An excerpt from the forthcoming book Nourished
“You can search throughout the entire universe for someone who is more deserving of your love and affection than you are yourself, and that person is not to be found anywhere. You, yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.” – Buddha
Often, in the quest for well-being or fitness, we’ve not considered the self-love connection to self-care.
I see self-care is fundamentally stemming from self-love. You care for yourself because you care about yourself. If you don’t care about yourself, it’s hard to muster up any real impetus to give yourself good things.
Although some people find it to be a cliché, self-love is not a facile concept to me. It’s intimately connected to self-care, to being good to oneself. Self-love is really, really honestly at bottom what this work is all about.
“Self–care” isn’t about spa treatments (necessarily).It’s taking care OF yourself because you care about yourself. About nourishing and nurturing and giving to yourself what you need because (a) you know what that is and (b) that shows up as a priority for you, and you want to fuel what matters to you.
We don’t get healthy and fit without self-love, because we generally don’t consistently do good things for ourselves without self-love. We may or may not be clear about the healthiest things, but we sure won’t do them without caring.
Many people have a hard time loving themselves to at least some degree.
When we’re loving ourselves, we take way better care of ourselves. It’s completely connected. When we love ourselves, we love ON ourselves. When we love ourselves, we treat ourselves like we’re precious. I mean, what is the core of self-care? It’s CARE.
When you’re truly connected with self-love, I contend, you will want to give yourself the very best that you can. You will want to know what that is, and you will find out. You will learn, and you will do it.
“Let me give that to myself because what else would I want to do for someone I cherish so deeply? What else but the best would I want to give myself?”
That’s the deepest work, and the deeper possibility.
Yet self-love can also be an overwhelming and seemingly lofty concept—I’ve had more than one person ask me, “But how do you DO that?”
It doesn’t need to be complex, although self-love can certainly be a long game, often benefitting from therapeutic support.
But if you think of self-love as simply valuing yourself, it might get at least slightly easier. A big piece of what Conscious Inspiration eventually instills is that you care too much to do that to yourself because you value yourself.
Part of the “awe and reverence” practice particularly (Conscious Inspiration #4) is to begin at least to nurture this sort of self-valuing. To point you to reasons to respect and appreciate yourself, even if it’s challenging.
If you don’t value or respect yourself, have not at least considered this discussion—and then health-fitness culture is shoving what to do at you, in a space where three is no love and care—how is that going to work? Think about it.
We spend an insane amount of time in this culture trying to get people to do stuff when they don’t care enough about themselves to do it. Start here, with the care, instead of the doing stuff—and watch miracles happen.
Self-love and self-care—the chicken or the egg
Here’s something I notice: When most people think about “loving their bodies,” they think that if it looked a certain way, then they’d love it. Too often people wait to have a better (even a “perfect” body) to love themselves.
I think about it exactly the other way around. When you love yourself now, first, actively—meaning, when you love yourself up, treat yourself right, care for yourself—then you get the best possible body you can have. One you’ll love even more.
Because when you give to yourself lovingly, you will undoubtedly get healthier.
“Giving yourself good things” is one of my favorite definitions of self-are. Of course, by “good things” I mean delicious beautiful things that are good for you, not “good” as in “I think GMO potato chips are good.”
But when you do the work laid out in the previous section, your definition of “good” will come into balance. It won’t be “I think Cheetos are good! I think convenience store hot dogs are good!” You won’t like that stuff as much—because you know too much about what’s in them and you care too much about what goes into your body. As we discussed, your standards will change.
Once you touch into the depth of your care for yourself as precious and the gravity of nourishing your own power and influence and value—and you combine that with awareness and knowledge of what’s really in things and what it does to you (which is where education comes in)… you’ll literally be repelled by the idea of putting harmful substances into you.
(What’s even nicer is when you realize you can have tons of yummy things that align with your care for yourself, without depriving yourself of pleasure.)
It’s like a relationship
Most relationship coaches and therapists tell us we can only find a partner or have a great relationship when we love ourselves first. The thing is, this is totally true for creating a healthy body and life, too. But as we’ve established, we tend not to make this connection.
You think if you change, then you can think and feel the right things. But it’s the other way around. You have to think and feel loving, healthy things about yourself in order to change.
Thinking your body and health need to change so you can love yourself and care for yourself and like yourself is a victim position. It makes you helpless to outside circumstances, instead of generating from within.
You don’t need to wait for your body to be a certain way so then you can love it. You can love it because it’s your body and it’s precious.
You can nurture that awareness and consciousness, and naturally be drawn to be more generous and kind to it with as a result.
That will lead to the actions that make a difference. It will lead to self-care that is self-evident and organic—instead of “things you should do” that you (and others) grimly try to arm-twist yourself into doing.
Self-love is NOT narcissism or ego
In spring of 2018, I posted a photo that my neighbor and friend took of me in my new swimsuit (my first item as a Prana influencer, and I loved it) as I was headed off to the pool.
It happened to be the night that my latest online course registration was ending, so I paired it with a reminder about that, along with a heartfelt sharing about what it means to me to “love your body.” (This idea that you can love yourself as an act of treating yourself lovingly…which nourishes a healthy body…which you’ll then probably love all the more, because being generous and loving toward yourself tends to bring you to better shape.)
In the post I said:
I love being a 50something woman who loves her body and loves wearing swimsuits. It’s not that I’m perfect, and I don’t love my body because I got here. I got to health and radiant energy because I love myself and my body. I love it *actively*—as a verb. I express my love by treating myself well.
I love myself up with good food, movement, meditation, herbs, nature, and – usually! – rest. And more. It’s my joy, privilege, and passion to teach and share with others how to do the same. And I don’t just mean “what to do” – I mean how to SEE it and experience it this way. So you give to yourself because you love yourself, and you get healthy and strong and fit. Not the other way around, where you’re unkind to yourself, withhold from yourself *until* you “get somewhere.” Because you don’t get anywhere that way. That’s the backwards way that makes everything hard…
The post got the usual handful of “likes”—but I also received a private message from an acquaintance/follower that gave me pause.
It in essence said, “nice photo and post, and I get where you’re coming from, but I thought you should consider that some people might find this kind of photo to be show-offy, arrogant or offensive. And that someone like you can’t understand how hard it is to love yourself.”
Wow. Someone like you.
I understand that nobody’s going to think being “shamed” or minorly hand-slapped for enjoying your own fit and healthy body (and saying so) is “harder” than being shamed for not fitting some cultural ideal.
But, shaming is shaming, too. And I think we really have to question and examine why we might consider it arrogant, showing off, or otherwise offensive to enjoy your body, love your body, appreciate your own body…and to share that fact. To enjoy walking around in a swimsuit, especially if you’re 53 years old. To enjoy your body and your swimsuit because you take informed, inspired, joyful care of you, and want to share with people what’s possible when you do that.
I felt we ought to celebrate when a woman over 40 or 50 actually enjoys and loves her body. When one is simply contented with her fitness and appearance (not because she’s perfect, because I’m not, believe me, no one is and certainly not me—but because she pleases herself, and doesn’t really give a crap what anyone else thinks).
Actually, for that matter, I think we should celebrate it when any woman—or man!—at any age is actually happy with and enjoying his or her body. (Because oddly enough, more than half of my private clients have been men, and I can tell you while they express it differently, they are not any less anguished or conflicted or concerned about their bodies, both appearance-wise or health-wise. This is a universal issue.)
We should celebrate it because it’s all too rare, and we need to sincerely and thoughtfully examine what that’s really about. Why it’s so rare, what are the nuanced tributaries of that river—instead of railing generically at “cultural ideals” as if that’s the one simplistic cause of our own self-loathing.
We sure don’t help by turning around and also labeling people who actually have that rare and valuable thing (self-love) …which we sit around the rest of the time scratching our heads and wringing our hands about people not having.
Are we ever satisfied? When people hate themselves, we rant about how this needs to change. And then when someone genuinely grooves on their own self, we vilify that too?
How twisted are we culturally that not only must we shame people when they don’t match up to our ideals of beauty—but we also shame people for feeling good in their bodies, for feeling beautiful, and sharing that? How is it that we find it offensive (or at least dismissible) rather than aspirational when someone actually feels happy in his or her own skin?
Especially if they’re not just showing off and flashing abs, but genuinely trying to share a possibility—like how much more easily and joyfully it can be done than you may think—and break down barriers to finding your own healthiest strongest fittest body; the healthiest version of you, not someone else, and being comfortable in your own resilient skin.
I’m interested in sharing the highest possibilities for aging—and not just how it looks, but more importantly our energy and vitality, and our odds against the chronic diseases that cut most lives short. I’m committed to disintegrating the myths and assumptions that keep people locked into resignation about “how it has to be.”
So I’m not showing off. I’m showing UP. To open up new ways of thinking and seeing that lead to people doing what we already know works.
I’ll say it again: I have the body I do (plenty imperfect but extremely decent for my age) largely because I love it.Let me say that again: I don’t just love it because I have it. I have it because I love it.Because I love on it and I love it up in my actions. Because my love of it is a VERB. It’s a stand I take.
I loved myself and so I gave to myself and that got me somewhere. I didn’t wait to be a certain way in order to care for my body and respect it and give it love.
This love didn’t just come over me, or get bestowed on me because I got to a certain place. It’s not random or pure luck. Of course I’m lucky also, and I’m endlessly grateful for that. But that’s not all it is. You can screw up great genetics—or maximize less than ideal genetics. I know I’ve done some of both and I’ve seen many people do one or the other.
No two people are ever going to look the same or feel the same, nor should we. I won’t look like someone else and they won’t look like me, but it’s not about that—it’s about being the best me possible. And enjoying it. And you can be the best YOU by treating yourself lovingly—including in some particular ways we know to be especially generative.
Most people can be a lot healthier and fitter just by learning some essential things that almost no one is really teaching them (for all the random, hyped up, contrarian and extreme minutia hacking going on) and then doing it. Lovingly.
If I can embody and evoke this possibility, I’m darn well going to share pictures of what I look and feel like in a swimsuit. And if I genuinely enjoy my body—which is something of a miracle for almost anyone but especially a 50-something women in this culture—I’m not going to be shy about it. Because it’s something people need to know is possible.
And because honestly, I believe that more than anything, that’s what people want. Not to look hot, but to feel joy. I really do believe that’s what people most deeply want. I spend a lot of my life talking to people deeply about these things. The things we’re told to want and are knee-jerk habitually acculturated to want or assume we want are all on the surface. Get underneath, and people don’t really want perfection. They want joy, freedom, and peace.
(Plus, most want to be here in working bodies for as long as possible. Me too.)
Also, if anyone thinks I don’t know what it feels like to be unhealthy and out of shape and low energy and fat, you only need to see pictures of me in my childhood, teens and 20s. The years when I got beaten up every day after school because I was so chubby and schlumpy. The days when I was terrified of sports because I got picked last for every team, every single time.
The years when I was always sick and tired because I didn’t know what the f**k I was doing and thought “eating less and exercising more” was the answer (because that was about all anyone ever has to say about it—and crazily, still often is).
Our past does not need to determine our future. I am but one example of this.
I’m not the only one who’s experienced this confounding backlash against self-love. Another coach I’m acquainted with posted a while back on Instagram about running around a lake in a cute bra and shorts, and three girls making snarky comments as she went by—as if she couldn’t hear—including “she must really think she’s hot s**t.”
Again, so interesting. This trainer is only in her thirties and in very lovely fit shape—although like most of us not perfect, and doesn’t feel she needs to be. She’s comfortable and confident in herself enough to run in body-baring clothing on a hot day. She works out to be healthy and strong and feel good and optimize her life. And she helps others do that.
Again, why not celebrate this rather than shame? What makes those girls want to sneer at her rather than bless her? I feel we need to look more deeply at that impulse.
At any rate, in response I posted a different shot of the same day—sweet new swimsuit, long graying hair and all. No apologies. It’s just a swimsuit. It’s just a body. I was just a woman headed to the local pool, feeling happy and grateful because it was summer, and I had a class full of people to teach and serve and share this perspective with. Grateful because I have a body that works well and is healthy and strong and able, and I have the joy and privilege of supporting others to help themselves become the best healthiest most resilient and agile version of themselves.
Elizabeth Gilbert on self-love and self-care
I am delighted to include this beautiful story from one of my favorite authors, Elizabeth Gilbert, on self-care that I think helps to support at least some of what I’m talking about here. I found it on Oprah.com a few years ago and began including it as a reading in my courses.
“What Taking Care of Yourself Really Means.”
I was recently speaking at a church event in the Midwest when a woman in the audience stood to ask a question. Before she even opened her mouth, I got a vibe off this person, and that vibe was: neglect. I don’t mean to say that she wasn’t tending to her beauty regimen (honestly, who cares?); I mean this woman just looked neglected—the way an unloved animal looks after years of disregard. She emanated stress and loneliness. Then she asked her question, and she really broke my heart.
“I don’t understand what people mean when they say we’re supposed to love ourselves,” she said. She began to cry. “How do I do that?”
She stared at me with desperation in her eyes, and I saw it again: the neglected animal that lived within her. So I said, “You need to start taking care of your animal.”
She looked confused, so I went on. “You need to stop thinking of yourself as a human being and start treating yourself like the traumatized little animal you are.”
I could see she was still puzzled, so I broke it down further. “Have you ever seen a frightened dog in a cage at a rescue shelter?”
She nodded.
“Pretend you’ve just adopted that dog from a kill shelter. You don’t know anything about this animal’s history—and you don’t need to know. You can see she’s been abused, and she’s afraid of being abandoned or hurt again. Now imagine this: It’s your first night home alone with that dog, and she’s trembling in fear. How would you treat her? Would you scream at her and tell her she’s an idiot? Would you kick her? Would you lock her in a dark room all alone? Would you starve her or let her binge-eat a bunch of garbage? Would you let her stay in an environment where other dogs attack her every day?”
“No,” said the woman. “I would take care of her.”
“Aha!” I said. “So you do know how to love an animal. You would offer her a warm and safe bed, right? Healthy food. A cozy environment. Walks in the sunshine. Fresh air and clean water. Careful socialization with other animals—nice ones that don’t bite. Naps. Tenderness. Affection. Playtime. And lots of patience. That’s how you love an animal.”
“But that’s an animal,” she said. “It’s easy to love an animal.”
“Well, that’s good news, because you’re an animal, too.”
I try never to forget three words the great Cole Porter wrote: “We’re merely mammals.” Hundreds of thousands of years before we developed our complications and neuroses, we were just another warm-blooded life-form trying to survive in a difficult world. When we forget that fact, we suffer. We get trapped in the shame and blame of our human minds and neglect “the soft animal of your body” (as Mary Oliver so beautifully calls it). But what makes us think we’re so special that we alone—unlike any other animal on earth—do not deserve loving care?
Sometimes the only way I can pull myself from the edge of terror or self-hatred is to ask myself, How does my animal feel right now? Then I notice my racing heart, my trembling hands, my shortened breath, my knotted stomach, my shaky legs, my clenched jaw…and I say, “This is no way for an animal to live.” I ask my animal what would make her feel better. A walk in the sunlight? A friendly voice? A treat? A nap? My animal teaches me how to take care of her, and she shows me how to care for myself.
That night I said to the neglected woman, “It’s time for you to adopt yourself. God gave you stewardship over one dear and vulnerable animal: yourself. Can you embrace that responsibility?”
“Maybe…” she said.
I hope she can. I hope the same for all of us—that we can rescue ourselves from the kill shelter and give ourselves the loving home we’ve earned just by virtue of being alive.
http://www.oprah.com/inspiration/elizabeth-gilbert-practical-ways-to-practice-self-care
