Getting to Know Your Inner Body Critic- Part 2
Take a minute to bring the image of your inner body critic to mind. That image that we worked to embody in last week’s body image post.
Now that you have a better understanding of how your body critic was shaped and formed, how do you feel about that image and developing body acceptance?
This is the image a version of yourself from another time? A younger you, faced with a parent who spoke harshly about their own body, or even your body?
Does the voice sound like the tone in weight loss commercials shaming the before picture and praising the after picture?
Or does it sound like someone or something specific?
were you able to identify the feelings that could be behind some of its messages?
When you visualized your inner body critic, did you notice a bodily response?
Maybe you noticed a tightness in your chest or a wave of heat washing over your body. Or, perhaps you noticed disconnecting from your body. Maybe you noticed numbness. Or, maybe you noticed nothing at all.
There’s no right or wrong.
But, this is all important stuff.
As we talked about in the last blog post, the more you can get to know how, why, and when your inner body critic shows up for you, the more you can build a relationship with it. This is how we begin to develop body acceptance and self-love.
Yes, you read that right.
Build a relationship with your inner body critic to develop body acceptance.
I want you to imagine a toddler who wants your attention (welcome to my world 🤪). You’re making dinner, trying to juggle 17 different things and you hear a little voice say, “Mama!”. You acknowledge the little voice, but you don’t give it your full attention.
“Mama?”
“Mama?”
“MAMA!!!”
The toddler is escalating, shouting mama in an attempt to gain your attention so you can help them meet a need. Maybe it’s a need they’re aware of, maybe it’s a need that they need help identifying.
So, you put down what you’re doing, take a deep breath and turn toward the toddler to provide assurance that they’re heard, their needs are important, and that you are available to help them regulate their emotions.
You also share with them your need to get dinner finished and give them options for other activities or ways to self-soothe or even help with dinner.
Everyone exhales.
And the shrieked “mama!!” decreases in intensity.
Yes, this paints a picture of a good day of life in toddlerhood with a toddlersaurus 🤣. But, with practice, and turning toward the escalating shrieks, validating the need(s) and providing some attuned coregulation, things get easier and more secure over time.
Try to apply this strategy to your inner body critic to develop body acceptance.
Acknowledge when your inner body critic is present. Tap into the visualization of it.
Let it know that you hear and/or feel it. Its escalating screeches, its messages, its washes of red hot shame falling over your body.
Validate the feelings behind the messages. Let it know that you’re working hard to meet its actual needs to soothe and understand those feelings (not just the surface need for body change, etc).
Provide some coregulation. Offer it compassion. Acknowledge how hard it is working for you to pay attention to what makes you feel unsafe in your world.
Let it know that you’ll keep listening. You’ll keep building a relationship with it. You’ll touch base so that maybe it doesn’t have to scream so loud. It might, and that’s ok, but keep connecting. Keep building that relationship. Keep working to meet this part of you’s needs.
Ya’ll, body image work is hard, and developing body acceptance is a journey in itself.
It runs deep.
And, the more you turn toward your body, turn toward your inner body critic, the more you can take care of it and that part of you.
All parts of you deserve care, concern, regulation, and compassion.
🧡,
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