Fitness and Body Image

Over 3 billion dollars is spent a year in the US on diet and exercise. While it is important to maintain a healthy weight and take care of our physical bodies, it is also imperative that we maintain our emotional counterparts. But how do we tend to our emotions when they are related to our perceived body image?

Fitness and exercise plays an important role in an active person’s lifestyle. But to many men and women across America, their true happiness depends greatly upon their perception of themselves rather than how others view them. At times, these men and women see a skewed image of themselves when they gaze into a mirror. A woman once said to me: “I don’t want to jog because everyone else will look at me, they will stare at how fat I am.” This woman had a distorted view of herself and was by no means, “fat”. If this sounds familiar, you aren’t alone.

Through the grace of the media, our culture promotes negative images and unrealistic standards for men and women. We are also product of a culture that is subject to diet fads and over-the-counter wonder pills. Such trends proclaim to give you the Body you’ve always dreamed of regardless of the tush and legs that your mother gave you. Not only are these fads unrealistic, they are unfair and unhealthy for the emotionally fragile person.

Being an athlete and active person from a very young age, I have come to understand the social complexities placed upon many men and women to stay fit, to stay healthy, and to stay young, even when we aren’t. There is a time when we must accept our innate body and love the skin we’re in. As an interactive and practical therapist, I support men and women of all ages, to do just that.

Now this doesn’t mean I am promoting a sedentary lifestyle, munching on buttered popcorn and potato chips while watching The Biggest Loser and Gray’s Anatomy. Nor am I promoting the assertion that: “If this is the body I was born to have, I might as well have another beer.” Research shows that if we stay within the following conceptual building blocks within the model of healthy body image (BodyImageHealth.org), the positive outcomes are endless.

1.) Balance attention to many aspects of identity. Looks are only one part.
2.) Consistently satisfy hunger with enough varied, wholesome food in a stable, predictable manner.
3.) Limit sedentary choices to promote a physically active lifestyle at all ages.
4.) Choose role models who reflect a realistic standard.

With a firm understanding of the importance of keeping the physical as well as the emotional body fit, a healthy body image is certainly attainable. Similarly, we can begin to better regulate the reasons behind maintaining a body weight, dieting and exercising. We can understand the difference between the images of Hollywood and the reality of life. With a healthy body image, men and women can design a physically active lifestyle for fitness, endurance, fun, relaxation, and stress relief and begin eating for health, energy and hunger satisfaction.