Our thoughts are a hybrid of information forged from our own experiences, traumas, successes, failures, etc., and massive input from our external world. All those media messages about “good” bodies and “normal” bodies: they’re in your thoughts. All the government-endorsed ideas of safe bodies and dangerous bodies: they’re in your thoughts. You have

Acknowledge intent while addressing impact. It is possible to be well-meaning and still cause harm. No matter our intention, we practice accountability when we are willing to acknowledge the impact of our words and actions on others. Likewise, people’s words and behaviors may have an impact on us, but they are rarely actually about us. The way we r

Without compassion for ourselves we will never stay on the road of radical self-love. Without compassion for others we can only replicate the world we have always known. Radical self-love is not about “getting it right.” “Getting it right” is a body-shame paradigm. Radical self-love is honoring how we are all products of a rigged system designed to

There are minuscule daily ways each of us will be asked to apologize for our bodies, no matter how “normal” they appear. The conservative haircut needed to placate the new supervisor, the tattoo you cover when you step into an office building to increase your chances of being treated “professionally” are examples of tiny apologies society will ask

The work is to crumble the barriers of injustice and shame leveled against us so that we might access what we have always been, because we will, if unobstructed, inevitably grow into the purpose for which we were created: our own unique version of that oak tree.

The act of giving yourself some grace is the practice of loving the you that does not like your body.

Start from the assumption that people’s experiences are real and that they are the expert on their experience. We may have shared experiences, but this is not always true. Ask to learn more about other people’s truths, rather than erasing them.

Living a radical self-love life is a process of de-indoctrination. It demands that we look unflinchingly at our current set of beliefs about ourselves and the world and get willing to explore them.

Their lack of awareness about those identities generally means their body falls into a multiplicity of default identities that uphold the social hierarchy of bodies. The luxury of not having to think about one’s body always comes at another body’s expense.