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10 Ways To Overcome Self-Criticism And Body Shame

“Women have cultural permission to criticize ourselves.”

“It’s like one day I just decided it was all bullshit. Who are they to tell me I’m not amazing exactly as I am?”

“What would happen if you put down the whip you’ve been flogging yourself with for decades?”

Yesterday I gave you 10 ways to “get out of your head” during sex.

Today we are going to talk about overcoming body shame once and for all! If your partner struggles with bad body image issues, there are lots of things YOU can do below to support them too.

LOVE YOUR BOD

32% of women say they struggle to orgasm because of being in their heads or because of body issues according to a Cosmo survey.

OK, Body. Love.

How can you get over body issues and cultural shame. How can you help your partner feel as beautiful to themselves as they are to you?

The large majority of women are ashamed of their sexual desire or how they look naked.

Our culture, our family, religious beliefs and advertising make us feel unattractive, imperfect and ashamed.

1. Do whatever you need to do to push every single limiting thought out of your head as it occurs and replace it with a positive affirmation. It’s just programming. You are beautiful no matter what you look like. And every day you deny yourself pleasure because of what you think others would say or how you think you look is self-defeating and shackles you in negativity.

2. Find workarounds to your issues. Turn down the lights. Wear lingerie that covers the parts you don’t like. Take better care of your body. Know that in this moment you are as young as you’ll ever be. Don’t wait for perfection. It never comes. Perfection is allowing yourself to love your imperfections and getting intimate with another human being who adores you.

3. Finally, men are not that picky. Women are our own worst enemies about our bodies and our sexual desires. Men want you to show your desire. Men want to see you nude and they love you for exactly who you are. Men love women who are sexually confident without hang ups.

Every time a self-deprecating remark passes through your head, just let it fly by and bring yourself back to self-love.

If you’ve never watched porn, you’d be surprised to know that though the standard “porn star” is allegedly “perfect,” when you actually watch a lot of porn those adult stars have all kinds of imperfections!  Men simply do not see the cellulite, the scars, the fat rolls that you are so worried about.

4. Permanently let go of self-criticism by seeing the circular logic that doesn’t support your thriving.

Dr. Emily Nagoski in her book, Come As You Are: The Surprising New Science That Will Transform Your Sex Life  explains the circular logic that is embedded in our culture that you can now break free of because you’ve been shown the light. She says:

“Self-criticism is associated with worse health outcomes, both mental and physical, and more loneliness. That’s right: Self-criticism is one of the best predictors of loneliness — so it’s not just, “I am at risk,” it’s also, “I am lost.” Self-criticism is directly related to depression.

The solution is to start replacing self-criticism with self-kindness.

When women start to think concretely about it, they begin to discover a sense that they need their self-criticism in order to stay motivated.

We believe it does us good to torture ourselves, at least a little bit. As in: “If I stop beating myself up for the ways I’m not perfect, that’s like admitting to the world — and myself — that I’ll never be perfect, that I’m permanently inadequate! I need my self-criticism in order to maintain my hope and to motivate myself to get better.”

When we tell ourselves, “I can’t stop criticizing myself or else I will fail forever!” that’s like saying, “I can’t stop running/fighting/playing dead, or the lion will eat me!” That’s absolutely what our culture has taught us, so it makes sense that many of us believe it. It’s so entrenched in our culture that it sounds… sane. Rational, even.

But it’s not.

Think about it. What would really happen if you stopped running from yourself or beating yourself up? What would happen if you put down the whip you’ve been flogging yourself with for decades?

When you stop beating yourself up — when you stop reinjuring yourself —what happens is… you start to heal.” — Dr. Emily Nagoski

5. Take more active care of your health. The two things you can do that will go the furthest of ANYTHING are:

1) Eat more organic vegetables every day
2) Walk every day

Taking ACTION: a little walk and some nutrition to fuel your body will immediately make you feel better about your body.

6. Practice focusing on the things you love about your body. Look in the mirror often and see the beauty of your body. Just fill your mind with gratitude.

7. Ask your partner to tell you what they love about your body. Get them to use as many specifics as possible and take it all in. Really be present and listen to what they love about your body.

8. Remember that you have a short time on this planet and any moments you spend lamenting versus celebrating your beauty rob you from the joy of your humanity.

9. When you compare yourself to others, think about yourself in the context of how much joy and love you create in the world. People aren’t paying attention to your body, they are noticing how you make them feel about themselves. How are you making yourself and others around you feel? Could you 10X the love you generate today?

10. Just let it go. Let go of your worries. If you are in what seems to be an unbreakable cycle of negative self-talk, you may have a mood spectrum disorder. That’s where there’s a sticky switch in your pre-frontal cortex. It can get stuck in the negative where you literally cannot see the positive. Psychiatrists such as Dr. William Prey of San Francisco, California are doing amazing work with Ketamine infusion therapy and low dose trials of lithium and other medicines that are not anti-depressants. Talk to your friends and family to see if they think you could be helped by going to an enlightened professional.

Focus on connecting intimately with your lover. Surrender to your co-created pleasure. This is what fulfills and nurtures us as human beings.

It’s literally THAT easy.

Come-as-you-are2

<== Come As You Are: The Surprising New Science That Will Transform Your Sex Life,

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All information from Susan Bratton, Personal Life Media, The20, and our collective brands are personal opinions. The statements made within this email/website have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. These statements and the products of this company are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease. Always seek consultation from your doctor.

7 Responses

  1. It’s NOT that I am beating myself up for not being perfect, it’s anguish and frustration in living trapped in a fat suit that will just NOT come off! “Loving and accepting” myself is one thing, but that fat is NOT ME! I look in the mirror and I know that reflection is NOT who I really am but a DISTORTION. It’s an AFFLICTION, that is apart from who I am yet it imprisons my body every minute of every day, with the REAL me underneath. Unless you’re going through the same thing, you will NEVER really understand, nor will I ever expect you to…

  2. “Men like extra (flab is the proper word, not your P.C. term “flesh”). Bullcrap! Unless they’re a “chubby chaser”, there is a reason why porn, movies and media portray sleek, slender lean women, it’s because that’s what most men go for! No one tells a guy which porn to watch, he chooses his preference, which is usually a non-flabby woman, because that’s what he really wants, even if that makes him a fat ass hypocrite! Some men even have a double standard about it “It’s acceptable for me to be heavy, I’m a guy!”. The guy chooses his ideal woman to look in such a way the typical average woman cannot achieve, yet he expects her to feel good about herself? How is that supposed to make sense? If he “likes” her flab, it’s because either he wants her to get past it so she can be that much more uninhibited which will be more fun for him (like AC/DC’s “a whole lotta Rosie”), or he is in a relationship with her and loves her even with her imperfections to where he’s past them and wish she were too so that she can be that much more uninhibited which will be more fun for him.

  3. I readily identify with this issue as my wife suffers from it in a big way but no matter what I do nothing helps. And I have given up 6 months since any. Want her so badly I can’t stand it but one little slip no matter how innocent unmeaning or even unrelated to her I get when you talk to me like that ( Like what?) I don’t feel turned on and it will be weeks and months before if ever she lets go. Most of the time I don’t even have a clue as to what I said so wrong. I have given up in this area and feel such so depressed and such a loss that never will we get to any form of sensuality and spirituality that sex has to offer.

  4. I live to motivate people. One of the most important things someone ever told me is, what you say has more to do with you and the person you’re talking about. These women or men have been abused mentally and physically. A man my body shame his woman if he’s cheating on her. Just to feel better about himself. I am so grateful that person shared that with me a long time ago. Also another important thing to remember told to me by the wonderful Dr Goldethal Who Saved My Life years ago but I’m fighting the battle again. Is to listen to your body it will tell you what it needs. Which is very very important. America strip that doctor of his license he was above all the military in America leading them and they didn’t like the truth he was sharing with everyone so they stripped him of his license. I had to share because so many people live in shame when in the Bible in Galatians God clearly tells us that if we could be perfect or live perfect that would have meant he gave his son in vain and he did not give his life in vain. I’m a public speaker who is ill right now my dream was to travel the country and start and all the schools starting at kindergarten and earlier if possible all the way up to high school. To inform the bullies early on they will no longer be tolerated a lot of people believe their crap but those bullies turn into menaces to society. When people know better they do better so I wanted to give him a lesson early on. A lot of people have the police recording playing over and over in their mind. Women, men and children, own the masterpiece of a body that God gave you and your whole body, mind and spirit will and bodywill remember if anybody’s body shaming you,it says everything about them and not you. Change your thoughts change your life.

  5. If I had a wife or girlfriend like in the photo above, I’d consider myself very lucky. She looks perfect.

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