#177 3 Steps To Stop Judging Your Body

This is episode #177 of my weekly show "Soul Infused Monday". In this audio lecture, I share 3 steps with you on how to stop judging and obsessing over your body and create more self-love and body appreciation.

Transcript

Hi there and welcome back to Soul Infused Monday,

The number one show for an inspired and meaningful week.

And thank you for being here.

Thank you for showing up every week.

The show would definitely not be the same without you.

So thank you for taking the time to be here.

And today's topic is something that is really close to my heart.

It's super important.

We all struggle with it.

And it affects a lot of people that I know actually personally,

But also you that you're listening in right now.

So I'm excited that you're here.

And the topic today on this episode of the Soul Infused Monday show is that I'm going to share three steps to stop judging and or obsessing over your body.

And before I jump in,

I want to give you a little bit of an overview of what I'm going to cover.

And I also have notes today because I can talk about this topic for weeks.

It's a really,

Really important topic.

And I want to give you a little bit of an overview so that you know what you can expect.

So three steps to stop judging and obsessing over your body.

First thing,

Just take a nice deep breath.

Welcome.

Welcome to the show.

Welcome to this time that you're taking for yourself.

Take a nice deep breath and allow yourself to be open,

To be open minded and invite to receive whatever is meant to be for you today to receive.

Now what I'm going to do,

I'm going to give you a little bit of a context,

A little bit of an intro that I'm going to obviously share those three steps with you.

I'm also going to give you two free resources today that you can use to support this journey of love your body,

To be more loving and kind with your body.

And I am also going to give you a few little bonus tips at the end.

I'm going to share a poem with you that is designed to actually tap into the energy of acceptance of loving and also forgiving when it comes to your body.

And towards the very end,

If I have some time,

I'm happy to answer one or two questions.

So if you have a question around this topic today in particular,

Please leave a comment below and label it very clearly as a question.

Keep it clear,

Specific,

Specific and precise so that I can actually answer that for you because my intention for you or my intention for this episode today is really to support you as much as I can with this topic because I know firsthand.

I know firsthand how painful and shameful this topic of body image,

How we look,

Appearance can be.

And whether you've been on the journey very fresh or whether you've been on the journey for a long time,

Whether you've done in a work already,

Whether you not done anything,

This is a topic that kind of like kind of reappears.

And I also sometimes see that specifically for you,

If you've done a lot of work,

There is kind of like an underlying shame and another judgment around,

Hey,

I shouldn't feel this way anymore.

I shouldn't,

You know,

Like I still judge my body.

I still can't accept myself.

And there's judgment on the judgment on top of it.

So I invite you to be really open minded.

If ever the thought occurs to you,

It's like,

Oh,

I've done this already,

Sonja,

Oh,

This isn't working for me.

Or,

Yeah,

It sounds so easy.

Just be open.

There is something still there for you to explore and discover on a deeper level.

OK.

And if you like this topic,

If you like what you've heard so far,

Please do me a favor.

Like this video,

Subscribe,

Share it.

And of course,

You don't have to,

But I appreciate it.

OK,

Let's jump right in.

So in the title,

It says three steps to stop judging and obsessing over your body.

So and I want to point out one thing right away.

Of course,

There's not just a one,

Two,

Three steps.

Easy peasy.

I do one,

Two,

Three.

Boom,

Everything is gone.

It's way more than that.

It's a journey.

It's a process.

But the reason why I wanted to put steps on this topic is because the mind,

The mind always wants to have a fixed structure.

The mind wants to understand.

The mind wants to have a to do list.

So I'm kind of like invited your mind in.

So now that I do have your attention,

I invite you to listen with your heart and your soul and not only with your mind.

And even though I'm going to give you steps and they're specific,

They're not like linear and they are not in a particular strategy or process.

It's a journey of exploration and discovering and healing.

But I did want to get the attention and the mind and even maybe the judge kind of brought you here.

So I'm glad that you're here.

And again,

If you have a question around it,

Leave a comment below.

At the end of the show,

I will see if I have time and I'm happy to answer those for you.

All right,

Let's jump right in.

Before I share the first step,

I'm going to give you a pre-step,

A little pre-step.

And you might already have done this.

And if you have,

Just do it again.

It never hurts.

It's really about rebuilding on your foundation.

So the pre-step before going into this topic is to make a decision.

The pre-step is basically make the decision to be in acceptance and love with your body or honor your body,

Appreciate your body.

If the word love is too strong,

Because let's be real,

You might be at a point where there's certain body parts or you're kind of like,

I kind of love it.

But if love is too strong,

Just use the words,

Be kind,

Respect your body,

Appreciate your body,

Honor your body,

Care about your body,

Whatever it is that works for you.

So the pre-step is to really do that and to commit to doing whatever it takes in order to get there.

So I invite you to do this right now.

Take a nice deep breath.

And internally,

You can say it internally or I would allow you to say,

I choose to be kind to my body.

I choose to make a decision that I'm going to do whatever it takes to love,

Accept,

Appreciate my body.

So now that you've done that and it goes great,

We don't over complicate it.

Let's dive right into the first step.

And this will maybe disappoint you,

Maybe not,

Because if you followed me before a while,

You know that I said this before,

Even though it's called how to stop judging,

You're not going to stop it actually.

We are not going to focus on stopping it because the judgment that you are having within your own body,

It's not actually yours.

It's a part of your psyche,

A part of your unconscious pattern.

So we are not going to get rid of it because that's a waste of time to focusing on that.

And believe me,

I've tried that many years in the past.

It's not going to work.

So what we're going to do instead,

Step number one,

First step is to allow and accept what's here right now,

Meaning,

And it sounds so simple in contrary,

But it's a profound step.

It's a very profound step.

You allow and you accept that you are actually judging and obsessing about it.

Just bear with me.

Just do that for a moment.

Just for a moment.

Allow yourself for a moment to say,

Hey,

I am judging.

I hear this judgmental voice.

There is judgment.

I'm having this experience.

And for a moment,

I'm not going to fight it.

I'm not going to judge it.

I'm going to allow it into my awareness as a wave that is coming.

And instead of fighting and judging and pretending and it's not there,

Everything that we do when something uncomfortable comes to our way,

You simply allow it.

Why is this so important?

It is so important because it's there.

Let's be real.

It's a struggle sometimes.

And the fighting,

The more you fight something,

The more you try to get rid of something,

The more power you give it,

Because the more you put the energy towards that versus coming back to your awareness and to be in acceptance.

It's really all about acceptance and allowing and noticing with your awareness.

And I often use the metaphor about the ocean and the waves.

So imagine that you are the ocean for lack of better imagination.

The ocean and the ocean experiences waves constantly.

There's one wave here,

One wave there.

One is harder.

One is softer.

One is higher.

One is lower.

One is higher.

Constantly waves.

So the ocean isn't there fighting that one wave and the other wave say,

Oh,

I like that wave.

I want more of that one.

I've got to hold onto this wave.

No.

The ocean knows that it's just part of the whole tapestry of experience.

So by you accepting first and allowing that to be okay and to acknowledge that,

It relaxes your system and it opens up for deeper exploration.

Does that make sense?

So first step is to really allow and accept even that you don't accept and even that you are obsessing.

Okay.

So,

And again,

There's way more to say to this,

But I'm going to leave it at this for now for the first step.

Moving on to the second step.

And the second step is,

Well,

The second and the third are my favorites.

The second step is dig deeper,

Meaning explore what's underneath the judgment,

Underneath the obsession.

I give you an example.

Like I grew up feeling very bad about myself and you most likely know my story.

I used to hate myself.

I used to hate my body.

I was extremely ashamed.

I was comparing myself constantly.

And now the last few months doing recovery from my surgery and my body obviously changing,

Not being able to move,

New scars,

New trauma,

Like so many things that I got hit by a huge wave,

A wave that I haven't experienced in a long time.

And I was literally obsessing over certain body parts and judging and kind of like,

I knew it wouldn't look different the next second I would look at it,

But I was constantly look at it.

Can you relate?

Is there something that you keep constantly thinking about?

Maybe it's your nose,

Maybe it's your butt,

Maybe it's your belly,

Maybe it's whatever it is,

It doesn't matter.

But it's like you're constantly obsessing about it,

Judging ourselves about it.

So because I've also experienced that just lately and I've experienced that so much in the past,

It's also an opportunity,

An invitation to look at a deeper level as something that wants to come up for us for healing,

Because it's also an invitation.

If we don't judge that and if we use it and we do the deeper inner work,

It can be actually a beautiful thing.

As an example,

I have a belief,

An unconscious belief that I've been working on in the past and it just came up now so strongly again.

I need to be perfect to be loved.

That's just one example.

And many,

Maybe even you carry that belief as well.

But we have beliefs,

We have trauma from the past,

We have fears,

Trapped emotions.

There's so many things in our system that get triggered that are underneath the judgment.

So once you accept that and you allowed it in and you do the deeper inner work,

You dig deeper,

Okay,

I have this belief,

I need to be perfect to be loved.

Of course,

That's not true,

But it's running still in the background.

So once you deal with that,

Instead of focusing on fighting the judgment,

You have the opportunity to really connect to the truth,

To connect to the truth,

To connect to the deep love inside and I also want you to know,

Don't think for a second that maybe the person that you might be comparing yourself with,

That you think,

Oh my God,

She or he is just amazing,

She's beautiful,

She has the perfect body,

Blah,

Blah,

Blah,

Blah,

Blah,

That this person isn't struggling with this once in a while or sometimes or even a lot.

So do the deeper inner work,

Commit to the deeper inner work.

What are the beliefs underneath?

What is the unresolved issues that you're still carrying that want to be released?

That's why they're showing up.

So the second step is super,

Super crucial in order to get a new perspective,

A new relationship with your body,

Okay?

So first step,

Allow it in,

Accept it,

Don't fight the wave,

Fighting the wave is a waste of time and energy and then step number two,

Do the deeper inner work.

Tune in,

What's really going on?

Like what do I feel underneath?

What's underneath the judgment?

What's underneath the obsession?

Maybe it's a feeling I'm not safe.

There could be an unconscious intention.

It's not safe to be beautiful or it's not safe to be too attractive.

So a lot of women or men as well have a lot of weight.

I had that myself,

By the way,

Too.

I mean,

There's nothing I'm saying to you that I haven't worked through or that experience or that I cannot relate,

Okay?

And if I would just let my inner critic talk,

I mean,

The inner critic always finds something to criticize.

And one thing that I really,

What I think is really important,

The inner critic and the perfectionist together are like the dream team for Saffron,

Right?

And listen to this,

You can never outrun your perfectionist.

You can never.

You might think,

Okay,

It's my nose.

And then you change your nose,

Suppose find something else.

In the past,

I was fat and ugly.

Now I'm fat and old.

No,

Not fat anymore.

But I'm old and ugly.

Or during this recovery where I'm not exercising,

My skin is too floppy-lappy.

My butt is basically disappearing.

There's always something,

And of course there are certain things underneath that I won't expose to you,

Obviously,

On this show that I really got to revisit.

And that need to be perfect is really a one-way street to suffering.

Like that need to be perfect.

So you want to really dig deeper,

Do the inner work,

Release that because you are beautiful the way you are at this moment.

And you can always find something in the moment to accept.

So right now,

Can I see if you find a moment of acceptance for how you are in your body right this moment.

And then do the work with someone.

This is deep stuff.

Like if you really struggle with this,

Get help.

Get help.

If you could have solved this for you,

Like by yourself,

You would have done it already.

It's like there are deeper things that we can't access ourselves.

So whether that's with me or with someone else,

I don't care.

Just work with someone because we don't reach places ourselves because the protection mechanism is too strong.

All right,

Let's move on to number three.

Step number three,

Take a deep breath.

Number three is go beyond your body,

Connect up,

Connect to something beyond your body,

Connect to your higher self.

That's one of the biggest pieces in the work that I do.

I teach the four flows of energy and going in,

Going up and that going up is crucial.

And I'm going to illustrate that for you.

So step one and two is more lower chakras.

It's like being with it,

Exploring it,

Letting it out.

And that can release already.

But if we stay there,

It's like a constant vicious cycle of judging,

Obsessing,

Looking again,

Analyzing,

So we got to go to a different place above that.

And you can even do this with me right now.

You take a deep breath and you imagine,

OK,

I'm going beyond my physical body.

I'm going to whatever that's for you,

Higher self,

God,

Source,

Universe,

Existence,

Spirit,

Love,

Your heart on a higher level.

If you stay in the same position where the problem occurs in the first time,

You cannot go beyond it.

Does that make sense?

And again,

If you have any questions,

Leave them here below.

And if you like this video so far,

Please like and send me some love.

I appreciate that.

Of course,

It's totally optional.

I want to illustrate this here for you with Greg,

Even though it's not going to be a great drawing,

But from an energetic perspective,

Why the third step is so important.

So let's say judgments,

Beliefs,

Trauma,

Soul conditioning,

The patterns that are not who you are,

It's just stuff around you,

Like layers,

Like an onion.

And so doing the work is like you are more polarized down here on the lower third,

Lower third chakras here,

One,

Two,

And three.

If you don't know what a chakra is or if you don't know what I'm talking about,

Don't worry about it.

It will make sense energetically.

You don't get caught up in,

Oh my God,

I don't know what that means.

But for those who do energy work,

Who know the chakra system and have been doing work with me,

Just to illustrate again why this step is so important,

Why I'm such an advocate and even a pain in the butt when it comes to energy-based meditation and going upwards.

So let's say this is all there is constantly.

This is a vicious circle that might have gone on for years,

For decades maybe.

So now you want to go up.

You got a pattern interrupt.

And it's so already paved.

This road is so paved that to get out of it,

You've got to really,

You've got to break it.

And you want to do that consciously over a longer period of time so that you create that energy up and that you create an energy and a new doorway that connects you to your higher self.

I hope this makes sense.

If you have a question,

Let me know.

So the first step is crucial with anything in your life.

It doesn't even matter if it's only about loving your body or accepting your body.

It's about going beyond the issue and tapping into the energy.

And you can do it,

Open up your third eye,

Or just if you don't know what I mean,

It's just simply look up,

Go up,

Change perspective,

Go above the mud.

Go above the struggle and the obsession.

The obsession can still be there in existence.

The wave came,

The wave gone.

The wave might still be there,

But you are not the wave.

You are not the obsession.

You are not the judgment.

You go beyond.

And a big part of this is really the work with the third eye.

And I said to you in the beginning,

I'm going to share two resources with you.

And the two resources that I really recommend if you struggle with this or anything actually for that matter,

As my guided self of meditation and the Awaken Your Third Eye training.

And whether you've watched this before,

Whether you have it or you've done it in the past,

Or whether you've never heard of it before,

It's totally for free.

You can use it to support your journey.

The self-love meditation is a guided meditation that is obviously designed to create self-love and also to go up.

And you find both of the resources on my home page.

Let me see if I can put this here.

Here's the third eye training.

And we're also going to leave it below the video.

You can find it.

So both resources are for free.

I highly encourage you to meditate on self-love and to learn how to shift your energy upwards so that you can go beyond that obsession,

Beyond the judgment,

And to let more love in.

Let me see the comments here if there's any questions.

And while we do that,

Take a nice deep breath.

Okay,

So let me see if I forgot something important.

I mean,

I'm sure there's so much more to say.

But let's recap for a moment,

Just real brief.

And then I'm going to share this beautiful poem with you and also give you a preview for the next show.

So recap the three steps.

Step number one,

The pre-step is to make a decision to commit to your journey.

Okay,

That's super important.

If you don't do that,

Something is really missing.

And then let's see if I can put this on here.

So the three steps are,

And this is us dancing.

Tall,

Short,

White,

Black,

Yellow,

Orange,

Pink bikini,

Purple bikini,

Doesn't need a no bikini.

Step number one is allow your current experience.

Don't fight the way.

Don't fight the way.

Be kind to your body.

Do the deeper inner work.

Choose,

Choose,

Choose.

I can't say that too much.

And it doesn't have to happen overnight,

But choose every moment to sort of love yourself,

To love yourself,

To be kind to your body.

And number three,

Connect to your higher self beyond your body.

That will make,

I can tell you that will change your life.

And if you think,

Oh,

Sonja,

I've been doing all of these trips already.

I've been doing those steps for over 23 years.

Does it mean I don't get to do them once in a while?

Yeah,

Absolutely.

Don't get caught in that.

I've done this already.

It's like,

I love that analogy about,

You know,

You're still brushing your teeth every day,

Right?

Just keep doing it.

Wonderful.

So you're coming to the end.

I'm going to share this poem with you.

And next week,

By the way.

So come back next week for a new episode.

And next week's topic,

I'm going to share my top five affirmations for health and vitality.

And that's actually going to help you with this specific topic as well.

But also with health and vitality,

Especially throughout these times that we have,

Pandemic,

Corona,

Whatever you want to call it,

And also not only sharing those affirmations to to show you how to make them actually work,

Because let's be real,

Affirmations often don't work,

Right?

So next week on the Sony Fused Monday show,

My top five affirmations for health and vitality.

And I'm going to leave you today with this poem.

And then I would ask you for a favor.

After the show,

Please leave a comment below with your biggest takeaway from today's show.

What is your biggest takeaway from today's show?

Leave a comment below.

I'm going to leave you with this poem called Ode to my body.

Take a nice deep breath and let the words just resonate.

Ode to my body.

Growing up,

I did hate you.

It got worse as a teen.

I did judge and deny you.

It was painful and mean.

Disconnected and lonely,

Feeling lost and ashamed.

Many trying to hide,

But I felt them the same.

I became a young woman still not able to see.

What a beautiful body you had given to me.

The need to be perfect distorted my being.

A fat,

Ugly body was all I was seeing.

I made a decision.

It took me some years.

It was painful at times,

And I cried many tears.

But I wanted to love you with peace and respect.

This I couldn't before,

And I'm sorry for that.

You deserve loving touch,

Gentle words,

And affection.

Feeling safe and relaxed and with true soul connection.

You are feminine,

Sensual,

Graceful,

And smooth.

I can see all of that because that is the truth.

It's an ongoing process.

Still some steps to do,

But I'm fully committed,

And my heart is with you.

Going to leave you with those words.

I invite you to be kind to yourself today,

Love yourself today.

Leave me a comment below with your biggest takeaway and get the free resources on my website so that you can continue the journey by yourself.

Much,

Much,

Much,

Much love.

Reviews

Thank you. My biggest insight was to accept that I am judging my body, not to struggle anylonger with it. The need to be perfect affected my body from the poem, very beautiful saying. Thank you!

Very interesting! Thank you!