If you ask any one of my friends, they will tell you that I spend a good portion of my time at the gym. It’s like my second home, and I own more sports bras than actual bras. People probably wouldn’t believe me if I said that the gym used to be a place that caused me never-ending anguish. The gym used to be the place I visited when I reflected on my own self-hatred, where I went to openly loathe my appearance on a daily basis. It took a while, but I grew to love the gym. Although I hate to admit this, sometimes liking yourself can sometimes be harder than hating yourself.
If anyone has ever told you that you had to be a certain size to be “allowed” to feel bad about your body, it isn’t true. I had always been smaller, but for a while my biggest fear had been that I was not small enough. I felt as though I needed to be my smallest to be my best. Food seems to always be the enemy when you think like this, and so are some exercises. You find yourself with thoughts like, “Lifting weights will make me muscular, and that isn’t attractive,” or “Abs aren’t very feminine, so maybe I shouldn’t have them.”
What doesn’t come to mind when we think this way is that we are destroying our bodies. I look back on those days and I realize now that I did too much cardio, but I was still eating like a rabbit. But what good was any of this if I was still unhappy with myself?
It took some time for me to realize that the problem was not my body – it was me. My mindset was wrong. My body had never failed me, not counting the occasional bruise or sprained ankle. My body lets me run stadiums, walk to my classes and meet my boyfriend for lunch, and I was not giving it enough credit for all it was capable of. “Beautiful” isn’t — and never will be — a single exclusive category. I’m short and lean, and I’m currently sporting an intense backpack tan on my shoulders. I’m never going to look like Adriana Lima, that’s for sure. But I look like me, and that’s enough to satisfy me. Every body has a different standard, and we should never hold ourselves to someone else’s.
The simple fact I often forget is that my body is not my enemy, and that it is not a problem that needs to be solved. When I was at the lowest point in terms of my body image, I was convinced that food worked against me. I thought twice about every ounce of food I ate, but here’s the truth: Food is delicious.
In fact, we literally cannot live without it because it keeps us alive. You should never stay “hangry” if you can help it. I used to think that by exercising and eating less, I was “healthy.” But eating too little is just as bad as eating too much. Once I figured that out, eating better became my new goal, and my health kick has become part of my life. Now it feels more genuine when I work out — I’m doing it because I love my body, not because I hate it. Overanalyzing what I ate used to be a big habit, and I’m still learning. It’s a steady process. (Side note: I had four peanut butter cookies last night and I don’t regret a single one.)
It’s weird that confidence is so taboo nowadays. For some reason, the fact that I may not hate myself makes some people uncomfortable. But why humor those kinds of people? By assuming that it’s “natural” to dislike our bodies, we devalue ourselves and reduce our self worth to articles of clothing and numbers on a scale. Thinking back on it now, it seems kind of silly. So you went up a size… isn’t that better than wearing clothes that are too tight? Who are you doing that for?
Collegiettes, we deserve to take up space. And we should never allow anyone, especially not ourselves, to convince us otherwise.
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