From the Brain of Dr. Nicki: Body Love

I have a surprise for you – a shocking, stunning, nearly incomprehensible surprise: We don't need to love the specifics of our bodies, to experience authentic self-body love! For real. No kidding.

 What this means is that you can love your body even though it has cellulite. You can love your body even though it's "too fat". You can love your body even though its "too old". You can love your body even though all the parts don't work exactly as you want them to. Right!?! Who knew! Not me. Not in all these years of complaining, restraining, & explaining has this notion ever occurred to me. Like most I've always imagined the right shape and size would plop me firmly in the land of body love -- the land where all the perfect people live. I was wrong. What I thought and taught was we love ourselves including our [body] imperfections. Or, for some, we love ourselves in spite of our physical flaws. Nope.

 Turns out, body love has nothing whatsoever to do with body shape, size, age and capacity. No. Those elements are completely irrelevant. Loving your body is instead about being truly, deeply, intentionally connected to the idea of having a body in the first place -- to existing in a divinely human form. Accepting that means accepting Life itself as an inspiring, inspired experience, which is exactly what leads to feeling amazing INSIDE your physical form, no matter how typically, culturally beautiful it is or isn't. Amazing, I hear you shout!! Great for others, you pout, but not for me -- never happened, never will. But that's because you're misunderstanding the real point. I know. I've done it too – over and over. So how does it really work? The idea is to first recognize that the body itself is an extraordinary vehicle – a miraculous "structure"  that lets us move around in our lives. Ask a disabled individual struggling with mere movement. They'll tell you what a blessing having a fully functioning body is. Second: Begin to appreciate that just as you are not your job, or money, or even your relationship, you are not your body shape, size, age or capacity.
 Perhaps you're saying you've tried to love your body -- done old style exercises like looking in the mirror naked and telling yourself you love what you see. It's notworked. Why? Because it's off point -- again: self-love and body appreciation have zero to do with appearance.

Let's hammer home this point: Loving your body is not going to be about what someone else thinks; it's not going to be about how many people you attract; it's not going to be about the perfect anything. Rather, it's going to hinge on your relationship to being alive. Yes, that's right. Your relationship to being alive. Now, if you don't feel lucky to be alive – if you don't see the promise in that – you need to check your purpose at the door. Do not pass go – do not collect $200 – instead figure out how to bring real meaning to your life. Don't wait for somebody else to assign you meaning. Don't hope love will do it. Don't hope money will do it. Don't hope the right job will do it. Seek meaning inside where it truly lives! Today I dearly love and appreciate my body. Not the specifics, but rather the life force it has and is.  And that appreciation, dear readers, makes all the difference.

** this is a re-post of a blog that first posted on May 19, 2016