So something that has been huge in my life has been discovering how to accept and love my self just the way I am, in this moment. How to look at myself and not have thoughts such as “when I lose 15 pounds I will like the way I look”, or “when these fat rolls are gone I will not look at myself in disgust”. I had found that the more I told myself these things, the further away from actually accomplishing these goals I got. The negativity overwhelmed me. When I saw myself in the mirror, I only saw these negative thoughts. I know there are many women, especially mothers, that have been stuck in this trap as well. I reached a point where I just didn’t want to feel that way anymore and knew that it was going to take training my mind to think differently, because at this point working out and eating healthy just wasn’t cutting it. I was doing the steps necessary to change my body, yet no change was occurring. I had to decide to mentally be content with myself, and hope the rest would work itself out.
I started this process by looking in the mirror and saying out loud to myself that I am beautiful. Sounds so corny right? At first I would laugh at myself. But it started to slowly work. Each time I felt a little less doubt as I said it. Next I started taking selfies. Yep, selfies. I started to realize that it appears as if I don’t even exist if you look at my instagram or my facebook page. I am constantly behind the camera and have used that as a handicap. When I was little I loved having my picture taken, and as I got older and had kids of my own, I began to hate what I saw on the screen. So of course this job was perfect for me… no pictures of me since I am the one always taking them. I had to change that though. I had to not only believe what I saw in the mirror was beautiful, but that my pictures were too. So I started taking selfies and posting them regularly. After a while I started to become more confident and found that the shift in my mind started to cause a change in my body as well. I felt better overall and started to have the drive I was missing before. And the weight actually started to come off! I saw my body differently and realized that whether I reach my goal weight or not, I can be happy and love myself. I do still have a ways to go on my goals, but they don’t control my well being anymore and I see these goals in a positive light instead of the negative view I had on them before.
I even got brave enough to have my husband snap a quick boudoir shot for me. Seeing it really showed me that I was really worrying about nothing that whole time. Life is too short getting stuck in a trap of constant comparison and constantly wishing we were different. We can make the choice to love ourselves now, and the rest will fall into place.
Sincerely,
Amber Tyler | Boudoir Photographer | Missoula Montana