As I am sure you will see in the next few days, all of the commercials on TV are about weight loss and starting your new year off right and starting a diet... it's kind of funny actually just how many companies jump aboard this one specific New Year's resolution. From Jenny Craig, to Hydroxycut, Atkins, and Weight Watchers, the places and ways to lose weight are endless, but should losing weight really be your only resolution?
For years and years, my resolution has been to lose weight and to look "better," and to be honest, most years I didn't lose any weight, some I did and some I didn't. But I learned just how much it affected me to make this resolution year after year. It killed my self-esteem and self-confidence. I always thought I looked too big and needed to lose weight and that every year I would start off working out and dieting strictly, and then within a few weeks I stopped. Its not because I didn't have the willpower, because believe me, I am incredibly stubborn... but it was because the more I restricted and told myself I needed to lose weight, the more I hurt myself and lost more than just weight, I lost my self.
I lost what I thought made me beautiful, and I lost the ability to try on a dress and say "damn, I look good!" There is no way that making this resolution made me feel any better, or any closer to accomplishing it in the first place. I just told myself over and over in my head that I was too big, that every year I was failure because I didn't lose the weight I had resolved to do for that year.
Last year, I decided to change my approach. Instead of making my resolution to lose weight, I made a resolution to try to come back to my body, as it was, and love it for what it was: stretch marks, no thigh gap, and my round hips, and do you know what happened? I started to love new parts of my body! Instead of telling myself every day that I needed to lose weight and only seeing what was "bad" in my physique, I had to make a conscious effort to see what was amazing about myself, my eyes, smile, hair, shoulders, and yes, I absolutely love my butt. :) But the change for me, was like night and day. I went from uncomfortable and trapped in my body, treating it almost like a prison for the "skinny" girl I thought was in there, and then when I started to love it, I found so much more peace. My own self-confidence grew, and I no longer focused on what was wrong with me. I would try on clothes and say, "you look freaking gorgeous!" and I did!
Sure, I'm not perfect... I have days all the time where I tell myself that my body is ugly and I need to lose weight, but once I switched from attacking myself to loving it, I found myself wanting to take care of my body and eating healthier because I wanted to and because it felt good. I wasn't depriving myself, I wasn't over-exercising, and I wasn't hating my body for what it was... I was taking care of it because I loved it.
