Forcing Myself To Love My Body Didn’t Work. Here’s What I Did Instead

Back in those days, the shape or state of my body was never something I thought about or something that I could fathom having negative or positive feelings toward. Why would I care? It just helped me play and enjoy food and stuff. Though, at some point, feelings did indeed start setting in, and let me tell you, they were less than joyful. Over time, the food I once so thoroughly delighted in devouring began producing feelings of guilt, shame, and anxiety. But why?

Like many (most) women, as I got older, I became more aware of my surroundings, and my surroundings consisted of ads featuring unattainable bodies, targeted marketing campaigns for fad diets, movies and television shows featuring beyond-beautiful actresses, and other, older, cooler teenage girls talking about how they all needed to lose 10 pounds for some reason. In a short period of time, I went from not thinking about my body to desiring a body other than my own in order to meet the sky-high expectations I was regularly exposed to.

In order to attain this aesthetic perfection, I tried the fad diets, I started exercising regularly, I weighed myself, I did everything right. What happened? I still had the same body, perhaps with a little less fat and a bit more muscle tone. Did I diet my way to massive breasts, a pencil-thin waist, and a luscious backside? Not quite—goal of ever becoming Adriana Lima’s body double = not achieved.

But, for me at least, when it came to truly LOVING my body…I struggled. I still struggle. I’m a perfectionist. My mind often works in black-and-white, and to me, there’s always room for improvement. Don’t get me wrong: I’m so grateful for what my body allows me to do every day, the health it provides me, and for quite literally giving me life—I have so much gratitude for that. But as far as the way it looks, I’m human, and I’m still slightly annoyed by my cellulite, stretch marks, disproportions (by societal standards, at least), and then some. Body positivity is hard for me, and this fact actually makes me feel worse when it comes to my body image—I feel bad that I don’t love my aforementioned flaws. The negative-feelings factor is now doubled.

Therein lies the issue: Why can’t I just net out somewhere in the middle? Why can’t I just stop obsessing about my body, full stop? Am I allowed to not love or hate my body? Is it OK to just not exert any extra emotional energy toward it? Emotional energy is valuable and must be rationed wisely—directing a good chunk toward my body, whether negatively or positively, does not seem to be the best use of it. Enter: body neutrality.

Body neutrality, like body positivity, is also exactly what it sounds like. It’s when you feel relaxed about your body and not defined by it in any way. You’re not stressed about the way it looks, you’re not obsessing over your diet, and exercise is something you do for your health, not for a thigh gap. Body neutrality is not an absence of caring about your body—it’s simply about letting it be as it is, with no (or as little as possible) emotional association with its appearance. Think of it as the middle ground between body shaming and body positivity—or, as I prefer to think of it, kind of like Buddhism for your body image.

Approaching things with a neutral mindset isn’t just useful for body image but is often the fastest path to contentment in life in general. Sure, being happy as often as possible isn’t a bad thing, but being neutral allows your mind and emotions to rest—to find calm, balance, and inner peace. It gives you back control of said emotions, helps alleviate stress, and allows you to truly understand what matters to you—and trust me, when you get to this state, what you look like doesn’t matter. It is in these moments that you find truth.

Live between the two extremes because your peace—with your body and otherwise—lies in that neutral territory.