Let’s talk about someone’s body who’s openly spoken about her struggles with her body with millions of people, shall we?
 
But it’s a compliment, we’re calling her sexy
 
And yet, lovely daily mail, you’re reiterating the exact point she made when she later said:
 
You're still in a society that worships photo-shopped super models. We all still feel the pressure to look like them because that's a symptom of a society that emphasizes all the wrong things and this will be an everyday struggle
 
 
We live in a society that emphasises all the wrong things
 
 
I wonder if you ever consider that? 
 
If you ever stop to think, am I too, emphasising the wrong things?
 
This isn’t about blame or fault – as this article, Kesha, the headline all spotlight that we live in a world that tries to tell us what’s important
 
That tries to tell us that appearance is what matters most
 
Especially as women, the words of Naomi Wolfe I so often share consistently play on loop in my head alongside the bridge to Cruel Summer and the 10 minute version of All Too Well:
 
A culture fixated on female thinness is not an obsession about female beauty, but an obsession about female obedience. Dieting is the most potent political sedative in women’s history; a quietly mad population is a tractable one
 

I remember writing a blog almost a decade ago about the amount of time I'd spent deciding if I was going to eat a nut at my dads house

I'd just come off a season of competing, was taking a break visiting him in France, a rare novelty, and as he was cooking a dinner I had no control over, I stared at a nut on the table that I really wanted, but couldn't in my head allow myself to eat without first justifying it

I can only imagine how many moments like that I had in my life of disordered eating and it makes me pretty sad that I remember the nut story more than I remember the smile lines on my dads face, the effort he made to make my 4 course dinner, the look in his eyes when I told him of my career wins, the laughter

 
Many of you reading this will spend a solid proportion of your time thinking about your food choices and/or your body
 
This time that could be better spent elsewhere, on your family, work, joy, gratitude, creativity
 
It was taking up so much of my brain space, Kesha said, from morning to night. I was obsessed with what I looked like, what went in my mouth, what size things were and people’s approval.
 
 
Again, many of you reading this will have normalised this in your mind, resigned yourself to the perceived reality that you will always be that person
 
It may be solely related to the emphasis on appearance and beauty standards. It may also be a source of control, of safety, of distraction, or self-regulation
 
Food and body preoccupation are not often solely a manifestation of the emphasis on all the wrong things
 
 
What struck me about Kesha’s vulnerability and shared experience is that she said:
 
10 years ago' nobody could have convinced her that she would've found 'freedom from that obsession
 
This I felt to the bone
 

I too remember thinking this was just how I am
 
I’m a nutritionist. I’ll always know the calories in my food it’s my job
 
I’m a fitness professional. I’ll always have the pressure to stay in a leaner body
 
I’ve binge eaten since I was 15. It will always be my coping tool, I just have to do what I can to accept that
 
These were all (well-meaning) lies I told myself to avoid making change. To self-handicap when I failed at any attempts to change. To stay stuck in the safety of my disordered eating.
 
 
With almost all people we work with at ETPHD, they come to us believing that this is just how they are, that they’re just someone who will always count calories / overeat / need to exercise every single day / binge eat (disordered eating manifests differently for everyone)
 
With all people who finish working with us at ETPHD, they’re flabbergasted (word of the day you’re welcome) that they made space for their authentic selves to shine through and released the weight of food and body preoccupation from their lives
 
 
I can’t stress enough – your disordered eating is not just who you are. Change is possible.
 
Self-awareness + action in the direction of your values = the growth & peace you’re looking for
 
 
I ask you – what do you think is important to emphasise in your world? In society? What do you think are the most important things? Where will you choose to put intentional time and energy?
 
What will you gain, when you let go of the weighting of overthinking food and bodies?
 
 
Have a lovely weekend, 
I’m always here,
Em