Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
I won't let my body out, me out wait everything
that I'm made, don't won't spend my life trying to change.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
I'm learning love who I am, I get, I'm strong,
I feel free, I know everybody of me. It's beautiful.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
And that will always out way if you feel.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
It with your hands. And there she'll some love to
the boo I have there say go day and did
you and die out way? Happy Saturday out wigh.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
I'm Leanne Ellington and today we're diving into something that
I know many.
Speaker 2 (00:40):
Of us need to hear as we wrap up the year.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
And so if you're anything like me or like the
women I work with, you're probably looking back at this year,
or maybe you your brain wants to go what.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
Did I accomplish or did I hit my goals?
Speaker 1 (00:53):
And if you're like a lot of the women I
talk to, those questions often revolve around one thing your weight,
your body, your health, your physicality. And so that's why
we're going to shake that up today and we're going
to talk about endy of the year with self compassion
and celebrating wins that have nothing to do with the scale,
because trust me when I say, there's so much more
(01:13):
to celebrate than a number. And so let's get real
for a second. How many times have you finished a year?
And the first thing a lot of women ask themselves
is did I lose weight? Or did I get my
body to where I wanted it to be or you know,
the size, the shape, whatever. And it's like this autopilot
thought that we all have at one time or another,
(01:34):
especially if you've struggled with food or your body image
for a long time. I find that it's stuff that
doesn't just go away. We have to reprogram it. And
so I remember for years, every New Year's Eve, I'd
stand in front of the mirror and I'd stare at
my reflection, thinking about what I didn't accomplish with my
body that year. And even if I'd reached a certain
goal in my career or my relationships, I was laser
(01:56):
focused on what my body wasn't and that kind of
thinking and kept me stuck in this loop of shame
and guilt and disappointment, like I wasn't good enough because
the scale didn't move the way I thought it should.
Speaker 2 (02:07):
And when I started.
Speaker 1 (02:08):
Working with other women, I realized I wasn't the only one,
and I'd have clients come to me at the end
of the year feeling defeated because yeah, maybe they didn't
lose the ten pounds they'd plan.
Speaker 2 (02:18):
But here's the thing.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
The scale is just one tiny piece of a much
bigger puzzle. And again, if we don't train our brains
to look for a different part of the puzzle, it
will stay stuck there if it got there originally, right.
And so I worked with a woman Sarah. I remember,
we started working together in a December, And originally it
was because she was feeling so defeated because she hadn't
(02:39):
hit her goal weight for the year and she was
done with the diet. She knew that there was something
deeper going on, and she had it all mapped out, right,
Like when she came to me, She's like land at
the beginning of the year, I was like, I'm gonna
lose twenty pounds. I'm finally gonna feel good about myself.
And that's when she, you know, stumbled upon my website
when she was looking back at the end of the year,
and she watched my webinar and she booked a call.
And this is about so much more than the food, right,
(03:02):
and she knew that she had to deal with the
real problem. So that's how we got talking in the
first place. But just like it happens to you, life
happened to Sarah and she dealt with unexpected health issues
that year. She had work stresses pile up, and guess what,
she didn't hit that number, and her brain had been
trained to beat herself up hard for it, saying things like,
you know, Leanne, I totally failed this year. So we
(03:25):
started working together, and the first thing I wanted to
do was help her reframe this thought as a failure,
because I didn't want her bringing those lies into our
work together. And so we sat down and we reflected
on her year together, and I asked her to tell
me everything that she did do, like non weight related,
like I wanted her to practice acknowledging what she did
(03:46):
do and who she was being and how she was
growing instead of focusing on all the things that she
wasn't doing or who she wasn't being. And wow, let
me tell you, Sarah had grown so much in areas
that had absolutely nothing to do with a scale, Like
she had learned to set better boundaries at work, and
she found a hobby that she loved that brought her
(04:06):
so much joy, and she started working with me to
repair her relationship with food in her body so that
she wouldn't be in the same cycle the next year,
and not doing it through restriction, but through listening to
her body this time around. But again, her brain had
been wired to look for what she wasn't doing and
who she wasn't being in what she hadn't accomplished, and
so it was hard for her to shift that focus.
(04:28):
But when we did shift that focus from the number
on the scale to real meaningful changes that she'd made
in her life, something clicked for her. It didn't happen
right away, but eventually it clicked and she realized, oh
my gosh, I'm not a failure, like she'd actually made
huge strides. And my friends, if you're listening like that
is all I want for you too, is to really
shift that like looking at your body as the one
(04:50):
thing determining success to looking at all the other ways
of being that have nothing to do with what you
look like or the scale or anything. And so self compassion,
especially at the end of the year, it is everything,
and it is so easy to look back at all
the things that we didn't do or all the ways
that we think we failed, But where does that get us?
Speaker 2 (05:08):
Like, it gets us nowhere? Good?
Speaker 1 (05:10):
Right, But when you approach yourself with compassion, it changes everything.
And so instead of focusing on what went wrong, you
get to start to see all the things that went right.
And so maybe your body isn't exactly where you thought
it might end up this year, but like, so what
like didn't you grow in other ways? And did you
take care of your mental health and did you learn
(05:30):
to speak more kindly to yourself and did you practice
forgiveness of yourself and others? Because those are the things
that are so worth celebrating, And that's why we need
to talk about this. And so here's what I want
you to know. Success is so much bigger than your body.
And we're taught to measure ourselves by our weight or
how we like, how fit we look, or how much
(05:51):
we can control food. But that's not real success, like
not the kind that last. Real success is when you
start showing up for yourself in a way that you
are proud of yourself and you're in alignment with who
you want to be, and when you start honoring your
needs and when you stop judging yourself so harshly that
is real freedom. And that's what I want you to
(06:14):
reflect on as you end this year, because I'll be
real with you. I used to be totally obsessed with
the idea that success meant, you know, being a certain
weight or fitting into a certain size. And I measured
my entire worth by what I saw in the mirror
and what other people or what I assumed other people
were saying about my body.
Speaker 2 (06:32):
And basically it was what I was saying and assuming
other people were saying.
Speaker 1 (06:36):
But let me tell you, it was exhausting, and no
matter how much I achieved in other areas of my life,
it was never enough if my body didn't meet those
impossible standards that I set for myself. But when I
finally stopped measuring my success by the scale and started
looking at the whole picture, like my emotional health and
(06:56):
my relationships and how I was showing up in the world,
like my spiritual life, everything but my body, Right, that's
when everything shifted and I started to actually feel good
about myself, not because I was forcing it, but because
I was allowing myself to be enough as I was,
and I was teaching my brain to use new measuring sticks. Right,
(07:17):
That's the thing if we are all we know are
those old measuring sticks. We have to teach our brain
how to use new measuring sticks. And that's the part
that's in our blind spot, and we can't see what
we can't see. But that's really what I want for you.
And so here here's what I want you to do.
Let's do that right now. Let's reflect together and just
think back over the year. But instead of focusing on
your body or your weight, or whatever body goals you
(07:38):
did or didn't hit, or whatever it is on the
physical side of things, I want you to ask yourself
these questions, what did I learn about myself this year?
Speaker 2 (07:46):
Right?
Speaker 1 (07:46):
What did I overcome this year that taught me some
really valuable lessons? And how did I grow emotionally, mentally, spiritually?
Speaker 2 (07:55):
Right?
Speaker 1 (07:55):
What challenges did I overcome that have nothing to do
with my weight or the scale? And how did I
take care of myself even in the smallest of ways.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
And these are little questions.
Speaker 1 (08:05):
You can ask her so many others, but I wanted
to give you ones that, like anybody could ask outside
of the scope of a conversation. But write these down.
And I know it might feel uncomfortable at first, especially
if you're used to measuring your success by external things.
But trust me, this is where the magic happens. And
so my other client, Jess, who did this exercise last year,
(08:26):
she realized that before she came to work with me,
her goals were to lose a certain amount of weight
or like an amount that she thought she needed to
lose to be happy. But instead she went on a
journey to heal her relationship with food in her body
rather than just focusing on her weight, like something that
she had been focusing on for as long as she
could remember, since childhood. But she also said healthier boundaries
(08:47):
with her family, and she had taken up journaling, which
helped her manage her anxiety, and she had completely rewired
her brain around food and using it as a way
to cope with that anxiety without all the guilt and shame.
And she totally transformed her body image. And because of
those things, like, because of those things and not even
focusing on her weight, she lost ten pounds, right, like,
(09:09):
just from focusing on the insides, not the outsides. And
it's ironic, right because she focused on the things that matter.
And these are the wins that are worth celebrating because
they made her a happier and actually healthier version of herself.
And she lost what I call the weight of the weight.
And so was it the thirty pounds and thirty days that,
like some extreme crazy diet was promising her. No, it
(09:31):
definitely wasn't. But she healed some major internal chaos and
healed her nervous system and her brain. And she also
laid down the foundations that would allow her to release
more of the weight of the weight. But finally, for
the first time ever, the focus wasn't.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
On her weight. Now.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
If that's not a miracle in itself, I don't know
what is. So as we close out this year, I
want you to give yourself permission to just celebrate the
things that go beyond the scale, and to honor the
ways that you've shown up for yourself even when it
wasn't perfect. Honor those two, and to recognize the strength
it takes to keep going when things feel really hard.
(10:11):
And that's been all of us this year, right. And
if you find yourself struggling with self compassion, remember this.
You are worthy of that compassion and that kindness, especially
from yourself, and especially even when you don't think you
deserve it. It's that unmerited grace, that unmerited compassion. And you're
also allowed to feel proud of the growth that you've
(10:32):
made this year, no matter what your body or the
scale says. Okay, you don't need permission to feel good
about yourself.
Speaker 2 (10:38):
You just need to give it to yourself.
Speaker 1 (10:41):
So that is my we'll call it homework, right, but like,
take this time to reflect on those wins and write
them down, let them sink in, and celebrate them. And
if you're feeling stuck or unsure of where to start,
remember self compassion is a practice, and you don't have
to get it perfect. You just have to start and
remember or your worth is not measured by a number
(11:02):
on this gale. You might need to hear that a
thousand different times before it sinks in. It's measured by
how you love and how you grow and how you
show up for yourself, and those are things that are
worth celebrating.
Speaker 2 (11:13):
So that's it for today, ladies.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
I truly hope that you got something valuable out of
today's episode, even if it's just a reminder that you're
not crazy and you're definitely not alone, Well, that would
make me so happy. And if you want to learn
more about how I teach my clients to turn off
the part of their brain that's obsessed with food or
obsessed with their weight and rewire their own brain for
peace and freedom. Then head on over to Stresslessseeating dot
(11:37):
com and sign up to watch the Stressless Eating sneak preview,
where I've literally peeled back the curtain and walked you
through the exact strategy I teach my clients to heal
themselves from the all or nothing diet mentality for good,
but without restricting themselves or punishing their bodies, and definitely
without ever having to use words like macros or low
(11:57):
carb or calorie burn. It's there for you over to
access on stresslessseeding dot com and if you like out Weigh,
I actually have another podcast here on iHeart where I
talk about all of this self image and body image stuff,
but from the perspective of where brain science intersects faith.
It's called What's God Got to Do with It? And
(12:18):
you can access it here on iHeart or wherever you
get your podcasts. So that's it for today. I'm Leanne
Ellington and I'll talk to you soon. Bye.