"We are craving these conversations more and more.
We want to feel confident in our bodies. Feel at home in them. Love the parts of us we can see. And touch. And attempt to embrace.
We call it body confidence.
Body acceptance.
Body neutrality.
Whatever we need to call it for us to feel what letting go of shame feels like for just once.
We read the self-love books. The quotes. The pinterest boards we designed for ourselves as reminders.
Maybe we believed it in that moment as we scrolled.
Or maybe we just thought the graphic was pretty and had the cutest font and color palette. (And maybe that helped us think for a second that the words on it had a deeper meaning.)
But there’s a part that can be hard to sit with.
Probably because it always gets uncomfortable to express.
We find it less important, usually unrecognizable, at least in the beginning.
Because we become so busy adding layers upon layers of new thoughts and behaviors over our wounds. We forget about asking ourselves why.
Why do we even need these new layers?
How did we even become so wounded with these negative body image thoughts?
What is it we are so afraid of?
But the conversation shifts. It’s where we wonder how do we do it, this self-love thing.
We search for the answer as to how, instead of all the ones as to why.
We so desperately want to feel our outlook begin to change.
We avoid any of the reasons.
We avoid any of the deepest, darkest truths.
We avoid admitting that we are terrified of appearing or becoming fat.
In a world that views it as the worst thing you could possibly be.
We avoid our internalized fatphobia.
It’s not our fault.
And it’s okay to admit it. It’s okay to peel back broken layers first. It’s okay if we have to start there.
Even when it gets uncomfortable.
Even when the layers that mask it feel like the safest place.
Even when we realize it won’t be gone right away, or forever, because we will begin recognizing it often.
Even when we just need a moment to sit with that for a while.
I had to just sit with it for a good while, too."
@meg.boggs in Twilight Magnolia 🌺
#knix