embody: Learning to Love Your Unique Body (and quiet that critical voice!)

I invite you to explore the ideas and practices in this chapter to find the tools that work best to help you to step towards self-love and away from self-criticism, even when those around you choose to partake in this fruitless ritual. Remember that loving yourself takes practice—and courage. The more you use your gentle, compassionate voice, the f

“It’s a process to take this all in, but once you do, it just becomes part of your everyday life. It’s addictive!” The addiction spoken of here is the commitment to self-love, the ability to see great beauty in one’s self as well as in others, and the pursuit of positive, joyful self-care. What could be better?

Healthy Pleasures, Doctors Sobel and Ornstein summarize the results of numerous studies done on the health benefits of moderate exercise. One study found that getting an average of thirty minutes of physical movement per day through activities such as gardening, walking, fishing, dancing, and doing physical chores cut the occurrence of fatal heart

It is not always easy to resist the voice that tells us we’re flawed. Don’t forget that advertisers give us just this message so we will spend our money attempting to fix ourselves. There is a reason the diet industry generates about sixty billion dollars per year!

To become your own expert, it is critical to examine the messages you’ve received—and continue to receive—throughout your life about health, weight, food, and exercise (also beauty, but we’ll get to that in a later chapter). You’ll want to pay attention not only to what you’ve been told by the media and medical professionals, but also by your famil

The problem is that along the way, for a variety of reasons, most of us unlearn intuitive eating. The idea that we can trust our bodies to guide us in making positive food choices is totally foreign. Trusting our innate wisdom—especially in making decisions about how to eat—runs counter to what most people (both health professionals and lay people

Staying with self-love keeps you from withdrawing your love from your partner. You don’t need to prove they are wrong in order to feel good about yourself.

When you’re ready, get your journal or a piece of paper and write at the top of the page, “I give myself permission to…” Now, without consciously thinking too much, write down everything that comes to mind. What do you want to give yourself permission to do?

•Learn to listen to—and follow—your body’s wisdom. •Acquire tools and resources to help you eat, exercise, and live intuitively.