WE-BE: What are some healthy, manageable ways to take care of your body?
DD: Eat when you are hungry, stop when you are not, learn how to cultivate a safe space to discover
why you might eat (or restrict your eating) when it is not about hunger… get the deeper needs met
without food or weight related behaviors instead of using them to replace the feeling of our feelings.
Invite yourself to move--doing activity you enjoy each day and with people you enjoy, if you can.
Don’t stress out about eating perfectly, but mindfully learn what makes your body feel good (after you
eat it and before). Try and choose friends who accept your natural body (and like you on the inside for
all the many parts of you.) Do what you can with what you have; to eat and move daily instead of trying to fit in with people who are critical. (Learn how to talk back in respectful ways to dumb outdated
ways.) Teach friends about fat talk and start a body positive club if you are up for it. http://
www.thebodypositive.org/
WE-BE: What are the three most important things (or more) on how one can work to gain selfconfidence?
DD: Learn how to trust your hunger and satiety cues and eat with them. Find the physical activity that
suits you and set yourself up to do it as much as you can.
Wear clothes that make you feel good about parts of the body you have and like already, or that are
uniquely you.
Practice embodying (imagine they are in your bones) someone you admire and walk like them when
you need some courage. Do stuff that makes you feel good about you.
Don’t weigh yourself. Just do good things that make you feel good about you. Smash your scale (if
you won’t get in trouble for it).
Get to know the real whole you and even journal to find her when stressed. Reach out to kind people
and surround yourself with others who are accepting and kind to who you are right now.
Whether you’re a size 0 or 18, if
you are a little curvier or a little
taller than the average height,
whether you’re blonde, brunette
or a red head, in the end it’s really only your opinion that counts.
Because, whatever you believe
to be true about yourself, others
will believe too. Everything you
believe about yourself makes
you who you are.
By
Megan Praat & Olivia Jensen