If you struggle to accept your body or just want to keep growing self-love, positive affirmation can be an effective practice to help improve your body image.
Positive affirmations are phrases and statements you repeat to challenge negative thoughts and establish new positive thoughts.
But I want you to know that not all these affirmations will resonate with you. In fact, worse when saying some of them if they are too far away from what you currently believe.
When I first started my own intuitive eating and body image healing journey, many of the typical positive affirmations made me feel more anxious and self-conscious because I knew I didn’t believe that. And truthfully believed the opposite.
If this is where you are, I have tips for you below the list of my 9 top intuitive eating-aligned positive body affirmations.
1. My body is always exactly as it’s meant to be
Thinking your body should be different than it currently is, is just fighting with the reality of where your body currently is. I included this affirmation first because it was one of the first I came up with that truly resonates.
Try with this affirmation to see if you can relax into truly believing that you and your body are exactly where you’re meant to be at this moment.
For me, this belief helped release some of the pressure to change everything about my body to make it “perfect” and was a big one along my food freedom journey.
2. I’m supporting my body and my body is supporting me
No matter how your day is going, you can always check in with this body positive affirmation and follow it up by asking “how could I support my body/self in this moment?”
3. I love my body or I’m learning to love my body
I’m leaving both of these options here because sometimes you may not be in a place where saying “I love my body” feels even closely true. If that’s where you are, try adding to the statement with a positive affirmation of “I’m learning to love my body”.
And over time you’ll reach the place where saying “I love my body” feels true.
4. I respect my body or I’m learning to respect my body
If saying love doesn’t resonate with you, consider starting with the goal of growing respect for your body.
5. I love my body’s ___________.
This is a fill-in-the-blank affirmation to customize it to something you love about your body. Such as inserting strength, resilience, perseverance, abilities, appearance, or anything that resonates with you.
6. I love taking care of myself and my body
This is another one of my favorite affirmations throughout my own intuitive eating journey because it helped me transition from a dieting mindset to the mindset of I’m doing this all to take care of my body.
My goals switched from trying to lose weight and have the perfect healthy habits to I’m taking care of myself in the way that feels right for me without any rules.
7. I trust my body
Learning to trust your body is a massive part of the intuitive eating journey. Diet culture teaches you to trust the meal plan and rules over your body’s hunger cues. And after years of telling yourself “I’m not really hungry, let me just chew gum, drink water, or go for a walk” it’s difficult to lean into trusting your body.
So this positive body image affirmation is all about learning to trust and believe your body again.
8. I know what’s best for me in this moment
You know what’s best for your body.
Period.
You might feel a little disconnected from believing this after trying to follow food rules for years, and that’s ok. It’s just where you are in this moment, but you do deep down know what’s best for you.
And part of finding food freedom is regaining the confidence to trust that you do, in fact, know what’s best for you. Whether that’s rest, movement, fruit, veggies, protein, sweet treats, or a combination of it all.
9. I listen to my body
This positive affirmation continues along the line of growing intuitive eating-based beliefs.
Eating intuitively means food choices based on your emotional and physical hunger needs. It’s not trying to be perfect or eating all of the foods to rebel against diet culture.
It’s learning to listen to what your body and mind truly need to feel your best. And no, you always want to feel your best because that’s just part of life.
But we can keep working towards supporting ourselves as best we can.
How to use healthy positive affirmations about body image
You can use this list of positive body affirmations in a couple of ways.
If you’re new to using positive affirmation maybe start by choosing one or a few that feel believable to you.
And if none feel believable try modifying them until it feels believable. Here’s a list of ways you could modify the affirmation I listen to my body:
- I am learning to listen to my body
- I would like to listen to my body
- Maybe I could listen to my body
- Maybe it’s safe to listen to my body
- Maybe one day I could potentially learn to listen to my body
- Other people listen to their body, which means it’s possible I could learn to listen to my body
The trick with reframing affirmation is to frame it somewhat as a question or like you’re pondering the affirmation. You just want to open the door to see if you could believe that statement over time.
When you find a few affirmations that you want to work on, repeat them multiple times a week or even every day.
How to create your own positive affirmations
If you want to work on an affirmation for a topic that wasn’t on this list, you can take the framework of any of those 9 statements above and adjust the wording.
Let’s say you want to create a positive affirmation to reinforce you’re someone who moves their body regularly.
You could try one of these affirmations:
- I love to move my body
- My body likes it when I move regularly.
- I’m someone who moves my body regularly
- I know I feel better when I move regularly
- I’m capable of moving regularly
- I’m working towards moving my body regularly
Really all you need is an area you want to work on and a statement that reinforces that desire.
Tips for using positive affirmations about body image
- Find statements that feel believable to you
- It’s ok if an affirmation that sounds good, doesn’t feel good to you
- Work towards believing a couple or even just one affirmation at a time
- Repetition is key. The more often you practice affirmations the more quickly you’ll adopt them as beliefs
- Find the method that works for you. You can write the affirmation, say it out loud, listen to a recording of the affirmation, or repeat in your head.
Alternatives to positive affirmations
Lastly, I want to leave you with it’s ok if positive affirmations just aren’t your thing. Especially if you’re starting with a negative relationship with your body. It’s ok to go with a more neutral belief.
If you’re in a place where you don’t like your body, going to a more neutral and accepting place is a realistic goal. Maybe someday you will work towards loving your body, but it’s ok if your end goal is being in a place of accepting your body.
I go into detail about this topic in episode 4 of my podcast, the problem with positive affirmations.
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