While aimlessly scrolling through Instagram the other day I came across a comment on a very popular influencers post which made me procrastinate so hard I made spider diagrams looking into the wellness industry. The comment said "you're telling me to not look at my body while posting a picture of you with your abs out" the post was about not analysing or hating your body. A very important message but the whole post highlighted exactly were the industry is fucking up. If you're telling someone to not analyse or even look at their own body and to accept it for how it looks then you don't need a picture of your very sculpted body to go with the caption.
Of course telling someone to accept themselves how they look, how they are rolls, cellulite and all is all fine and really good I love it but that one comment opened my eyes to how toxic these messages are slowly becoming. It doesn't take long to find a before and after picture with a caption ensuring they loved how their body looked in the before picture. Ok, cool what's the point you're trying to make? Why are you so focused on the change in your body? Why are you telling someone to accept their rolls but your after picture shows perfectly sculpted abs? Ironically these are the same people who claim to exercise to feel good but in a post a week later will be showing off their favourite glute exercises to get the perfect bum. I was once told that you can't change someone with words, they'll only change when they feel they want to change. So why do influencers feel their words focusing on changing someones beliefs and thoughts about themselves be changed by a picture of abs and one of rolls proving we can change our body with good angles and lighting while telling us they never exercise for aesthetic purposes. Ironically while procrastinating writing this post I went on Instagram to message my friend and on the search section where it comes up with recommended posts I saw qa picture of a body at 8am and a more bloated version of the same body at 10pm showing that bloating is normal, of course it is but the caption gave a paragraph on loving their normal bloated body the next offered bloating remedies. Can you see the fucking problem now? If your bloating causes illness or pain please go see a doctor or a registered nutritionist, of course it's normal but if you feel you need remedies for it your body deserves medical attention. That paragraph about bloating remedies ended with the person saying "as you can see these sometimes don't help" not really a remedy then are they mate? It was also clear on the morning picture she's breathing in. Please if you're going to do a I love my body and accept how it looks post then post a picture of how your body actually looks. I just feel influencers have allowed the word influencer go to their head a bit, it's not even a real word. If you're in the awful situation where you hate yourself, you hate your body and would do anything and pay anything to change it then an I love my body and it's celulite post isn't going to change your mentality. It actually might take talking to a professional to change your mentality. For me it took me feeling a certain way about training and eating well to change my mentality and a lot of trial and error and being patient with myself. We've all been there aimlessly wandering around gym machines and forcing ourselves to eat food we don't like because it's green. But that's were Instagram has it's benefits I follow these fitness and food bloggers for inspiration for my own meals and workouts. I have the same weekly routine with the gym and I love it, I love lifting heavy weights, spinning and circuit training. I love it because I feel good doing it and it constantly challenges me. But you know what is ok, exercising to look a certain way especially with holidays or family events to look forward to. I'm sure, well actually I've seen an influencer who's stepped up their exercise regime because they had a holiday booked and that's fine but I just wish they admitted they were doing it but it probably went against their core brand values but even saying "actually I want to feel my most confident when I'm in a bikini so I'm working even harder because I know a physical change will help me feel good despite the fact I tell you all to accept your flaws" would have helped it was that obvious what they were doing. For me next year I'm going to be a bridesmaid, I'm going to be photographed a lot and walk down the aisle with everyone staring at me. You best believe I've already spoken to my personal trainer friend about bridesmaid bootcamp, I want to look my best for that wedding, why? Because I want to look at pictures of my brothers wedding and know I worked extra hard to look that good. When I think about what I'll look at the wedding I don't think about what my body will look like because that will start a poor mental approach to bridesmaid bootcamp, I know the areas I want to target and see where a professional can take me and how far I can push my body. One thing you won't see me do is take a before and after picture saying I accepted my body in the before picture because if I did I wouldn't do bridesmaid bootcamp would I? I don't want this post to be seen as me attacking the wellness industry, I'm all for self love and self acceptance and using a platform to spread this message. I love seeing girls lift weights and love spreading the message of self love and taking care of yourself. It can just be a bit of a gobshite at times and very toxic. Toxic to the point where you tell someone to love their stretch marks. Fab that's better than what the so called standards of society to tell us. But this young person may has had it programmed into them that stretch marks are ugly and you shouldn't have them if you haven't had kids, while she's shopping for make up she can see bio oil who's main selling point is it makes stretch marks disappear. She's seen your Instagram post to accept her stretch marks and love them. Conveniently she's booked a holiday and she wants to be proud of her body, yes this year she's going to wear a bikini. Congratulations influencer your message is working. She finds a nice bikini, she's telling herself she's going to look so good and confident in this bikini. She tries it on and she fucking hates herself. she's built it up in her head that she's going to feel and look confident, there's someone telling her stretch marks are beautiful but in this moment she doesn't like them and she doesn't like what she sees in the mirror. She's confused because she's told herself stretch marks are beautiful and when she sees them on Instagram she agrees with herself that they are beautiful. But that's the thing about self love isn't it, it takes time and practice, working on the inside to love the outside. While Bio Oil is bad for selling themselves on getting rid of scars and stretch marks it can be just as bad telling someone they have to love themselves. Of course they do but have some empathy, self love takes time and there's no right or wrong limit. It's ok to not love what you see in the mirror as long as you promise yourself to work on how you feel about yourself. Stretch marks are cool but don't feel pressured to show yours off if you aren't comfortable just because someone else is. We're all working in our own time scale. Don't stop telling people to stop comparing themselves to others just don't think a picture of your abs is suitable for that caption. I bought a be your best self journal and not once does it talk about my body, how it looks or about how I feel about my body because self love starts within. No matter what the caption says you look at someone elses body and you think about your own, it's human nature. Don't tell me to focus on my personality if I'm 2 inches of material away from seeing your arse hole. If you're showing a progress picture and the caption tells me that you weren't happy with what you saw in the first picture so you made some changes and this was the end result and you feel a lot better, that's fine it's your social media. The wellness industry just deserves a bit more honesty if we're going to be more open, that's all. Be honest with how long self love can take, it's not a given thing and it's not a consistent mentality. Much like all thoughts and feelings self love can and will have it's up and down days. Find what works for you, follow people who share your core values and who make you feel good and if you need some comic relief from the wellness world please follow @WellnessTed on Instagram and go eat that piece of cake and don't feel bad about it.
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