Yeah, it's just not going to happen.

  Speaker 2: 30:38

  But we can learn to live with them. Live with them, how to react to them.

  Speaker 1: 30:42

  Or not react at all. Mm-hmm, let them come and, let them go. Yeah, and that's the. This is the star, star, star of the whole episode. Call it what you want. Learn this flexibility piece and also look at this as maybe your goal is positive body image and you want to learn ways to love yourself and appreciate your appearance and have those pieces. Maybe that part of it resonated with you the most. That's awesome, mm-hmm. But maybe you wake up and you start having all these negative thoughts about yourself and on that day, the distance between your thoughts and positive body image feel like that enormous canyon.

  Speaker 2: 31:24

  Mm-hmm.

  Speaker 1: 31:25

  Is neutral body image more accessible.

  Speaker 2: 31:28

  Yeah.

  Speaker 1: 31:29

  Is accepting your body more accessible. Make that be the answer. That's what this body image flexibility is about. Is what is accessible to you in each of these experiences, in this series of thoughts you're having right now. Yeah, so an example of practicing body image flexibility You're at lunch with your great uncle, who is forced to watch a video of you powerlifting Sound familiar, sturdy girl, mm-hmm. And he calls you a sturdy girl and makes comments about the size of your body not being what it should be.

  Speaker 2: 32:06

  Yeah, the physical appearance.

  Speaker 1: 32:08

  Yeah, so you get these comments. And sure was I able to turn it around. Yes, but initially it was rude, yeah, and those negative thoughts about my body came up.

  Speaker 2: 32:20

  Yeah.

  Speaker 1: 32:21

  Of like well, you're like, I used to be smaller and I used to look different and I used to see me before and known me my whole life.

  Speaker 2: 32:27

  So maybe I should be smaller. Oh, should, should, should.

  Speaker 1: 32:32

  But I let those negative emotions, those feelings come up, yeah. And instead of hooking myself on those Inspiraling, I realized sturdy means not fragile, yeah. Sturdy means that I am not weak, yeah, Strong. And instead it's recognizing that most people in this situation would react the same way I did, which was to like gasp and want to tell him he was being a rude jerk.

  Speaker 2: 33:02

  Yeah.

  Speaker 1: 33:04

  But that pause between their words and my reaction took me from what the hell to. I'm actually very sturdy, yeah, thank you, and have that piece of self kindness, have that relation of common humanity, that piece of self compassion that says most people would have the same reaction I did. Most people go through these similar situations, yeah, and remind myself that it's not about my appearance, because I feel really freaking strong and actually really great in this body most of the time.

  Speaker 2: 33:37

  Yeah. So, there's an example? Yeah, do you have one? I mean, even when I was kind of in the height of lifting more, I definitely have had more than one family member comment on my shoulder size or the way my arms looked. I mean, even when I got married, I think in my wedding photos my arms looked big, not big as in like I was lifting a lot at the time they looked amazing.

  Speaker 1: 34:06

  They were very muscular.

  Speaker 2: 34:07

  They were very muscular. But I definitely got some comments on that. And that's funny because at first I was like, like I'm not small, but at the same time I was always proud of it. So when they commented that, they saw it as a negative but I saw it as a positive.

  Speaker 1: 34:21

  But did it make you question yourself in the moment when you have family members that are like saying things in a negative way about an appearance based thing that you actually felt good because you worked your ass off to?

  Speaker 2: 34:34

  build bolder shoulders, yeah, but it always seemed to have that moment where, when it first comes out, where you kind of think about it and they're like, okay, I see where this comments going yeah, and it's kind of like recognizing what they're saying but also knowing, like how I feel about the way that I looked, yeah, and I was like, well, I think I look great, so you feel good in your body.

  Speaker 1: 34:57

  Yeah, you recognize that. Maybe for them, their perspective on body image or healthy body, as I'm using your quotes is a smaller body. Yeah, is someone who has a petite and feminine frame or something like that, and that's what they've internalized. That's something for me that I've had to recognize when people make comments about my body is it's often a reflection on their internalized norms for bodies? Yeah, but awesome example body image flexibility.

  Speaker 2: 35:30

  I love how we always look of a family member example. We love our family, we love them. Yes, we really do.

  Speaker 1: 35:37

  So the last part of this episode is about the sturdy girl mindset. And then, just to wrap this up all together, one big piece of this Our bodies are forever changing. Our relationship with our bodies is ever changing. Pick the type of body image that resonates the most with you. If none of them fully resonate with you, take it on a day by day basis of what is going to help you get through the day in a healthy, constructive way. Is it body positivity, body neutrality, body respect, body acceptance, body love, body appreciation, confidence, body liberation. These all mean that you work on improving the relationship with yourself, with acceptance and appreciation of your body, and I don't say any of this to minimize the struggle that it takes to work on a healthy body image, to work on our relationship with ourself. I say this because I want you to find the term that resonates with you most and go with that work on that and know that you might be going between them.

  Speaker 2: 36:50

  Maybe you're in the boat of flexibility and you might have days where you're very positive, your body positive, and days where you need to be really neutral or you know, or just accepting Absolutely.

  Speaker 1: 37:02

  And that's. That's really no matter what type you choose. There are a few key things to focus on, and that's where Sturdy Girl comes in, where we talk about so much as far as resilience physical and mental but when body image disturbances come up, how do you respond? And another key thing with that your body is worthy of respect and care, no matter its physical appearance or your feelings about your body. That is the number one takeaway, sturdy Girl mindset, whether you call it any other type of body image, your body is worthy of respect and care. I don't care how you were feeling about it. I don't care if you have that negative body image space or you're in this negative spiral. You still need to take care of you. Yeah, Are you eating nutritious foods? Are you sleeping enough? Are you drinking enough water? Are you dehydrated, houseplant? Are you moving your body in ways that feel good to you? Are you finding ways to play? I just finished a book about playing and the science of play and now I'm obsessed, so that's important.

  Speaker 2: 38:20

  I do a lot of playing.

  Speaker 1: 38:22

  It's. It is so important as a healthy human to play. But also the words you say to yourself matter, and that's another thing in this body respect piece, the words, the tone, the things that you say. Would you say them to a friend, right, that friend test from last week? And another piece of that is your self-worth is not defined by your appearance. So resilience, I'm being sure you know your body is worthy of respect and care, no matter how you're feeling, Understanding that your body image will fluctuate. So practicing that piece of body image, flexibility is super important, no matter what camp of body image you fall into. Lastly, the relationship with yourself is the longest and most intimate of any you'll ever have. It's worth cultivating a good one. I love that. I think I've said this in every episode, but it just. Megan and I are both married. Think about being with your partner. Could you be in a long-term relationship with them if they constantly said mean things to you? Could you be in a long-term relationship with someone that you didn't love or at least like, or at least find nice things to say? We are stuck in our heads from the beginning to the end. If we're not treating ourselves with respect, kindness, compassion, taking care of ourselves. What are we doing? Okay, I think that I'm like, I feel like fired up right now because I freaking love everything about this. Yeah, and I didn't know that this is how we were going to conclude this episode until I was doing all this research and I mean, megan knows this. I'll tell you guys, I had 20 pages of notes for this episode alone and I had to sit with Megan for over. There was a lot of editing two hours at this point, bringing it down to four, four and a half, because there was so much information I wanted to impart here about the research and the nuance and all of those pieces. And then you realize the similarities between each of these modalities and realize they all include that body of respect, they all include that personal resilience, they all include that cognitive flexibility piece of the space between action and reaction and what we want to take away from that. Yeah, they all include that relationship with ourselves. What more can we ask for? Do we have anything else to add? You're just smiling over there.

  Speaker 2: 41:17

  Because I love this, you're so passionate about it, I'm like, yeah, go on.

  Speaker 1: 41:20

  You see me like waving my arms over here.

  Speaker 2: 41:23

  Okay, it was your moment. I was giving it your own. Thank you, thank you.

  Speaker 1: 41:27

  I'm just going to drop the mic and walk away now. Was there one takeaway from this for you, from all of this reading that I threw your way?

  Speaker 2: 41:39

  I didn't really have a word for it, but I think that I honestly resonate the most with body neutrality. Yeah, and I definitely think that my opinion on what body positivity has changed.

  Speaker 1: 41:52

  No, I completely agree and I think on a day to day there is this level of body image neutrality for me, just in that recognition of respect, self-care, mindfulness. I talked about this with my therapist today. Actually I said that for a long time the thought of mindfulness felt woo-woo and I kind of pushed it aside. And in the last few months, as I started doing all this reading for Sturdy Girl, realizing the importance of mindfulness as just being able to be aware of your thoughts, be aware of where you are in the space and time, of that groundedness. It's not woo-woo, it's being able to be present in our own bodies. And that's so important. So for me, on a day to day, there is that piece of body image neutrality, but there are portions of the others that I take away too. So that's why I just talking about that Sturdy Girl mindset for me of resilience, of respect of self-care, and leaving it at that, can I practice that cognitive flexibility, that body image flexibility on the day to day? That, for me, is the biggest takeaway that I've learned just from doing this research.

  Speaker 2: 43:07

  Your 20 pages. You brought it down.

  Speaker 1: 43:11

  It was good. It was good, yeah. So thanks so much for listening. Friends, this is the end of episode three. You get to decide. Is body positivity the answer for you?

  Speaker 2: 43:23

  It's not for us and not for me, but definitely aspects of it.

  Speaker 1: 43:28

  Absolutely. Yeah, we hope you enjoyed listening. Catch us next week as we do our very first interview with a wonderful friend and dietitian, jen Scott, as we discuss body image, disordered eating and all that that entails. Talk to you soon, friends. Bye. If you enjoyed this podcast episode, please feel free to follow, subscribe, like whatever the heck you do with podcasts. As always, stay sturdy, friends, and I'll talk to you next week.

  Speaker 2: 43:58

  Goodbye

Episode 2: Navigating Bad Body Image Days: strategies for living a big, rad life

Every one of us, at some point in our lives, has faced the struggles of body image. It's those days when you teeter on the edge of a negative body image spiral that can be incredibly challenging. This episode of Sturdy Girl dives into these struggles, sharing personal experiences and offering practical strategies to navigate these challenging days.

The episode begins with hosts Megan and Jess opening up about their own experiences with body image anxieties. Megan shares her apprehensions about appearing in a swimsuit during a resort trip, while Jess talks about her battles with the scale in the often unforgiving world of powerlifting. The shared experiences aim to offer solace and provide practical strategies for dealing with tough body image days.

Throughout the episode, we explore the deeper aspects of body image, revealing that it extends far beyond physical appearance. Coping strategies are discussed, including recognizing triggers for negative body image thoughts, dealing with discomfort, developing resilience, and learning to let go of negative thoughts without judgment. It's all about embarking on a journey of self-awareness and acceptance, and we're right there with you.

One of the key takeaways from this episode is the transformative power of self-compassion when dealing with body image issues. We delve into how accepting our imperfections and appreciating our bodies for all they do can help shift our mindset towards positivity. It's about understanding that the key to feeling better in your body lies in how you think about it and treat it.

We discuss how our first few thoughts in the morning can set the tone for the day, and the power of 'enoughness' in helping to create a better relationship with ourselves. We emphasize the importance of pivoting away from the obsession with appearance and celebrating the big, rad life you deserve.

In this episode, we also explore the concept of act or acceptance and commitment therapy, and how it can assist us on our journey of self-acceptance. This therapy modality encourages us to let our thoughts come up and let them go, helping us to not identify with them. This is a practice that takes time, patience, and consistent effort.

Lastly, we discuss the importance of treating your body with respect, even on days when you may not like the way it looks. We stress the importance of nourishing your body with nutritious foods, regular movement, and adequate rest and recovery.

In summary, this episode offers practical, real-world advice on how to navigate body image struggles. We firmly believe that self-compassion and acceptance are the keys to overcoming body image struggles. Remember, you are more than your body image. Celebrate the big, rad life you deserve.

• Full Transcript

  Jess: 0:01

  Hello, friends, 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 the 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 two of Sturdy Girl. Today, we're going to talk about getting through bad body image days, because we all have them, but how the heck do we get through them? I'm your host, jess Heiss, joined by my co-host, megan. Hello. What's new host training, then?

  Megan: 0:41

  Are you done with racing season? I am done with racing season for mountain, for Enduro stuff. I just got back from Whistler so I've spent three days in Canada. So that was super fun. It was for a bike trip, so we were mainly just riding, but for fun, not racing.

  Jess: 0:56

  That's awesome, yes, all for fun. Okay, and then? So, now that you're in done with racing, are you back to Olympic lifting?

  Megan: 1:04

  Yes, I will be. This week was kind of like a reset rest. I didn't do a whole lot. Honestly, it's a holiday week, enjoy yourself, walk the dogs. But I will be starting back up. I'm going to start my program and then, hopefully, as long as things go well, do a competition Yay.

  Jess: 1:24

  What about you? Well, speaking of comps, I am 10 weeks out from my next part of the week, so that's what's been going on. I'm lifting like four days a week right now, running about two just to kind of keep that up, but yeah, lifting's going well. This was a deal.

  Megan: 1:42

  How's it feeling? You feel like you're hitting your numbers and stuff. Well, last week.

  Jess: 1:46

  week before I hit a well, I hit my squat PR a second time at a better RPE. Nice, so 285,. About an RPE, I'm going to say 8.5 to 9.

  Megan: 2:02

  That's nice 300 is going to fall in 10 weeks.

  Jess: 2:08

  That is the goal. Bench is bench, it's just staying consistently the same.

  Megan: 2:17

  You've gotten a lot better at bench.

  Jess: 2:19

  That takes time, though the road to 200 bench is going to be long, I'm accepting that. I will be very patient. It'll get there eventually. Deadlift is feeling good. This is D-load week, so this week was just like three by five, at like 60%.

  Megan: 2:39

  Those are the nicest though.

  Jess: 2:42

  It's super easy, so that's feeling good. Running is a little trudgy these days, but I just I mean, I run outside because it's been a little bit cooler, or I hop in the treadmill and throw some Netflix on. So yeah, training is feeling good. I don't know what I'll do after that. To be honest, like this, this lifting season has felt super fun.

  Megan: 3:01

  Yeah, and do you have any races planned or no?

  Jess: 3:04

  No, I, honestly I've been feeling the itch to do a marathon again. It's been.

  Megan: 3:08

  I will not be joining you. For that, come cheer me on. I'll come support you. Yes, I'll bring cookies, bring a cowbell.

  Jess: 3:15

  Yeah, no, I've been having the marathon. It's been four years, four and a half years.

  Megan: 3:20

  Yeah, it's my last, so. So you're going to do a marathon, or do you think you'll do a half? Well, I did a half in the spring. Oh, that's straight. I think I've got that last time.

  Jess: 3:28

  Yeah, I did a half in the spring. I missed a trail marker, two trail markers and it was pouring rain sideways the whole time. Oh, fun and.

  Megan: 3:39

  I ended up running like 15 miles instead of 13. Just training for the marathon, it was ridiculous.

  Jess: 3:44

  So no, I don't know. I don't know what's next. So just kind of see how I'm feeling. I may very well just dive right into marathon again, because my last long race I ran a 50K that's, but that was self-supported, so unofficial, I guess. Unofficial race yeah, that was a wildwood trail end to end for my 30th birthday and then I, like, got done and ate an entire pizza by myself. It was amazing, yeah. So that's training for me. Thanks, based on a lot of the feedback after the first episode, we wanted to get a little more personal, a little more of our body image struggles. This isn't just learning, we also want to make the connections, because it's all personal.

  Megan: 4:27

  The most recent time that I can think of when I struggled with it was this past weekend. I just went to Whistler. I left the country for the first time. Congratulations 30 something year old Megan. I know it was only about our time. We were at the hot tub in our resort. I don't normally wear swimsuits, it's not my thing. I'm wearing sports bras and shorts. It is way more accessible. Totally, totally sports bras Also. Then you can do all your activities in them and it's fine.

  Jess: 4:53

  It keeps the girls contained. You know like, yes, very athletic. What kind of swimsuit were you rocking?

  Megan: 4:59

  It was a full one piece, which you know you'd think one piece Okay, that's a little tame, but like a one piece when you're not the most well in doubt on the top and when you've got a little bit of a pear shape too, is you know, regardless of the actual shape, like how you were not feeling good in this. So that day we had definitely not been eating great. I had been snacking pretty much all day. It's a little bloated, a little on the fluffy side for me, just the way the fluffy feels the fluffy feels. So we went to the hot tub. I put in my one piece. I'm like looking in the mirror and I'm just like, oh my goodness, I look so different than what I had envisioned.

  Jess: 5:41

  It's not an article of clothing that you wear normally. So right away, I'm already uncomfortable.

  Megan: 5:46

  It feels tight.

  Jess: 5:46

  Okay, was this the one was this like the kind of one piece that I like? I've yet to find a one piece that feels good because I have a longer torso and then you like tell me about it, like, up the butt, up the front like it's like dipped down so you get the full side boom thing. Is that what happens?

  Megan: 6:04

  Oh yeah, and because, because I I don't have a lot going on top, I feel like the top just kind of comes down and I constantly am fighting with it to be like please just cover the top. It's a struggle. I was going out there and I was like, and I'm just with my friends who it doesn't matter you know you still have the feels in your body. Yeah, and I'm going with a bunch of people I don't know, and it's just a new setting, and so I'm kind of like trotting my way to the hot tub, like oh no, how's this going to go, how's this going to look? But by the end of it it really didn't matter. I was having a fun time, and once you kind of get past it it's all right.

  Jess: 6:38

  You still wore the swimsuit, or the sun still got in the hot tub Got a hot tub.

  Megan: 6:42

  Yeah, how'd a good time.

  Jess: 6:44

  You're friends weren't like. What are you wearing, oh, of course not.

  Megan: 6:49

  In fact, I think my friend Trudy's probably like that's a cute swimsuit. I'm like black that out and just saying you're like dad.

  Jess: 6:55

  You know how many times I've had to like pick this one. Do you come on? Uh huh.

  Megan: 6:59

  Mainly just try and pull up, because you know there's probably something popping out of the top.

  Jess: 7:02

  So I mean, but that's what happens in swimsuits A hundred percent. You wore the thing I did. You were uncomfortable in your body, had some of those negative thoughts, yep, but still wore it and did the activities that you enjoyed.

  Megan: 7:16

  Yeah, a hundred percent.

  Jess: 7:18

  End of story. Yeah, you showed up. It was still those thoughts in that kind of like negative thought spiral, which we'll talk about in a minute, but that's super important. Yeah, I think for me bad body image day I stepped on a scale for the first time since last November and I don't want to be triggering and talk about number specifics, but it was a larger number for me than I have seen since the beginning of my fitness journey in 2010. And one thing with competitive powerlifting is there are weight classes. Yep, and I think it was out of said weight class and realized I hadn't changed really anything like what I've been eating. I hadn't really changed my level of physical activity. So it was like why is this happening?

  Megan: 8:03

  What in the world?

  Jess: 8:04

  Yeah, and it was definitely a negative thought spiral of how, the after that this happened and definitely letting those thoughts come up and there was that a bit of spiral and then the realization of I'm stronger than I was Mm-hmm.

  Megan: 8:20

  It gained a lot of muscle, sure.

  Jess: 8:22

  Yeah, I have gained muscle. I am still doing the things that I enjoy without hindrance. I still feel, generally speaking, good in my body.

  Megan: 8:32

  Mm-hmm.

  Jess: 8:33

  That number at the end of the day doesn't really matter, but the thoughts about my body shifted for a little bit. Oh my God, I've let myself go. Oh yeah.

  Megan: 8:42

  I feel that way. Yeah, I was just recently. I went to the doctor and they weighed me and it was the same thing where I was like, oh, because I don't ever weigh myself. No, it's just. You know, it is what it is, it's just not a priority. I don't in general either. Plus, I feel like it. Yeah, I view myself.

  Jess: 8:56

  That's kind of the relationship you have with that number for sure. Oh my gosh, If we had more time I'd tell you a story from I've changed providers because they tried to talk to me about my weight.

  Megan: 9:05

  Oh yeah, they've done that to me too. My BMI was too high.

  Jess: 9:09

  Oh, don't get me started on BMI. I was marathon training and I was running 50 mile weeks.

  Megan: 9:18

  Let's say on average.

  Jess: 9:20

  And the doctor, without even looking at me, looked at my weight and started talking to me about BMI and asking me how I was going to adjust my diet and exercise to improve my BMI. Yeah, 26 years old and putting in crazy work for my marathon, it was just a whole thing. Anyways, bad body image days yeah, no matter how good like using our quotes here your body images, you're still going to have bad body image days. So the whole point of this episode is for us to talk about tangible ways to help get through those days. These are going to come up. We talked in the last episode about body acceptance, body image resilience and how those things are a practice. We have good days and bad, and there are things that take that status quo of our body image and either improve it or make it worse. So those negative body image days and negative spiral and that's what we want to focus on today is how we can cope and still thrive when we have these kinds of days. And if you haven't listened, I highly recommend jumping into the first episode, which is what is body image, and go over that definition and then the factors that help shape it, just to get an idea of our foundation for Sturdy Girl going forward.

  Megan: 10:34

  And you should just listen to the first episode. You can just ramble some more, it's fine, all right.

  Jess: 10:39

  Do you want to kick us off? I want to talk about body image disruptions and calm disturbances.

  Megan: 10:45

  Yeah, I really liked this metaphor that you used for it, which was you're waiting in the ocean, in your treading water, and the waves are small, you're going with the flow, and then these disruptions can be, these big waves that come through, they knock you and they hit you and you're off course.

  Jess: 10:59

  Yeah. So body image disruptions are like if you're waiting in the water it can be small waves or they can be the ones that try to drown you, yes, yeah. So these thoughts that come up and these days that come up waves are the triggers of a bad body image day, and those can be things like scrolling social media, yeah, yeah, comparison to our past selves to others. This can be fullness, like if you overate at a meal and you were 10 out of 10 uncomfortably full. It can be wearing clothes that you're not comfortable in, yeah, like a one piece, yeah Right. It can be looking at old pictures of yourself seeing family we talked about this last week. Family plays a big part in body image. Is it not being able to work out because of illness or injury or seasons of life, eating foods that might not agree with you?

  Megan: 11:49

  Yeah, I have this problem all the time. Dairy or just anything.

  Jess: 11:55

  There's so many more than that, right, but the big triggers that can bring these thoughts up yeah, let's talk about ways to cope, okay, and these waves come crashing over us.

  Megan: 12:08

  How do we keep going? How do we cope with it?

  Jess: 12:11

  Well, there's some pretty crappy ways that we cope.

  Megan: 12:13

  They're mainly crappy ways.

  Jess: 12:15

  We're going to talk about that first and then we'll go into the better ways to cope to be a healthier human. The first crappy way we cope is sinking into shame, sinking into discomfort, insecurity. This furthers the spiral.

  Megan: 12:32

  Yeah, and again, I think we talked a bit about this last time. Shame is such a big part of it. Shame can be so many different things. You shame yourself for how you eat. You shame yourself for what you're looking like that day, and it couldn't even be weight.

  Jess: 12:44

  It could be oh, my skin looks bad and it's a lot of times we're shaming ourselves for how we're feeling and not actually how we appear.

  Megan: 12:51

  Yes.

  Jess: 12:51

  It's a mental piece versus actually how we look. Yep, the next way that we cope is clinging to our comfort zone or taking some kind of self-defensive action, and I want to clarify some of these points. In here we talk about being negative ways to cope. These can also be ways to cope in a positive way, to feel good in our bodies. I want to preface that it's a both and situation. When we talk about clinging to a comfort zone or taking these actions, we talk about quick fixes of appearance fixing so makeup, changing your hairstyle, getting new clothes, retail therapy, going for fillers and Botox, changing your diet a new diet, looking better in order to feel better Right, so changing our appearance on the outside, when it's actually how we're feeling on the inside? Yeah, right, it's a way to cope.

  Megan: 13:39

  Right, but at the same time, it could be okay that you want to do some of these things for your outside appearance. If you're comfortable with getting Botox, it's not. Yeah, no, no, no, shame for it. None of these things are bad.

  Jess: 13:50

  Yes, that's not our point. Yeah, it's. If your response to feeling shitty in your body is to go out and get breast implants, fix it, because that's going to hopefully make you feel better. Yeah, that's not the way that we want to cope. You can wear makeup as a form of self-expression, like that again, not our point, our point being Such a fun self-expression. Yeah, oh absolutely, and this is a total side tangent, but one of the things in reading about body image research and a lot of people, when they're talking body positivity or the people who talk about body acceptance and body neutrality, go really hard on. You shouldn't care about your appearance and like that's not the point.

  Megan: 14:32

  No, it's the, and if you want to care about your appearance, that's totally fine, yeah.

  Jess: 14:37

  It's. The differentiation between body image is how you feel about your body. Yeah, not about how you actually look. If you feel freaking awesome, putting on amazing winged eyeliner and know how to contour, go for it.

  Megan: 14:52

  I do not possess those skills, please contact me to help. Don't know how to do this Same, so another one is seeking reassurance from others, and so this can be both positive and negative of your seeking reassurance in hopes to help yourself.

  Jess: 15:10

  Yeah, well, and I think seeking reassurance this is more like I want to go to my partner and seek the reassurance to make me feel better about myself. Yeah, versus, I think it's perfectly healthy within a relationship to have reassurance yes, yes, absolutely.

  Megan: 15:24

  So maybe a difference of the two.

  Jess: 15:26

  Yeah, this is the same where we're talking about quick fixes. It's a both and situation, right?

  Megan: 15:32

  Yeah.

  Jess: 15:32

  That's a big point here. Another thing that we do to cope is to avoid the situations that trigger a negative body image response Putting on the one piece to ensue, yeah, and going to the hot tub, to the beach, wearing certain clothes. At the gym, trying on clothes, going into dressing rooms trying on jeans. Oh my goodness Hard past or I've had this conversation a lot in the last few years with a big change in working from home Is the people who there's. It's a big hurdle to get dressed and leave the house, just the overwhelm piece of. I'm really uncomfortable with normal people clothes.

  Megan: 16:11

  Yeah, and I think, as someone who, like, works remote, you go for so long without wearing the normal clothes that you need to wear to the office. So by the time you're trying to get reestablished and, like I had to go into the office probably two, three weeks ago, had to put on hard pants, I like to call them, and like a real shirt, and just switching to that and kind of trying to get back in that and I was like, oh, everything feels really tight, I feel really really snug and it could actually have felt like that before, but I mean it's been so long Awareness.

  Jess: 16:41

  I work in an office but I wear scrubs yeah, it's basically stretchy pants.

  Megan: 16:45

  It's basically what I wear. Pajamas yeah, it's basically pajamas.

  Jess: 16:47

  Well, my point being, I don't wear pants with waistbands. They're all stretchy pants, or I mean workout clothes or running clothes, and when I put jeans on, I'm like whoa, those are tight. It's a big difference. Okay, yeah, okay. The last way that we cope and this is a positive one it has been termed in a couple of different books to rise with resilience. So getting to choose how you respond to these disruptions, it is accepting the discomfort and acknowledging that it's neither good nor bad, it's merely a feeling, and being able to come out of that and say I can still do the things that I enjoy doing, even if I'm uncomfortable. That discomfort doesn't have to change or ruin my day.

  Megan: 17:32

  Mm-hmm.

  Jess: 17:33

  I think that's a big part of it, which that kind of puts us right into. How do we get through a bad body image day? What are some good coping strategies that we can go over? Our first tip to getting through a bad body image day and coping in a positive way is building awareness. So think about waiting in the ocean and those waves as they come up. Building awareness can be like, I don't know, learning to surf, how to ride the wave right. It's just becoming aware of the thoughts in our head and recognizing and starting to notice when that negative spiral happens.

  Megan: 18:05

  And this is without judgment, like star star star without judgment, yeah, and it doesn't mean that you necessarily need to fix what you're thinking. It's just kind of being aware that you're having that thought. Being aware of the thoughts that come up.

  Jess: 18:17

  You get up in the morning, You're bloated because you're a few days out from your period and you walk into the bathroom and glance in the mirror and you're like, oh my God. I'm never going to have a flat stomach and I just I feel so ugly and like look at this stomach and these pajamas just don't fit Like they used to and God, I feel like I'm gaining weight again, rationally. You know, your body comp hasn't changed overnight, but you have those feelings that come up. And bringing awareness simply means that when those thoughts come up, you acknowledge oh, hey, I am starting off the stay in a negative body image space or hey, I'm noticing negative thoughts popping up about my body right now. You acknowledge how you're feeling, without judgment, without getting upset at ourselves for feeling this way, because we can't change something by hating it. That's a big thing here. No judgment, we're not trying to hate on our body. It's acknowledging that we all get these feelings from time to time. We know they're going to pass and sometimes this can feel really frustrating If you just be like everyone goes through this it's going to pass.

  Megan: 19:17

  It doesn't feel like that when you're in it. No, not at all.

  Jess: 19:19

  But at the same time, it is reassuring to know that all of us struggle with this.

  Megan: 19:24

  Yeah, and I think especially I mean even this morning. I feel like I struggled very heavily with this because I'm was a CEO was a story. You, right now, it's me yes, 100%. You have your comfy shorts on today. Oh yeah, I know I've been complaining about them, even though they're the comfy ones.

  Jess: 19:42

  Just need stretchy shorts like mine. But another piece of this awareness, too, is as we start to acknowledge these thoughts. Is it building awareness around? Maybe what triggered the body image disturbance? Was it some of the triggers we mentioned before? Is it a change in the level of stress in our lives? Is it not sleeping well? Is it being in need of more love or reassurance based on current events in our lives? If we can start to build awareness around what our triggers are, we can be better prepared for how we handle them and how we respond.

  Megan: 20:16

  Yeah, and I think that kind of goes into the next one. This one sounds very woo-woo sometimes but, like changing your mindset, it seems like it's super broad to yes. Yes, but I think that your body doesn't need to be perfect for you to be able to live your life fully and yeah. Just have being able to recognize that and still be able to do your activities. And you know I might have you having a negative Thought come into my head about my body, but that doesn't mean that it's going to control everything that I can do that day.

  Jess: 20:45

  Yeah, you don't need to look different in order to treat your body well, to be respectful, to be able to continue to live your life, and the whole point with this tip is Changing your mindset, is more just becoming aware of what kind of relationship you have with your body and still being able to continue living your life, even with those thoughts, knowing that those feelings pass, acknowledging them, feeling them, letting them go, not having to identify with them, and this is throughout every one of these tips interwoven is something that I want to acknowledge here. It's a type of therapy. It's called act or acceptance and commitment therapy. This is a whole thing. We can have a whole podcast episode, but you'll notice this thread and I noticed this thread too through a lot of the reading about body image, research and even self-confidence Was this modality and the essence of it is learning to Let thoughts come up and let them go, not identify with them. Mm-hmm and rationally. I know it's not as easy as just letting go or unhooking. It's a practice, it takes a lot of time. It does and I don't want to discredit that at all, so don't think I'm glossing over that but it takes Awareness, what we just talked about. It takes time, it takes patience, it takes practice. You can't just be like, oh you know, I heard on this podcast that if I have these negative thoughts that I just like let them go and then I'm fine.

  Megan: 22:06

  Yeah, and you have to kind of identify what is letting that go. Mean yeah, yeah, how do you?

  Jess: 22:11

  not get hooked on it. Yeah, and that's a big piece of this too. It's noticing the thoughts that come up, identifying them is, hey, I'm having negative thoughts, or here's that judgy voice again, yeah, and then ask yourself where they're coming from, why they might have arisen, and recognize that you are not your thoughts. That's the big, powerful piece of this mindset is you are not your thoughts. As much as we identify with them. We don't have to, and this is the practice of recognizing too, where we said you can still live your life Even when these things arise.

  Megan: 22:46

  It wasn't until I started going through your stuff that I realized that I'm doing this already in therapy with so many other things.

  Jess: 22:53

  Yeah, you were you're talking earlier about how this type of thought process helps a lot from unhooking from anxiety.

  Megan: 22:59

  Oh yeah, I mean I've dealt with anxiety my whole life but really last like 10 years, a little bit more acute I. But I've noticed that my therapist kind of started to bring in this, like we acknowledge the thoughts and then we let them pass. And I think it's funny that you just say it and you're like, oh, how you know, how is that possible? Where's the application? Yes, but when you actually start to practice it, it does help.

  Jess: 23:23

  It helps to kind of say, calm him down. But it helps to bring yourself back to the present moment, because I know, for me from a body image perspective and this could even extrapolate into anxiety too is like I don't realize how much those thoughts are just coming up, coming up, coming up, coming up all at once and they're all stemming from the same thing of I'm wearing these pants that give me this insane muffin top and I feel really uncomfortable and somehow that's created this entire spiral and now I don't think that I'm worthy of the life that I'm living or do the things I want to do. And you're like how did this happen?

  Megan: 24:00

  How did I get here?

  Jess: 24:02

  Yeah, it's huge and that's that's a half of this is just that practice piece. The next point we want to get into is treating your body with respect. This is something that I'm still reading quite a bit about, just talking about self respect, body respect, and the main point here is we don't want to punish our physical body for how our brain is feeling. We want to nourish it with nutritious foods. Regular movement, adequate rest and recovery Like these are super important when we start to have those negative thoughts, that negative spiral is we're not going to go force ourselves into extreme behaviors. How can we still be respectful of our body and take care of it, recognizing that our body's not the problem?

  Megan: 24:53

  Yeah, and I know personally, I used to like anytime that I would eat more than I needed, or let's say I had a heavy weekend or I went out or something like that. I would notice these patterns were the whole other week. I was doing so much cardio and trying so hard to counter what I did.

  Jess: 25:08

  Well, we had a holiday weekend, last weekend and there's always a conversation around you didn't fall off the wagon over the weekend, you enjoyed yourself. Yeah, we have ebbs and flows in those things, but it is when you change the routine, change what you're doing, change what you're eating that can be a trigger. So treating our body with respect is wearing the comfortable clothes or the clothes that you feel good in your body. When you were having a negative body image day, it might not be the day to wear the spandex shorts and crop top. It might be the day to embrace the oversized t-shirt and your favorite Viori joggers. Leaving aside the fitted things that make you uncomfortable or the jeans that give you muffin top or that kind of thing. Wear the alpha that you feel good in and let that be one less thing to be a trigger.

  Megan: 25:52

  Yeah, and so many things can play into that, like what have you been eating that day? Are you about to start your period? Sometimes clothes just feel uncomfortable on you and it has nothing to do with your actual body, it's just how you're feeling. Yeah, yeah.

  Jess: 26:05

  That's huge. And I think another piece of this, too, talking about body respect, is you may not like the way your body looks today, but can you still do the things that are important to you? We've touched on this a couple times already in this episode. We can still do what we value and still do the things that we want to or need to do in that day, even if we're dealing with a bit of body discomfort. And another piece to that talking about respect is shifting that attention to the activities that you want to or need to do, paying attention to what's important. So this is shifting away from appearance and onto the doing piece. This is showing up for yourself and your life values, and values are something that I could go off in a full tangent about, but it's really something that creates a compass for how we make decisions in life and that's like values based living. But we're going to we'll talk way more about that in another episode. Might be something worth googling in the meantime if you're curious. But this is such a great way to base your decisions. Am I living my values.

  Megan: 27:07

  I'm actually really interested in this one, because when you first said your values, it just makes me think of corporate world, where you're like here's our core values.

  Jess: 27:16

  I'm missing the most. Like you know, brene Brown talks about wholehearted living. Yes, Talks about, you know is one of your values family.

  Megan: 27:25

  Is it? Community Is it? But when we talked about it, I completely had a different outlook on it.

  Jess: 27:29

  Showing up boldly. This is not corporate values.

  Megan: 27:31

  mission statement, vision value 100% and that's why I loved when you brought it up, because I feel like to me as someone who's been like working in a company forever. When you hear the words, you're like huh. But then when you start to actually talk about it and realize what it means, you're like, oh, that's really important it does, yeah, it does help.

  Jess: 27:49

  So more on this later.

  Megan: 27:51

  Sorry, I'll be back.

  Jess: 27:53

  Okay, next tip Practicing self compassion. So we touched on self compassion quite a bit in the last episode. I won't go too much into detail about it, but there are three parts to it, and that's self kindness, mindfulness and common humanity. Basically, you are not alone in your struggles. That's the whole point of self compassion is that moment where we're not just grind hard, no days off, discipline over motivation and all of those things Like being self compassionate and knowing what is the best answer here to take care of myself, to nourish my body, to respect my body.

  Megan: 28:30

  Yeah, about finding the balance that you have. So we have this as the friend test. You know, would I say this to a friend?

  Jess: 28:36

  Yeah, would I recommend that you do this thing to help your headspace.

  Megan: 28:41

  Yeah.

  Jess: 28:42

  Right, is it? You go into this negative body image spiral and you go on a run? Are you going on the run and you're punishing yourself with your paces? To quote fix your bad body image day? Or are you going for a run because movement is good for your mind and for your body and it's a way to reconnect to yourself at a pace that's comfortable and enjoyable? There's a difference. So it's not saying don't do this thing, but what would you recommend to a friend? Would you be like yeah, go out and try to PR your mile time? Yeah, that's going to make you feel better.

  Megan: 29:12

  Yeah, and how would you talk to them? I mean, what kind of tone of voice exactly would you say you wouldn't shame them into something? I mean, a good friend shouldn't shame you into something or be extra negative or make you feel down on yourself.

  Jess: 29:26

  Exactly Would you talk this way to a friend, and it's amazing how much you can catch yourself going. Oh my god, no, megan, I'd never say that to you. Yeah, I feel this voice in my head is like saying so much shit and it's ridiculous Very mean yeah yeah. Well, on the other side, in the last episode, the relationship we have with ourselves is the longest and most intimate relationship of our lives. How we speak to ourselves matters a lot, yeah, yeah. So one last thing in the practice self-compassion piece is one little mantra I like and that is practicing saying this to yourself I am human and we all have imperfections. To demand otherwise is to fail to accept reality. We're not perfect, we will never be perfect. We're all going to have these days and these feels, and our bodies are never going to look like the airbrush crap we see online. We rationally know this, but when we get in these negative body image spirals it is so hard for us to try and disengage from wishing we had a flat stomach and a giant butt and perfect boobs and super defined shoulders and whatever else. Whatever, the defined, perfect female body is Right. Yeah, the perfectly smooth skin, the airbrush look.

  Megan: 30:43

  Yeah, no, never.

  Jess: 30:44

  Never gonna look that way. So there's that piece, and then that goes right into our last tip for getting through a bad body image day, and that is taking a moment to appreciate. We can also call this practice in gratitude, but I feel like some of us might be resistant to that because gratitude has become such a buzzword and can also feel a bit woo-woo and so don't want to be like pull out your journals and let's do a gratitude practice. Like that's what I want, but I don't want it to just feel disingenuous. I want this to be taking a second to appreciate all the things your body does for you each and every day, every second of every day yeah, all the body processes. Being science nerd over here and being stoked on all the things that our body does without our conscious effort, appreciating that we can still get shit done even when we don't feel like we have the body we want or the body that we keep dreaming up that isn't reality, or we haven't reached our quote ideal weight, which, honestly, is bullshit. Let's be real.

  Megan: 31:46

  Yeah.

  Jess: 31:47

  Can we do the things we enjoy while feeling that discomfort?

  Megan: 31:51

  Yeah, and I know that you said it's a buzzword and I know that so many things now are like practice gratitude, but it really is important because if you can, even just when you wake up, if you're just like all right, well, these are the two things that I'm thankful for today, or if you're feeling down on the way that you're looking, or if you wake up in that headspace where you're feeling extra fluffy and unhappy with the way that you look, just kind of taking that moment to be like all right, these are the things that I can appreciate.

  Jess: 32:20

  Absolutely, I agree, and that's one thing. I can't remember where I heard this the first time. But talking about the moment you wake up and taking that time to appreciate some things, some things plural it can change your headspace for the rest of the day. That's not saying you sit down and get your journal out and write for 30 minutes which I love journaling and it can be super powerful as well. But this is even just as something as simple as sitting up in bed, putting your feet on the ground and saying I am so grateful for the fact that it's my birthday and I could agree with this today Happy birthday. It is. I am so thankful that I'm getting out of bed with enough time to sit my coffee on my back deck and enjoy the nice weather before the rains come. I don't know, whatever the heck it is, but I guess my point here. I read something recently that was talking about enoughness, yeah, and how much our minds can set us up for a good day or a bad day based on our first few thoughts in the morning. So if you set the alarm and you hit the snooze and hit snooze, and hit snooze, and finally you jump out of bed and it's like, oh my God, I don't have time, panic, I don't have enough time and then you look at your whoop or your watch or your sleep analytics because everyone tracks sleep these days, I feel like and it tells you that you did not get a great recovery score, and then you're thinking I did not get enough sleep. So within the first five minutes of waking up, you already don't have enough time or enough sleep, and then you're already in the space of not enoughness. So is it that big of a stretch to then start thinking I'm not enough, I don't have enough time to do these things, I'm not enough in this way?

  Megan: 34:12

  I'm not doing enough to be successful.

  Jess: 34:15

  Yeah, so just food for thought of how you start your day. And this isn't what do I want to say. This isn't having the perfect morning routine not our point but if you can bring yourself back to the moment and appreciate something and that's not saying appreciate your physical being or these physical characteristics or whatever, but having that little bit of gratitude brings us back to the present moment of hey, I'm alive. I'm alive doing the things that I enjoy around the people I love. Hopefully, that's our point. Yeah, I love it. Okay, the best way to improve how you feel in your body is to change how you think about it and how you treat it. I think that's summarizing this entire episode.

  Megan: 35:00

  Oh yeah, 100%, I think that.

  Jess: 35:02

  Yeah, I mean, I don't know you can't hate yourself into a healthy body image. Yeah, shaming yourselves into submission does not work. Saying the negative shit to try to motivate ourselves does not work. We're always going to have bad body image days that come up. Maybe they'll be less frequent as we improve our relationship with ourselves, but they will come up. We live in a modern society with access to media at all times and other people and old photos of ourselves and family members and friends and friends.

  Megan: 35:36

  Air quote maybe if they're like, if they're putting us in that video, tell your friends shame you yeah exactly Realistically, those days are going to come up no matter what.

  Jess: 35:44

  So what skills can you practice to know how to ride the waves as they come up? Hopefully, by listening to this episode, you have some new tools in your tool belt for building awareness without judgment, for practicing self-compassion, for taking a moment to appreciate gratitude, to change your mindset, to treat your body with respect. We loved going over this topic with you. We hope that next time you do have a bad body image day. Maybe one of these points will stick with you, maybe a couple. Maybe you hear our voices in the back of your head telling you that changing the way you feel can change your relationship with your body.

  Megan: 36:25

  Right, we hope that you enjoyed this whole dang episode and our rambles, and I just want to say happy birthday again. We are recording this on Jessica's birthday there are cookies down there?

  Jess: 36:37

  There are cookies. I did get an extra large coffee from Starbucks this morning. It was a great start to the day.

  Megan: 36:44

  Yeah, I'm probably going to eat more cookies after this.

  Jess: 36:48

  Guaranteed, and then we'll go to the beach and it's going to be great. All right, thanks so much for listening to episode two. Next week it will be more on body image and self-confidence. If you enjoyed this podcast episode, please feel free to follow, subscribe, like, whatever the heck you do with podcasts. As always, stay sturdy, friends and we'll talk to you next week.

  Megan: 37:09

  Goodbye

Episode 1: What is Body Image? (+3 tips to improve right now)

In the first episode of the Sturdy Girl podcast, we dive into a complex and often emotionally charged topic: body image. Our goal is not to provide a one-size-fits-all solution, but rather to explore how fostering resilience and body acceptance can help individuals on their unique journeys towards improved body image.

Body image, as we discuss in the episode, is a mental representation of oneself. It can be influenced by a myriad of factors, including media messages, societal norms, cultural messages, and personal experiences. Unfortunately, a staggering 70% of people worldwide struggle with body image issues at some point in their lives.

One way to improve body image is to shift the focus from physical appearance to functionality. This can mean appreciating what our bodies can do, rather than fixating on how they look. For instance, one can appreciate the ability to walk, run, dance, or lift weights rather than focusing on the size or shape of their body.

Another significant topic we discuss is the role of self-compassion in improving body image. Self-compassion is defined as the ability to be kind to oneself, to view one's difficulties as part of the common human experience, and to be mindful of one's distress without becoming overly identified with personal difficulties. By practicing self-compassion, we can learn to treat ourselves with kindness and understanding, rather than harsh judgment.

In the episode, we provide practical tips on how to improve body image. These include focusing on the things our bodies can do rather than their appearance, and exercising for functional reasons rather than aesthetics. We also emphasize the importance of acknowledging and accepting negative thoughts about our bodies, rather than trying to suppress or change them.

The Sturdy Girl podcast aims to empower listeners to cultivate a healthier body image and foster resilience and body acceptance. By discussing these topics openly and honestly, we hope to provide listeners with the tools they need to navigate their own body image journeys.

In conclusion, body image is a complex issue that affects a significant portion of the global population. By fostering resilience, practicing self-compassion, and focusing on functionality rather than appearance, we can work towards a healthier and more accepting view of our bodies. Remember, the Sturdy Girl podcast is here to support you on this journey.

• Full Transcript

  Jess: 0:02

  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. Today, we're going to talk about the Lee thing that sets the foundation for the whole season, and that's what is body image, how it forms and three tips to start improving your body image right now. I'm your host, jess Heiss, joined by my favorite co-host, megan. Are we talking about your last name or are you just Megan? I'm just Megan. Okay, you have too many last names. It's too many, okay. This was Megan. Megan was my first friend when I moved to Portland over a decade ago and has graciously offered to co-host with me just because Sturdy Girl had kind of a deep meaning for her and, obviously, for me. Do you want to tell our audience a little bit about the Sturdy Girl things you do?

  Megan: 1:02

  So I just came off of a race season for mountain biking, so I do Enduro racing. You're a racer, yeah yeah, and I also like to Olympic lift, I like to hike, I like to be active, and so I think for me that's kind of how I interpret being sturdy my perception of myself has changed so much and just being able to do all these activities and not really care so much about how I might look, you're physical, okay, yeah, absolutely.

  Jess: 1:33

  And putting myself out there. I love it. I guess a little Sturdy side note on myself. I was a marathon runner for gosh over a decade Everything from like 5Ks to 50Ks. Loved it and then forayed into powerlifting about three years ago and have been doing that predominantly. I did run a half, I guess this spring yeah, not that long ago but it's still mainly powerlifting and that's my Sturdy Girl story. I love hiking as well being outside. We live in the Pacific Northwest. There's a lot of hiking I think that lends itself to just getting outside a lot. But yeah, these are the voices you get to hear through the podcast. Let's dive right in and let's talk about what exactly body image is. Do you want to kick us off? Sure, I'd love to. What is body image?

  Megan: 2:19

  Body image is the mental representation of an individual, created of themselves, so it may or may not bear any relation to how one actually appears, which I think is pretty important, right.

  Jess: 2:32

  How much of it is about how we actually look versus our perception of our appearance, and that ties right into the types of body image. There are four types. So there's perceptual the way you see your body. Effective, the way you feel about your body this is effective, not effective. Cognitive the way you think about your body. And then behavioral, which is probably the big one here. Right, the way you act as a result of your body image. So it's not the way you act as a result of the way your body looks, it's the way you perceive your body. So four types there. Okay, so diving a little bit more into body image itself, there are so many different ways to identify body image. Right, we have positive and negative body image. You may have heard talk of body image neutrality, feeling neither positive nor negative about our bodies. There is I just realized I said there's a growing body of research on body acceptance and body image. Resilience is another term as well. So what's our goal here? Sturdy girl is its own mindset, with a big focus on resilience and body acceptance. But one thing I really want to just throw out there there's no right answer Isn't body positivity, body neutrality, body acceptance, body image resilience? That's really up for you, as a listener, to decide. Throughout this whole first season, our goal here is to help you understand two things One, combating negative body image as a practice and two, the way our body looks has nothing to do with our worth. Okay, so that first part, body image being a practice. It is like when people talk about happiness and achieving happiness, they're moments and they come and they go. So having a quote, unquote healthy body image, however you choose to define that isn't a constant state of being. It's not a state that you achieve and just stay there. It is a practice. It takes work and effort and a lot of awareness on that. So that's why Sturdy girl exists, yeah, right.

  Megan: 4:32

  I love it.

  Jess: 4:35

  So that's statistics, and then we'll look at what influences and what helps form body image. I think it's safe to say negative body image is something the majority of us struggle with at one point or another. Yes, 100%.

  Megan: 4:48

  I'm not and I know that. And just kind of going into the next point, like the 70% of people world, or like over the world, are struggling with their body image. At one point I'm surprised at 70, honestly.

  Jess: 5:01

  I know, I want to know how that was quantified. Yeah, and everywhere I looked, but it's like I would assume that every human at some point struggles with body image and then ebbs and flows and good days and bad, and it doesn't mean you're always stuck in that state, but at some point, right, yeah. And I mean you look at like kids, kids as young as four years old, yeah, struggling with body image issues. Looking at my niece's six, and she had an instance a few months back with body image where she was telling her mom that she didn't want to eat all of her dinner. Oh no, because she wanted to have a six pack like her cousin. No, and so we made it a point the next time we went and visited, like to talk about, like eating all your veggies and eating all your food. And yeah, we live cookies. These help fuel our bodies to do the fun things like jump on the trampoline for six hours straight and carry their uncle around.

  Megan: 5:53

  Yeah, and it's not something that a child should have to be worrying about.

  Jess: 5:57

  No, it's so crazy though. Four years old, yeah. And then another study talking statistics still nearly 70% of young adult women reported withdrawing from activities due to their body image.

  Megan: 6:08

  So sad and I know that I have personally been in that same.

  Jess: 6:11

  How many times your life have you purposefully withdrawn or not done something because of how you feel about your body? Yeah, not like because of how your body actually looks like. How many times have you not gone to the pool or to the lake or the river? Mm, hmm, because you didn't want to be seen in a bikini, because you didn't feel good about your body? Mm, hmm, how many times All of my teen years? Yeah, how many times did you wear the big like cover up or t-shirt over your swimsuit because you were not wanting to expose your stomach in any capacity? You know, didn't shy away from wearing the fun outfit because you wore the safe outfit to. You know, hang out with your friends, right, like. How many times have we not done the thing? Yeah, taken the opportunities because of our appearance?

  Megan: 6:59

  Mm, hmm Well, and especially as a woman and like, as you know, a female, as you age, you know, and certain things become a little different. Looking with your body too.

  Jess: 7:09

  Yeah, okay, so after these statistics, just some food for thought. As we dive into what influences body image. I want to have you, as the listener, ask yourself how you feel about your body. What would you say If I were to ask you if you were healthy? What would you say If you consider your health without focusing on body weight, shape or size? How does that change your perception of health? Now you know, I'm going to be clear. Like, health has a really, really broad definition here. I don't want to give a definition to this, I want this to just be floating around in your brain as we start talking about the things that influence body image. Mm, hmm, let's dive into body image influences. Just a disclaimer I am going to kind of gloss over these as we go through them, because there's a whole different episode where we're going to break down these influences in greater detail, because there's a lot to be said about how these things influence our body image story and how important it is to understand them and be able to break them down. But the first one is media. So media messages, societal norms, cultural messages.

  Megan: 8:20

  Mm, hmm. The idealized beauty standards is a whole other thing, and this has changed so much over time. I mean, even in my, you know, growing up, the perfect image of what you should be has changed so much from what it is now. But that's the thing, like societal standards are always changing, yeah, and so if you're trying to constantly keep up with that, mm. Hmm, yeah, yeah.

  Jess: 8:42

  And you think about those that messaging. Yeah, you know, one thing to remember with all of this too is like other people don't judge you as harshly as you judge yourself. Yes, so when you look at all those media messages and you're like internalizing a lot of messages and judging were our own worst critic, mm hmm. And then the next one is interpersonal and life experiences. So relationships, family, friends, our community partners, siblings Mm hmm.

  Megan: 9:11

  The list could go on.

  Jess: 9:13

  Yeah, yeah, the people you have surrounded yourself with your whole life. You know what messages did your parents promote about body image growing up? What about your relationship with your siblings? Were you teased as a kid for some kind of like physical attribute? And then, looking at that story of your body image through early adult or, excuse me, early childhood, adolescence, early adulthood, right, what influences played a?

  Megan: 9:35

  part in that. So, like physical characteristics and changes, so this could be anything from like an illness or cancer. Pregnancy, you know, if you're going through a time that has really high stress, high anxiety, yeah, that's a battle of mine, big perception change. Yes, um, you know acne, or just not fitting into what society deems is like the norm.

  Jess: 9:58

  Yeah, yeah, this was a huge one. Talk about physical characteristics and those things is like if your body is marginalized because of race, ethnicity or ability, I mean that really, really shapes your body image. If you were not a quote, unquote accepted body type. Yes, that's right, I'm yeah, that's a whole. That's a whole. Another thing that we could talk about. That's a whole episode. Yeah, it is, and it's something that you know. We, we as quite straight, straight sized humans in this world. Um, we don't know that experience, so just speak to that being recognizing the struggles that people who live in marginalized bodies go through. And then, lastly, the big thing to talk about, too, is personality traits. I'm a really big fan of talking about growth mindset and talking about how we view challenges, if we shy away from them, if we embrace them, and that, like genetics, play a big part in our body image and how risk-averse we are and how resilient we are, based on our experiences and how we choose to respond to those.

  Megan: 11:12

  Yeah, and I mean even things as like trauma, growing up or like your dynamic. I mean this kind of goes back into the family, yeah, how we perceive it. But I mean I think that all of that stuff can really play into it as well.

  Jess: 11:24

  And growing up, yeah, I agree, and talking about personality traits too, the biggest influence on our body image are our own ways of judging and thinking about our looks, thought patterns that may have become habitual or automatic, but the thing about that is those thought patterns can change. It's not solid state. We have the story of how we grew up and the way that our body image was influenced growing up, but we have the ability to change that perception and shape how we want to view ourselves, going forward and work on those things.

  Megan: 11:58

  Yeah, and it's a constant work in progress, but like that's why Sturdy Girl is here. Yeah, and therapy, oh my gosh. Well, yes, yes I can't.

  Jess: 12:08

  That goes without saying. Yes, we are not therapists, we are not dietitians, we are not doctors. We are not any of that. I am a performance coach, I'm a dental hygienist, I am a fellow Sturdy human living this experience right, that's what we're here for. But if body image is to the point that you are struggling with some kind of eating disorder or body dysmorphia at those things, please seek therapy. Let's talk about body image disruptions and then let's get straight into tips to improve body image. Yeah, this is another thing that I'm going to kind of gloss over, because next week we're going to talk all about it, and that's body image disruptions, and this is kind of when events can trigger us to question our body image. So, when we're talking about the practice of body image, if there is a comparison that comes up, if you are scrolling social media, if you do these different triggers, these things that disrupt the status quo of where your body image is like, feeling its best, it is something that can lead us to change our appearance or change our behavior. See quick fixes, but more on that next week. Let's dive into tips to improve body image. A loving but tough reminder improving our body image is an inside job. None of these tips are going to be about how to change your appearance or how to quote unquote fix your appearance. When we keep attempting to fix an internal mental problem with outside physical solutions, these quick fixes will never really solve our problems. If body image was something that could be viewed and understood from the outside, then we could improve it from the outside too. This is repetition. But changing your body is trying to fix an internal issue with an external bandaid. Your body is not the problem. The thoughts about your body are yes, mic drop, mic drop.

  Megan: 14:01

  And this isn't to say it's like anti-diet. Just throw this out there Like, or you know, like, changing your body or.

  Jess: 14:08

  Yeah, we are not exactly. We are not anti-changing your body. Changing body composition for some people can lead to an improved quality of life. But again, weight loss, body come changes are physical One issue, yeah, body image, body acceptance are mental yeah, two separate issues.

  Megan: 14:27

  Yeah, okay, you can be as fit as you want and still not have the mental Exactly.

  Jess: 14:32

  Okay, tip number one for improving your body image Instead of thinking about all the instances where you don't feel good in your body, can you think about times or activities that you were so caught up in that you didn't even think about your body or its appearance? On a mountain bike, yeah, on a run, racing, lifting heavy shit, doing yoga, embracing yourself in a book, like it doesn't have to be necessarily a physical thing. I was telling Megan this before we hit record, but we were supposed to have family in town and I was really stoked to see family but they canceled last minute and I was like well shoot, what am I gonna do with my weekend? And I realized that I really wanted to do a puzzle and I got really excited to like get this puzzle out because I can just kind of reach that flow state right. Your appearance doesn't play a part in that, and that's runners will understand this. We talk about flow state, like lifters can too. It's definitely something that is worth seeking out and achieving. Yeah, because you're taking the focus away from appearance and onto activities that you enjoy.

  Megan: 15:37

  Yeah, I mean, I would just say, like for me personally, like I think one thing that when you kind of start talking about this, one thing that it did kind of trigger in my head a little bit is I feel like in the moment, when I'm like riding or like even at the races that I've like recently done, yeah, I think that I don't even think about it, I don't think about how I look, I don't think about anything like that. And then sometimes I see the pictures and they come back and I'm like oh, my knee pads look really like my legs look like little sausages, like squished into my knee pads. So it's after the fact, but it's after the fact. And then you kind of have to get back into that of like, oh my goodness, like just but.

  Jess: 16:14

  I was so in the moment doing my thing. What is it really matter? It doesn't, you know, it didn't affect your performance.

  Megan: 16:20

  It was something I didn't think about. It didn't affect your environment in the moment, yeah, and it's kind of more to that later.

  Jess: 16:25

  Yeah, okay, that's actually like. So tip number two for improving your body image is to shift your focus from how does my body look to what can my body do. Does your body do the things that you want? Can you Mountain bike the way you enjoy, run races, lift the weights, hike the mountains? Can you keep up with your kids and your nieces, who never want to get off the trampoline? Right, just this shift in narrative can help us see that our satisfaction in life Doesn't come from our appearance. Yeah, one thing worth noting here. When we're talking about shifting away from looks to what can our body do, this statement can be problematic and triggering for those that aren't able-bodied. Yeah, the intent here is to draw attention away from our appearance and more on the appreciation for our body itself, the meat sack that gives us the ability to experience life on earth Like that. That's the point here. It is not to take away from anyone who has some kind of disability or isn't able to do the things that they're, that they generally enjoy. If you're going through an injury, if you are disabled, if you have other things right, many of us lose sight of the things that we can do and instead get caught up in how it may not fit the quote ideal of the activity that we're doing or the society that we reside in, and especially when you're bombarded so much by social media.

  Megan: 17:49

  Oh yeah, you're just sitting there, doom scrolling everything and and then seeing, or you're like I will.

  Jess: 17:55

  I'll do this thing when my body looks this way.

  Megan: 17:58

  Yeah, putting something off. Yeah, right, yeah, I'm waiting for your body to look a certain way, when I'm this, I mean like, I mean it goes. You know, for me it's always like oh, I could do that, when I'm like that fit or something. Yeah, that's how I look, you know, versus, exactly, and I actually do it and tip number three for improving your body image is exercise.

  Jess: 18:22

  Now, hear us out on this. We're not going to tell you that running, lifting, mountain biking, they're going to fix your body image struggles. But looking at a few different studies the total over 500 individuals showed that those who exercise for functional reasons rather than aesthetics had a better body image and better body satisfaction. That's worth noting. And this isn't to say exercise and go join a CrossFit gym so that you can compete in the CrossFit games. This isn't to say go become the best lifter or runner or you know, challenge yourself to doing something every single day, like that's not our point here. There's a lot to be said about getting out and going for a walk. Yeah, there's a lot to be said for Going through a mobility flow or yoga or something like that, where you're just moving moving.

  Megan: 19:11

  Yeah, exactly, I mean even like I think you know we were talking about this before but like Even working remote at home, you know, having that shift and only kind of being at my desk and bubble where I'm only at home I was able to Kind of time myself to be like all right, I need to go out and like take walks, I need to go out and, even if it's just playing with a dog for a little while, like have some type of movement, because I feel like that just made me feel better overall. I don't know if that necessarily is you know kind of like with the body, but like I feel like it ties in. Yeah, absolutely.

  Jess: 19:46

  Yeah, working from home, you are sedentary, you're sitting it's almost like that inertia piece, right. Our point here being moving your body can help with us kind of getting out of that negative head space. I don't want it to be like that Instagram video of like going for what Cures your depression, being in nature, but there is value in this, so that is why it is on kind of our top three tips. So taking a walk, moving your body, even if that's, I guess. So this is like four times jumping on the trampoline with your nieces.

  Megan: 20:18

  Yeah, and I mean like exercise to me like a big bullet point with this is just really movement. Yeah, like in any form really.

  Jess: 20:28

  It makes me this is a total aside, but it makes me think of Legally Blonde when she's making her case about, like exercise producing endorphins. Yeah, and endorphins make people happy, and happy people just don't kill their husbands, they just don't. They don't. So, like, our point here is that exercise can help improve body image. Yeah, yeah.

  Megan: 20:52

  There you go Well, and it can improve. Like I know, for me exercise is a huge piece, like when I I recently went through an injury on my shoulder and I had to cut back with a lot of my lifting, a lot of my regular pattern things.

  Jess: 21:06

  Well, you also were in season for racing as well, which changes your lifting habits, true it?

  Megan: 21:11

  was a combination. I feel like the injury happened and then it cycled into it. Okay, so it just like went for so long without doing my regular pattern and like I honestly I felt my body changing and like not necessarily in the way that I wanted it to. And I think it was a mental barrier for a while, because I was like I'm losing strength, I'm not able to do these things.

  Jess: 21:35

  And that note noticing like oh, the time has gone by, I've clearly lost physical strength. Yeah, that also involves our perception of our body too.

  Megan: 21:44

  Yeah, cause I was doing other things. I mean, I was got there, you're biking, you're climbing a ton of elevation like every weekend. You were still super active.

  Jess: 21:51

  I was very active, living your body, but like when you know you've shifted away from this modality for a time, I mean that's me and me and running right now, yeah, I still run a couple of days a week and I keep that in cardio base, if you will, but I'm not as fast as I used to be and it's not and I so I changed that perception. Oh, my God, I don't look like a runner, I don't feel like a runner and having to have that that piece of like, no, no, no, you know, I'm still staying active. We're still like powerlifting, we still like walk the dogs, we still do those things. And I think this ties perfectly into kind of the last and bonus point for our body image tips and that self compassion and having that self compassion practice. You're going to hear us talk a lot about self compassion in this, in this podcast. There's a ton of research on it. Kristen Neff is a huge researcher for self compassion and there's a lot to be said about self compassion with body image, with with so many things. So Let me define it real quick. It's defined as the ability to be kind to oneself, to see one's difficulties as part of the common human experience and to be mindful of one's distress, as opposed to being self-judgmental, feeling isolated and getting over, identified with personal difficulties. Yeah, so this can look like accepting that a moment's painful or uncomfortable, for example feeling extreme dissatisfaction with our bodies, but we don't sit there and try to change our thoughts. Right, if these things, if we're sitting in a day that's just bad body image and we're saying all kinds of shit to ourselves, it's letting those thoughts come up and it's acknowledging that they exist, but it's not trying to change those thoughts or shame ourselves for having those thoughts. It's having that self-compassionate like. Here's the self-compassion check. Ask yourself the question how would we respond to a close friend feeling this way or saying these things? That is the self-compassion question there, because this ties into the overarching theme of body images, about our relationship with ourself. It is the longest, most intimate relationship that we will ever have and there's a lot of value of being able to shift away from shame and guilt to self-compassion and that's something that you and I had. We'd kind of talked about shame earlier and just how important it is to shift away, because it's like there's even times now I would say in the last, like six months or so. Self-compassion has been heavy on my mind and it's really come from a lot of the reading I've been doing for research for Sturdy Girl is paying attention to those thoughts that come up and I'd get home from work at the end of the day and shame, and you know it's like shame and or guilt to just be like why don't you go to about five and work out in the morning? Now you still have to work on the evening. You're so lazy, it's this, it's that. And yeah, the self-compassionate piece would come in and say you're still getting your workout done, it just looks a little bit different and it's at a different time of day. What's the difference and I think that that is such an important piece of body image is being able to be compassionate, because you're going to go a lot further in life with compassion than that shame. Yes.

  Megan: 25:04

  Well, and shame does. No one could, as someone who has dealt with a lot of therapy and shame and guilt, and you know, I think that that has spilled over into so many things, and body image is a huge part of it. Oh, absolutely. And the response of like feeling shame when you're not as active as you should be and I know it's kind of like we said exercise. But there is a point where you can be in the opposite spectrum of it, where you're used to a pattern of like I need to do this and this and this and like I have to be consistent with this and this is the only way I'm going to feel better. And it took kind of going for me personally, kind of going into like therapy and also recognizing like it's okay to have those moments of the positive and I'm not going to think about anything and I'm going to be in this.

  Jess: 25:53

  Yeah, or choosing the self compassionate person is the one who gets done with a long day of work and realizes that the better answer is to rest yeah. Then it is to push through a hard workout yeah. Or do the puzzle. Instead of going on the long walk, self compassion can also say the right answer is to get my workout in, at whatever capacity I do have. If I'm tired, do I adjust the RPE, do I adjust the intensity, do I pick the main lift and move on? Or sometimes the answer can be simply to rest.

  Megan: 26:34

  I will say I've never regretted working out, though True.

  Jess: 26:39

  True, no, I know, but I feel like that's such a misunderstood when someone's like, the only workout you regret is the one you didn't do. Oh, 100%, it's not like that.

  Megan: 26:49

  But you learn if you want to do something super simple and you're like I'm not going to do that, yeah, it's like modified, we've all programmed today.

  Jess: 26:55

  Right, but it's the modification of showing up where you are that day. I think that's more to the point than like, don't skip your workout. You train based on RPE and you train based on like where you're at that day, and that's super important. So that, yeah, if you have six exercises on the lift or something and you go in, you get the first one done. You're like, if this, I'm done, yeah, can I?

  Megan: 27:19

  just say two. Can I just say two? Like in you said RPE, in my like lifting program I will say I love doing RPE versus your percentages because I feel like it's so. I know this is a separate Tangent.

  Jess: 27:34

  This is like so lifting? Yeah, niche, I don't ever. I hate lifting percentages as well. Yeah, because that give me, you give me RPE and give me a weight range.

  Megan: 27:45

  Yeah, Well, sometimes it just makes me feel bad because I'm like I can't be at my 80% today. No, it should be like what I think is what I think is 80% yeah.

  Jess: 27:55

  How. Whatever 80% feels like yeah, absolutely life, rpe. Yeah, there you go, oh my God. So here's how to recap. Here are three tips to improving body image. Think about times or activities when you didn't think about your body. Find that flow state. Do those things. Shift your focus away from how does my body look to what can it do? Third, exercise and everything that entails. And lastly, practice self compassion. And that is it for your tips on improving body image. Thank you for tuning into the first episode of Sturdy Girl podcast. Next week we will be talking about getting through a bad body image day and, like we had said before, talking about body image disruptions. Be sure to tune in next Wednesday with the next episode drops. We'll talk to you then. Friends. Bye, hey friend, sending you a virtual hug, high five or fist bump to say thank you for listening to another episode of Sturdy Girl. We're so stoked you're here. Please consider following or subscribing on iTunes, spotify, wherever you listen to podcasts like us, review us. We're just glad you're here. Until next Wednesday, stay sturdy friends. text goes here

Episode 0: [Trailer] Welcome to the Sturdy Girl Podcast

[Launching September 6th!]

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 the podcast where we shift the focus away from your appearance, and on to living the big, rad life you deserve.

Every Wednesday, you can expect to hear from your host, Jess Heiss, and a few special guests as we deep dive into life experiences, the vulnerability around body image and what the heck it takes to be a confident human.

So, hit subscribe and we'll chat on Wednesday.

Join the Sturdy Girl community on Instagram HERE.
Connect with Jess HERE.

Stay Sturdy, friends.