If you are in eating disorder recovery, you are probably familiar with the term body positivity: learning to love your body after years of feeling like an enemy to it. Appreciating the parts of it that once drove you to harmful behaviors like restriction, calorie counting, or purging. While the spirit behind this is admirable, it is not realistic for most folks with a history of body image challenges. Enter body neutrality.
How are body neutrality vs positivity different?
Body neutrality encourages us to focus on the functionality of our bodies rather than the aesthetics of them. One of the issues with body positivity is that it still puts a heavy emphasis on the appearance of our bodies - just a positive one. With body neutrality, we take aesthetics entirely out of the equation, and focus instead on what our bodies can do for us. For example, body positivity might encourage you to appreciate the “problem areas” of your body - maybe your thighs, stomach, or arms - it’s different for every person. Where you previously looked in the mirror and saw something you hated, body positivity encourages you to look at these body parts through a more compassionate lens. If you’ve spent years loathing the appearance of these parts of our body, however, learning to truly appreciate them may not be realistic for you, and just layer on the guilt in an already challenging recovery. The good news: you don’t need to like the way your body looks to recover from an eating disorder.
Body neutrality shifts the focus entirely from how your body looks to what it can do for you. Start by getting clear on your values: do you value relationships? Presence? Humor? If you value relationships, for example, consider the ways your body allows you to show up fully for the people you love: arms that allow you to hug your mom, feet that carry you to a friend’s house, hands that let you pet your fur babies. If you value humor, take a moment to appreciate your ears for listening to the brilliance of your friends’ wit, your mouth for articulating your unmatched comical finesse, and your stomach for those deep belly laughs that (imo) make life worth living.
why body neutrality is more supportive of ED recovery
We spend so much time in our eating disorders obsessing about the appearance of our bodies and every micro change they undergo. More times than not, the eating disorder’s values differ from your own. If the eating disorder had its way, you would be tracking, measuring, and “managing” your body 25/8. One of my favorite exercises for clients who struggle with body image is drawing out a pie chart of how much time they spend thinking about food/their body vs. what a values-aligned brain would look like. Example from my own recovery below:
What body neutrality does really nicely is shift the focus entirely away from the appearance of your body (ED values) to a focus on how to live a life that is more in line with your values. Body positivity gets tricky because it is still operating in the framework that your body’s appearance is a priority. Body neutrality shifts the focus entirely away from prioritizing appearance.
If physical appearance feels like a value to you, however, that is something worth digging into. While physical appearance is not a value in and of itself, some of the things associated with it (e.g., health, confidence, social connectedness) are.
If you’re ready to take the next step towards living a more values-aligned life and ditch the body focus, reach out to one of our clinicians today. We’d love to be a part of your journey.
Comentarios