Our message at TBYT is that God’s way to permanent change starts with a foundation of love, not condemnation. That foundation is built on learning to see yourself the way God does.
To help you with this, here is a special article written by a TBYT member, Elizabeth Ann Dorsey-Young. I know Elizabeth’s words will touch your heart and encourage you today.
You can connect with Elizabeth personally through her Facebook page.
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Sometimes, looking in the mirror can bring on feelings of low self-esteem and negative body image.
Negative body image is a distorted perception of your shape.
You are convinced that only other people are attractive and that your body size or shape is a sign of personal failure.
You feel ashamed, self-conscious, and anxious about your body. You feel awkward and uncomfortable in your body.
Trying to overcome negative body image issues is a painful process, but there are some physical and spiritual things you can do to change the way you look at yourself.
The key to developing a positive body image is to recognize and respect your natural shape and learn to overpower negative thoughts with positive, affirming and accepting ones.
No one is perfect, so embrace the fact that you have flaws and love the things that make you unique that aren’t related to how much you weigh or what you look like. Remind yourself that “true beauty” is not simply skin deep.
Beauty is a state of mind, not a state of your body. Look at yourself as a whole person-choose not to focus on specific body parts. Become a critical viewer of social and media messages. Understand that things we see in print or on television have been altered to perfection. Everything is not as it seems!
In order to overcome negative body image, forget about what “society” portrays as normal or attractive and do what is right for you, your life, and your body type. It is hard to love yourself if you are constantly focusing on labels of too fat, too skinny, too tall, or too short. Compared to whom?
Our goal should not be the outward appearance, but total body health. If you treat your body (the only one you will ever have) with respect, it will reflect how you feel about yourself and how others perceive you. Love yourself the way you are right now, unconditionally, not what or who you want to be.
Stop hating yourself for everything you aren’t. Start loving yourself for everything you are. If you don’t love your body before you lose weight, you won’t love your body afterwards.
Celebrate the beauty of you. Loving yourself, respecting yourself, and appreciating all the wonderful things about you makes you more confident, increases self-esteem, and makes you more attractive to others. It isn’t about how many inches your waist is. It isn’t about your clothing size. Appreciate what makes you unique-what makes you special. You will see so many incredible qualities in yourself if you just take the time to look. Be your biggest fan.
All these physical things are good and will help us with self esteem and body-image issues, but if we just do the physical things and neglect the spiritual aspect of God’s image of us, we will end up in failure every time. We are so focused on what we see in our physical mirrors that we forget to view ourselves through God’s mirror (The Word of God) We need to fix our gaze on God’s mirror.
- God’s mirror sees us accepted in the Beloved (Ephesians 1:6).
- God’s mirror says we are fearfully and wonderfully made in the image of God. (Genesis 1:27; Psalm 139:14).
As we continue to view ourselves through God’s mirror, who we are in Christ will begin to grow stronger in our hearts, and we will begin to see ourselves like God sees us. When we look at ourselves in a physical mirror, we are only viewing a flawed reflection of what we see, but God’s mirror (His Word) perfectly reflects who we are in the spirit.
As we continually look into God’s spiritual mirror, we will begin to see and experience ourselves for who we really are. As who we are in Christ grows stronger in our hearts, we will begin to see ourselves like God sees us.
By viewing ourselves through God’s mirror, our image of ourselves will have to change to line up with His Word; and self esteem and body-image issues will have to flee because we will not be swayed by what we see in the physical mirror, but what we see in God’s mirror.
Then we can allow God to reveal the beauty He created in each of us.
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Be blessed in health, healing and wholeness,
Kimberly Taylor
P.S. I hear so many women put themselves down for the way they look. It saddens me so I was inspired to create a shirt to counteract those messages. It is the shirt pictured in this article.
I believe every woman of God should have this shirt, especially our teen-aged girls who need to praise Cod for their uniqueness, not try to become someone else.
To learn more about reserving your shirt, click here: I Am Fearfully and Wonderfully Made Shirt
This has truly blessed me
I am passing all I have learned from the bible and through TBYT about body image on to my daughters as I want them to grow up with a healthy image of themselves. I will be sharing this wonderful article with them as they grow in the knowledge and love of the Lord.
This article, based on God’s Word is received gratefully. Thank you Elizabeth.
I lost a great deal of weight in the past then gained it back because I didn’t lose the negativity and poor body image in my mind. Thanks for these words Elizabeth.
Great article, i will reflect on the verses deeply
That you for your comments! I have passed this on to Elizabeth as well so that she can know about the feedback. I know she will be glad that others are finding this message helpful.
Praise God for the encouragement! Sometimes we forget and revert back to old habits of condemning ourselves BUT GOD continues to send us “angels” to give us a kiss of his spirit!
I truly needed this, this morning. I felt very insecure and inadequate, but God sees me as beautiful and perfect. I AM WONDERFULLY AND FEARFULLY MADE. AMEN.
THANK YOU.
Thank you for the inspirational words. As I start me first “new focus” day I will most likely return to read this often.
Very good word, Elizabeth! As believers in Christ Jesus, we are the children of God, created in His likeness and image, indwelt by His Spirit. He has given us the responsibility of caring for His individual temples!
What a blessing it is to be able to go to the scriptures- God’s holy Word to find comfort when we are feeling discouraged or disillusioned regarding our physical bodies .
Just stopping to think how He crafted us with the necessary organs, veins, arteries , muscles, bones and yes, even fat and how they function together is enough to give Him praise!
As they say in the vernacular , ” God don’t make no junk!”
Elizabeth Dorsey Young is right on point with this message and I believe that it is well received by all who take the time to read it.
So true, Ruth! I’ve shared your message with Elizabeth as well. I know she will be gratified to know her message was well received!
Thank you so much for posting this. As I get learn more about GOD, HIS love is incredible
Isn’t it though? Discovering God’s love change my life!