In my hypnotherapy business, I receive more emails than the average bear. 90% of the ones regarding weight loss have some form of the following declaration – “I hate my body.”

Sadly, culture has added fuel to that raging fire. The last time most women felt comfortable in a bathing suit was at age 10. That alone should tell you something about how we perceive our bodies.

Here’s a question to ponder? How cooperative would you be with a person who detested you? My guess is not very.

Your body is to be loved and treasured. It does exactly what it was designed to do. If you consume more food and beverages than you expend energy for, your body will turn that into excess fat. That’s miraculous! Your body is doing what it is supposed to do. Hating your body for doing what it was created to do is like hating the weatherman for doing his job.

Here is a recommendation that will be helpful in your quest to lose weight and keep it off. I recently found out that the word “attitude” is an aeronautical term which means angle of approach. If someone told you to change your attitude, that may sound harsh and parental and you may not have a great response to that request. If, however, they said to change your angle of approach, that is a lot less easy on the ears and there is not quite the emotional response to that suggestion.

I’m suggesting that you shift your angle of approach a few degrees in how you view your body and begin to notice how cooperative it can become.

Your body is deserving of recognition, respect and love. It has served you through life and has done precisely what it was created to do and you may be treating it like an evil step-sister. Your body loves you and it only does what it’s been programmed to do. There are some strategies that are helpful to jumpstart a weight loss program in my latest newsletter. These approaches are very helpful AND the most helpful thing you do at the foundational level is to give your body some love.

Acceptance is the starting point. Accept your body just the way it is. If you think about it, that’s really the only choice in reality that you have. Not accepting what’s right in front of you is an illusion. That’s denial. If you are having difficulty with acceptance, here is an excerpt from my new book, LIFE – IT’S YOUR MOVIE (available in early 2008).

“Acceptance is the catalyst for transformation. Willingness is the catalyst for acceptance. Willingness is the cornerstone of the Radical Forgiveness Model of Colin Tipping. Read his wonderful book RADICAL FORGIVENESS for insight as to the value of acceptance and willingness. Somewhere in there Colin intimates that anyone who is not able to accept something, or express willingness to accept something, can still benefit by acceptance. He asks them to accept the fact that they can’t accept. Just getting a taste of acceptance is often enough for you to want to sample more.”

Honor and acknowledge your body for the miracles it performs every day. Express your gratitude for all that it has done for you and begin to show it your love. Then stand back and watch what happens. The Tipping Point
is reached when you sincerely start communicating that “I LOVE MY BODY.”