What nudity has to do with self-healing? A story of self-acceptance.
I can't stop thinking about the ‘freeing boobs’ project. I know I promised to write about the nervous system but today I will write about body positivity instead.
Last week I joined a 3-day school of courage for women with a vision and mission. I met there a very inspiring Polish body positivity activist, Iga Nasiek. Her life was a stream of eating disorders in various forms. A few years back, she gained a lot of weight after giving birth to her daughter. It was her breakthrough. She decided to love herself instead of fighting and hating her body. Today she encourages women to get naked more often so that they accept their bodies.
Why I'm telling you all that? Because, in a sense, I have a similar mission, just more from the ''inside out''.
Before I explain it better, let me digress by sharing my own story of body self-acceptance. The acceptance I gained in spite of my first boyfriend who claimed my breasts were not ''normal''. And despite the toxic shame culture I grew up in.
My dear friend was lucky to be born in a country where nudity (read: human body) is natural rather than sinful and shameful. I was maturing to my naturist coming out for years. So when my friend invited me to enter icy cold Baltic waters on the naturist beach in Lithuania, I was surprised to notice I didn't feel ashamed. I felt free. For me, this was the extension of my decision to stop wearing high heels even on big occasions. I listen to my body more and more. On and off the mat.
Unfortunately, people still confuse naked flesh with sexuality. I have to be careful with what I wear when I teach my classes. The last thing I want is to be thrown into one bag with Yoga-Body-fetishising teachers.
Body positivity is about ''feeling good in your skin''. It doesn't end with a smile when you look in the mirror. It's also that open curiosity and unconditional acceptance with which you approach any sensation within the body.
In the context of the yoga world, everything circles around flexibility. The yoga body is a flexible body. If you're not bendy, you must be doing something wrong. And you're ready to take any measures to be as you should be. Maybe you even start hating the body when you feel pain or can't control it. Or when your range of movement starts changing with age.
Striving for perfection is one of many reasons why I distanced myself from mainstream Yoga, choosing Somatic movement and mindfulness instead. My last masterclass: ''The Myth of Flexibility'' (available in the recorded version) discusses why gentleness is a more efficient approach to feeling better in your skin.
But I feel that's still scratching the surface of the deeper problem. Self-healing anxiety, depression, chronic pain, or auto-immune diseases starts from radical self-acceptance. That’s why I celebrated International Yoga Day with this 30-min Self-Acceptance in Action session.
It took me years to accept my Scattered Mind self, my Negative self, and my Angry self. The candy-floss spirituality the internet is so full of doesn't allow you to embrace yourself as a whole. It makes you feel deficient. It feeds your perfectionism. It forces you to search for an unattainable ideal - just as glossy magazines do.
It’s hard not to feel judged as there are so many societal pressures on how we should be: as women, mothers, professionals... The list could go on. But the cure lies in accepting yourself DESPITE everything.
PS. I'm planning another Masterclass on Anxiety in July.
If you happen to be:
1. self-employed
2. female and
3. experience chronic anxiety/ fear/worry
please answer a few questions.
I hear you. And I want to help you out.