What to do when you feel fat
Do you have days when you particularly “feel” fat? You wear a nice dress and look in the mirror & your brain goes like, “You look fat” and immediately you then your feel heavy. So what exactly is happening when you feel fat. Today, let’s unpack “feeling fat”. Stay tuned.
Hi there? How are you doing? So yesterday morning, I wore one of my old favourite shirt and when I looked in the mirror, I immediately felt a wave of an eternally familiar emotion in my body and my brain was screaming, “Girl you look fat”.
Well, I took a deep breath & then my next immediate thought was, okay brain, after all these years and after all this work, you still want to get on the same “I feel fat, I look fat train” of thoughts…what ! You can’t be serious.
And as I witnessed these thoughts play out in my brain, I couldn’t help but smile….
And I thought…ooo…this has to be the next conversation that I have with you guys.
So are there days in your life when you feel fat? If your answer is yes, then you have to listen to what I will be teaching you today.
First of all, let me clarify that feeling fat has nothing to do with body fat. So you could be any weight, slim or overweight and get attacked by the “feeling fat monster”.
So in case you are overweight I.e have more body fat than what is your desire, then you might be like, Anu what is there about feeling fat. I am fat, so I feel fat.
That is why, I wanted to let you know know that feeling fat has nothing to do with body fat. It’s almost universal. Like women of all ages and all body fat levels have days when they feel fat. If you have skinny friends, go ask them. They too feel fat at times. I can guarantee you that. Ok.
The next thing that I want you to unpack here is going to be super valuable for you.
And that is fat is not a feeling…what…
Yes, it’s not an emotion.
It’s a cover up for what you are feeling beneath which of course is critical for you to explore and understand.
So it could be sadness, anger, disappointment, shame, guilt, dread. Any emotion.
As long as you think you are feeling fat and not really get present to what’s going on…not really asking what am I truly feeling? …you wont be able to address the actual truth of the moment and continue to stay stuck. You will keep chasing the wrong boat with no actual progress.
And that’s not all…not dealing with the actual emotion disconnects you to your core being and it intensifies the Universal void…the incompletion that we humans feel and guess what then becomes a crutch to seek completion from the external world that comes at a cost…the food becomes the false fix…the weight struggle continues and it makes you wonder as to why you keep going in circles…why you feel heavy and miserable!
So yesterday, when my brain offered me this default well practiced thought that used to be my favourite place to go during my diet days i.e I feel fat…I immediately asked myself, what am I actually feeling. And I immediately got present to the underlying sadness that was getting generated because of the way I was thinking about an issue in a particular way.
I felt this immediate relief in knowing what I was truly feeling, learning the actual causative thought generating it and not really going in circles with feeling fat thing. I simply looked at my “feeling fat” as a doorway to find out my true emotion.
So next time, you feel fat, I want you to know that a. Fat is not a feeling b. Examine the underlying emotion beneath it.
The third point that I want to highlight today is the actual meaning of the word Fat. And over here I mean body fat…
In our culture, Fat is a 4 letter word. It’s this dirty little word with negative connotation…isn’t it?
Well, logically speaking, we all do understand what fat actually means. But this is not how our brains respond to the word fat. I mean how do you feel when someone calls you fat.
For a moment, really tune into what comes up for you when someone calls you fat.
Now, we all have our ways of not feeling what we are truly feeling…
But that simply perpetuates our suffering
And becomes a barrier in truly connecting to who we are as a complete & scared being.
So drop your defences and get present to what comes up for you when someone calls you fat.
Let’s say your aunt who hasn’t seen you in years comes to your home and says, Girl, look at you. You’ve become fat. Vooo, you have put on weight.
How do you truly feel at that moment?
I remember after my wedding when I had gone to my mum’s place to stay for a few days, my grocery shop uncle said, Oh look at you…marriage effect…you've put on weight. I immediately felt as if he had punched me on my face. Yes, I had put on 2 kgs but I felt rage for that guy…ha ha.
Well even if logically understand what fat means, our emotional brains don’t.
We all have our meanings & stories attached to this word
Well, the word fat literally means extra fat on the body. Thats it. Period.
Its not some ugly tissue that you have to cut and get rid of as soon as possible.
But as a society a fat body is stigmatised and there is weight bias & fat shaming. And so we learn somewhere during our growing up years that fat is a dirty word. And hence we all have out meanings attached to the word fat.
For the longest time, my brain made the word fat mean rejection.
What does the word fat mean for you?
Is it rejection. Does it mean ugly, unattractive, undesirable, useless, unworthy, unlovable. What does it mean for you?
Until you decode that, you will continue to experience this desperation around this word and you will never be able to establish a peaceful relationship with your body.
And let me tell you if you think you can experience a loving peaceful relationship with your body once you lose the weight, then guess what, this wont happen. It cannot happen. You accepting your body has to begin unconditionally right now. I understand that it takes time and practice but it totally begins with your understanding and willingness.
You wont believe my 6 year old wants to go on a diet & lose weight. I do have these kind of conversations with her but I also understand that she is living in the same society that condemn a fat body.
Listen,
Extra body fat does not make you unlovable, unattractive, unworthy, unwanted, inadequate or ugly at all…
As long as you keep believing that extra body fat means any of these, you would continue to reject your own self. And you know what, rejecting your own self is a powerful threat to your nerves system. And when your biology feels threatened, your hormones and immune system are all compromised. Fat burning as well as re-inventing a peaceful relationship with your self is simply not possible. Your self sabotaging eating behaviours & your weight struggle would stay alive & kicking.
So girl, you have to stop this negative spiral. You have to stop rejecting your own body tissue…you have to rejecting your being. It’s like you have rejected your body before the world can reject you and you continue to play this out with your diet-binge-overeating cycles.
Sooo…We have to challenge these old outdated societal brain washing and create a new paradigm where all bodies are great bodies. Yes, you working towards healthy behaviours is important but this cannot be achieved by rejecting your own body.
Start becoming aware of what the word fat personally triggers in you and then question the truth in those thoughts.
Ok, so next time you feel fat, you know that nothing has gone wrong. This is what the brains do. Your brain is sending you a false message cleverly gift wrapped with the tagline , “you look fat today”. Instead of panicking or feeling anxious about this, your job is simply to witness what’s happening.
Next time you feel fat, you exactly know what's happening. Either your true emotions are being covered by your well oiled neural pattern, a thoroughly rehearsed thought which is “I feel fat” or you are equating the word fat with a disempowering underlying thought. Question the truth in that thought and acknowledge the underlying emotion.
Be compassionate towards yourself as life time of practicing the same neural patterns take time to prune. And “feeling fat” then becomes your opportunity to do just that. My hope is you let yourself truly shine with all your glory inspite of feeling fat at times.
That is it my friends. Hey it would be great if you could leave me a review on iTunes. That would help in my mission & spread this message to more amazing women like you. I will talk to you soon.
