According to a 2021 journal article based on a UK study of 506 adults aged 34 years on average, findings suggest that the COVID-19 pandemic may have contributed to an increase in body image concerns for folx of all genders.
Body Image Research
A 2015 journal article reviewed the efficacy of interventions to improve body image. It found that the following change techniques were associated with significant improvements in how people related to their bodies:
Discuss how thoughts play a role in how individuals relate to their bodiesTeach techniques to monitor and restructure cognitionsAddress negative body languageEngage in guided imagery exercisesRely on exposure exercisesMake use of size-estimate exercisesProvide strategies for preventing relapseTeach stress management techniquesEducate people on the concept of body imageDeconstruct factors that can cause negative body imageExplore how negative body image can impact peopleReview the behavioral expression of negative body image
10 Ways to Feel Better About the Way You Look
Exploring the work of poet and activist Sonya Renee Taylor can be integral to any attempt at feeling better about how you look. Taylor promotes “Radical Self-Love,” a framework that incorporates many evidence-based strategies that have been demonstrated to be effective for improving body image. By deconstructing how oppressive systems fuel the ways in which folx can be critical of how they look, it becomes easy to see the factors that make it extremely difficult to embrace radical body love. In her book, The Body Is Not An Apology, Taylor recommends the following 10 tools as part of a larger framework to combat the harms of body shame.
Dump the Junk
With this approach, folx are encouraged to reject media messages that can make them more critical of their bodies, including European beauty standards, binary gender, ableist expectations, fatphobic norms, etc.
Curb Body Badmouthing
Through this strategy, it is recommended that folx challenge the negative ways in which they can sometimes talk about their bodies, given the devastating impact that can have on how they feel about themselves.
Reframe the Framework
By deconstructing how people often relate to their body as an enemy, especially when dealing with health concerns that may feel out of control, it is encouraged to challenge that approach by allying with their body.
Meditate on a New Mantra
Through the repetition of affirmations that promote radical body love, folx can combat the implicit and explicit ways in which body shame is often fueled by oppressive forces from settler colonialism to white supremacy.
Banishing the Binary
By challenging binary understandings of their intersectional identities, people are better able to accept all that they offer more unapologetically given how often there can be tensions in between extremes in which they often exist.
Explore Your Terrain
Through radical body love, folx are encouraged to explore their bodies as a part of the process to reconnect with themselves and what they need to live more freely in a world that can usually place many limitations on them.
Be in Movement
By embracing the joy of movement, individuals are equipped to reclaim their bodies as a space of liberation, rather than a site of oppression that can often be dictated by societal expectations that contribute to more body shame.
Make a New Story
Through reimagined narratives, folx are encouraged to rewrite stories in which they can rescue themselves from body shame through new realms of their own making which allow opportunities for growth and development. That may mean trying a new approach to how you relate to your body.
Be in Community
Through acts of vulnerability, folx can benefit from a sense of community that can help to promote radical body love, in stark contrast to the body shame that can be fueled by isolation from connections with others.
Give Yourself Some Grace
By meeting themselves with compassion even when it proves difficult to challenge body shame in a world that profits from it, people are encouraged to continue doing the much-needed work of embracing radical body love. This final tool refers to the ongoing compassion needed for you to do this work.
A Word From Verywell
While these approaches to feeling better about how you look may not be what initially comes to mind, these recommendations align well with empirically validated interventions for improving the body image of folx. Given how often critical ways of relating to your body are a direct result of negative feedback that influences your thought patterns, these 10 tools for radical self-love are well worth the effort of challenging conventional ways of relating to your body with shame through the lens of oppressive systems.
