what is your relationship to food?
From what I see, most people nowadays have lost their connection to their food. Within that lost connection is another, more serious loss of connection— the loss of connection to self. To your body. To your own health. This loss of connection has it’s roots in many different areas, like a tree. The roots are spread out, far reaching, and moving by feel. Trouble is, if your feelings are off, if they are being guided by trauma, or limiting beliefs then your roots may be growing in harmful directions.
This is one way our diets connect to our emotions, to our feelings, to our mental health.
what beliefs do you hold about your body?
This is a crucial question to start with. You won’t get very far in your health without being willing to answer this question. It might seem like a big ask, or it may even sound like a loaded question, but that’s all the more reason to answer it. Fully. Honestly. With abandon. Answer it.
The most important thing in answering these questions, is your honesty and deep self-reflection.
What Beliefs do you hold about your body?
Some common answers to this question are:
My body is too fat/too thin.
My body is attacking me.
My body hurts me unnecessarily.
My body doesn’t make any sense.
My body is an unsolvable mystery.
My body is a painful place to be.
I don’t know how to read my body, I feel blind to my own needs.
My body will always be sickly, or low-energy.
My body is against me, it’s trying to take away my fun.
My body is broken.
These points are examples of beliefs that people hold about their bodies. You may not identify with any of them, or you may identify with some of them, or you may be somewhere in between. There is no right answer. These examples are meant to spark ideas in your mind of belief patterns you hold about your body, positive or negative.
Here are examples of positive beliefs about your body:
My body is here to help me.
My body does everything it can with the input I give it to give me a good life.
My body wants to thrive.
My body wants to heal and is always in pursuit of healing.
My body communicates with my brain constantly.
Reading my body is easy, and comes naturally to me.
My body asks for what it needs in the form of cravings, thoughts, and symptoms.
My body is never against me, it is only communicating with me and trying to stay healthy.
My body needs me to treat it well; to feed it nourishing foods, to connect with nature, to get natural light, and to express my feelings.
Do you see how different those two sets of Beliefs are?
Now, you try.
Where do your body beliefs fall on this spectrum? You are welcome to borrow answers from the list above, but I encourage you to come up with at least 5 beliefs in your own words for each category, or just 10 altogether in your own words.
Some people will struggle to come up with positive body beliefs on this first round, and that is ok!! There are many reasons why you might struggle to see your body in a positive light. You may struggle with chronic illness, digestive issues, weight issues, body image, body dysmorphia, or intrusive thoughts. If this is you, simply write down as many beliefs about your body as you can come up with, but at least 10. If that number seems high, good. It’s meant to challenge you, to pull you out of your comfort zone. If that number seems low, then blow right past it, find the number that challenges you and create your list.
This is an observational practice. Please do your best to suspend your judgement of what you right down, whether it be positive, negative or neutral, it’s all coming from your mind right now, and we are simply here to witness it.
Have patience, dear one. This is only the beginning. Your thought patterns will change if you apply yourself, and give honest effort throughout these modules, but we are aiming for lasting change. Sustainable change. Change that will hang around because it wasn’t bullied or shamed into, but rather it was intentionally integrated through observation, association, education, and consistency.
Now that you have your list of body beliefs, I invite you to take a moment to congratulate yourself for that hard work!
Your truth can be a difficult thing to acknowledge and put into words, but doing hard things is how we grow, and you did it! I’m proud of you. Now, tuck that list away in a safe space, we will revisit it later.
next, i invite you to initiate a body scan
This next exercise goes hand in hand with the body beliefs, and offers us a deeper perspective on what our bodies are trying to communicate to us.
This exercise can be a sizable undertaking for some people, so I invite you to do what you can, and then push yourself a little bit past your comfort zone.
This is not meant to overwhelm you or send you into a trauma reaction, so if you feel a great sense of overwhelm beginning to encroach on you you may want to try:
Taking a short break and coming back to it.
Pausing where you are for another set of deep belly breaths.
Get up and walk around before settling back into the exercise.
Break your body down into sections, do one section every day.
Pause, take a nap, eat a snack or do a little jig, shake your body, move your body, dance, dispel that anxiety in whatever way feels most nurturing to you.
When in doubt, breathe. Close your eyes, cover them with a sleeping mask, or your arm, and notice what the back of your eyelids look like; are there colors dancing all around? lights flashing? are you seeing red? or is it a flat black? This is a good indication of anxiety levels. Flat black or deep tones indicate more ease, and bright flashy colors indicate stress.
Remember this is not about forcing yourself to accomplish a set of goals, this is about getting to know yourself on a deeper level. Take as many breaks as you need, but also challenge yourself to move past your comfort zone. You can always revisit this practice, and in fact you will.
For people who have experienced a lot of somatic trauma going into your body like this may be overwhelming, or panicky. That is normal, and perfectly ok for right now. Try to breath through it, but if you feel yourself losing control, stop or pause. Take a break, and don’t force yourself to continue.
At this point you may want to schedule a 1:1 session with me to work through what feels unsafe in your body, or you may want to simply introduce this practice slower, in more manageable ‘bite-sized pieces.’ There is no shame in needing to go slow, or asking for support.
The only thing you absolutely do not want to do is force yourself. You have all the time in the world to get comfortable with this practice. I invite you to set an intention to introduce yourself to it at your own pace, and keep moving towards this goal with grace for yourself.
Please be aware:
If you do force yourself, you may incite a ‘trauma reaction’ which is the body attempting to release stored trauma in the form of twitches, moans, shaking, vibrating, convulsing, jerking or various forms of crying or locking up. These experiences can be scary to go through on your own, but they are a normal part of dispelling trauma states.
However, we don’t want you to go through these states before you’re ready, so please be gentle with yourself, and if you experience a trauma reaction, feel free to set up a session with me to help you understand it, and give you tools and support for working through these states.
With all of that said, let’s begin.
Please take a moment to clear your mind. Take 5 deep belly breaths, and 5 full breaths into your chest. Now scan your body. What do you feel? Write it down.
Do you have pain, tension, or discomfort anywhere? Write it down, or record it in your voice notes in detail.
Example:
“The connection from my shoulder to my neck feels really tight, as I move my head side to side I notice the pain of this tension radiates up to the base of my skull. If I keep twisting my neck I notice a headache begin, or I notice tension release, depending on the movement.”
The more detail you can give, the better this exercise will serve you.
I invite you to go through your entire body like this.
Getting to know yourself as you are right now, as you go. Once you have gone from the top of your head to the tips of your toes thank your body for communicating to your through sensations, symptoms, tension, and even pain.
Once you have finished place one hand on your chest, and one hand on your belly—bonus points if your bare hands are touching your bare skin. Conclude with 5 deep belly breaths and 5 deep chest breaths. Notice how your hands rise and fall with your breath. Notice that you are in control of the speed, depth and release of your breath. Enjoy the peace that this feeling brings.
Congratulations, you just successfully engaged your parasympathetic nervous system. This is the part of your nervous system that manages your stress response, as well as things like anxiety, fear, intrusive thoughts, and rapid heartbeat. Science tells us that even a single deep belly breath is enough to engage your parasympathetic nervous system, bringing a sense of calm to your person, as well as down-regulating your body out of fight or flight mode.
How does it feel? Do you feel more relaxed? Less stressed? More in tune with yourself?
Again, there are no right answers. We are merely learning to observe ourselves. Observation takes time and repetition. As you go through this program, I recommend coming back to this module often and using this exercise to reconnect with yourself.