This Is What It Really Means To Love Your Body

To love your body is to learn to love it right now.

You might want to lose weight, or you may want to bulk up, but unless you learn to love your body in this moment, you won’t be able to love it at all.

To love your body is to listen to it carefully, and always nourish it with what it wants. Not what your mind tells you it wants, but what the whispers of your body tell you. Some days that might be a bowl of leafy greens, other days that might be a bowl of choc chip ice cream.

To love your body is to think less about the physicality of it, and more about what it allows you to do in this world. Your body is the reason you can sprint around the park, climb mountains, and explore exotic lands. Your body lets you see nature in all its beauty, it lets you dance naked to your favorite song in the shower, and it lets you kiss the ones you love. You see, your body is merely a shape, formed by layers of muscle and fat encased around solid bones. Your body is a vessel for your heart.

To love your body means to leave your judgment at the door. And no matter how many times you find that judgment weaving its way into your mind, you learn to confront it, figure out why it was created, and upgrade it with empowering beliefs that serve you. Because your body does not deserve to be judged – your body deserves nothing but your love.

To love your body means to consciously choose to love it every single day. On the days where you struggle to fit into your best jeans. On the days where you’re trying on clothes in a dressing room and you feel like everything looks awful on you. On the days where someone calls you fat in the street. On the days where someone tells you you’re too skinny and you need to eat more. On the days where you’re watching your favorite TV show and comparing your body to the ones on screen. To love your body means to love it on all of your days, no matter how many reasons you find not to.

To love your body is to dress it in the clothes that make your soul light up within. Not what your friends or those magazines tell you you’re supposed to wear. And to wear those clothes with a beaming smile on your face, and a hum in your heart, because this is who you are and you’re done hiding it.

To love your body is to move it every day. Walk barefoot on the grass, run around the block, or swim in the salty waters of the ocean. Step onto your mat and lose yourself in kundalini yoga, make a killer playlist and hit the gym, or hop onto a surfboard and ride the waves as they carry you forward. It doesn’t matter what you do, just as long as it makes you and your body feel alive.

To love your body means to surround yourself with people who love your body and their own just as much as you do. Because life is too short to keep company with anyone who places such high value on physical appearances or makes you feel like your body is somehow not enough.

To love your body is to say wonderful, loving things to it often. To stand in front of the mirror and approve of what you see staring back at you. To thank it for all of the adventures you get to have each day. And to be grateful that you were given this body, because deep down you know there’s a reason why you needed this one. Say kind things to your body, because she is always listening. Always picking up on your feelings towards it. Criticize or abuse it too much, and it will begin to shut down and disconnect itself from your heart.

To love your body means to use it. To run marathons, walk tightropes, or whirl and twirl doing the tango into the early hours of the morning. To feel every cell in your body on fire as it becomes one with another. To scream at the top of your lungs when the mood takes you. And to sit cross-legged with your hands nestled at your heart, as you breathe deeply and allow yourself to be at peace.

You see, loving your body has nothing to do with what your body looks like. Loving your body is about how you choose to feel about your beautiful body.