Saturday 16 July

Whether you’re a girl or a guy, older or younger, we all experience days
like this. We look in the mirror and think “ugh, I look awful today”,
whether that’s your body, hair, face, skin. We judge ourselves based on our appearance.

On these days, we are only focussed on our appearance. We judge every bulge, bump and scar and self-deprecate. We don’t see the internal goodness that we all hold inside. Mirrors don’t see our wonderful traits and the virtues we carry inside us. It’s a very self-obsessed thing to do: look in the mirror for so long and pick apart every part of our body.

On these days, we may also be “doom scrolling”: we scroll through
social media pages and either intentionally or not compare our bodies to those we are seeing online. This does not help.

It’s like as soon as we wake up on these days and see our reflection in the mirror, the whole day is going to be bad. Nothing seems good after that, and, we keep checking ourselves throughout the day in reflections and other mirrors to confirm that, yep, we still look bad. In our minds.

Thoughts are just that – thoughts. They are mists in our mind. They don’t
exist nor do they confirm anything. They are not facts, but fiction we make up in our minds. Thoughts are subjective, not factual. This is crucial to remember.

However, I do know that on BBIDs, it can feel impossible to get out of this mood. BBIDs make the whole day feel like it’s an avalanche of bad things one after the other, and you just want to hide in bed. Or the opposite, you want to work out the whole day and restrict because you feel “fatter” or “your abs aren’t there”.

If you are basing your self-worth on your appearance and what you don’t have (like abs), you are missing everything good in your life. Another trait of the human race: to constantly search the situation for all the negative niggles. It’s what our minds are trained to do, tracing back to the cavemen days of constant anxiety that we’d starve or be eaten by a jaguar. And the Middle Ages or Roman times, of being killed by your enemy or the gladiators. You get what I mean. It’s all about switching your mindset to a more positive outlook, an abundance mindset, instead of searching for the negatives and never being truly happy. Your self appearance is just the same concept.

Your body is just a vessel for carrying your qualities and personality. At
your funeral, nobody is going to say “she was such a great person because she had abs and a thigh gap”. They’re going to read out every single great trait you have. That’s your true internal worth.

On the other hand, your body is a vessel in the way that it is your home. You live with and in your body for your entire life, so start appreciating it for all that it is and thank your body for doing all the great things it can:
breathe, carry you, digest food.

If you’re having a BBID, 1) put on a baggy t-shirt and avoid mirrors. Avoid
that routine of checking out your body first thing in the morning because from there it’s only going to go downhill for the entire day. Not because you look bad, but because you know that otherwise you will just keep pointing it out. 2) Cover up your mirror with a cloth or blanket, or if it’s freestanding, move it out of your room or turn it around. This is something which I’ve done long ago – ditch the mirror! 3) Also avoid “doom-scrolling.” Journal about why today is a BBID and how exactly you are feeling. From there you can start to identify patterns on why you feel like this at certain points in the week/month. Then, you can work on yourself and lessen the BBIDs you have.

Try and remember that whatever journey you are on right now, your body is doing that for you. Your body allows you to do so many incredible things in the day and it’s not just a subject of self-deprecation and judgement ❤ 

PEPETOE LOVE ❤