18 Nov 3 Most Commonly Asked Questions: How did you learn to love and embrace your body?

One of the most impactful actions I took, was tapping into having more gratitude for all the things my body could do. So many of us have gone down this road of hating our bodies, loathing our bodies, being so anchored down about how we feel about our bodies. It has become so consuming that we have become obsessed thinking about these bodies being less than perfect. If we look at what our bodies can do, not just how they look, we really should be very grateful.

My legs can run, my arms can hug, my body completed a marathon.

What my body looks like doesn’t define me. What does define me, is who I am as a person and how I contribute to the world. When I started considering my body, not as an ornament, but rather a vehicle to my dreams, I became so happy and I felt so grateful every single day for all that I had. On the topic of gratitude, I was speaking to some girlfriends a couple of months ago and they were turning 40. One of them said, “oh my god, I’m turning 40!”, and I said, “oh my god, congratulations! That’s amazing!”. She was feeling flattened by turning 40, and I said, “this is a privilege denied to many. You are 40. This is amazing. Congratulations, you have been on this earth for 40 years!”.

I think as a society of people we have lost our perspective on what’s important.

I asked thousands of women around the world, “what is it that you are going to be thinking about when you take your final breath on this earth? In those last few days, what thoughts will be going through your mind?”, and no one has ever said their big bum, or their cellulite, or their stretch marks. This is because of none of those things matter. If we can come back to the here and the now, we all have access to such a rich and abundant life. So, my answer to how I learnt to embrace my body, is a perspective on my life, and gratitude for my body.