How Positive for Our Health Is Body Positivity?
- Abigail Balkus - MSc. in Health and Social Psychology
- Feb 14
- 9 min read
Updated: Feb 20
We all ♥ self-love…
But... should we be so extremely body positive?
Where does the line draw on it affecting our health?
How do we find the balance between promoting a healthy weight and not pressuring adolescents into eating disorders?
Table of Contents
1.)🪞Look into the Magic Mirror
Mirror Mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all? ✨
What do YOU think when you look into your Magic✨Mirror in the morning?
Do you burst with body positivity, or are you struggling with self-love ♥?
Should we be as harsh on ourselves as the magic mirror is to The Evil Queen?
Is body positivity equal to the Queen's delusions about her greatness?
Do body size and looks even matter?🪞
The Current Media Reflection 🪞
✌ Sides
The people advertising self-love that are overweight should take better care of their health
Vs.
You don’t know someone’s health based off of how they look
❓
In this article, we seek to find the middle ground ⚟
The MIDDLE way🏴 ☳
2.)👀SO Size Doesn’t Matter? ;)
How focused are we on looks versus physical fitness abilities? 🏃
Someone can be slim and look fit but get out of breath when running a mile or walking up stairs.
We all have that friend that seems to have a naturall high metabolism. They could eat greasy french fries 🍟 and burgers 🍔 all day long, yet never gain a single pound.
That is what is so dis-heartening about a diet-pressure society, where young girls that begin to gain weight at the start of puberty... growing into their natural body type, feel forced into extreme diets and even eating disorders.
Society seems to be flipping the switch.
On social media, eating disorder-promoting accounts are flagged and later cancelled by the people or the media company.
In turn, body positivity influencers🌟 are stealing the show with stars like Spencer Barbosa and Mik Zazon redefining young girls' connection with their bodies.
Both women advertise their less than perfect figures, how they fluctuate with time and during their cycles, and promote authenticity, being loud, and taking up space 💪
Both women advertise healthy lifestyles and the fact that our body shapes do not match our level of health and physical abilities.
And, in fact, that our bodies' functionality, our cardiovascular endurance, mobility, and energy levels are MORE IMPORTANT than how our bodies look.
....Some statements that science is very much in agreeance with.
Recent empirical studies have highlighted that physical fitness and activity levels are more indicative of health outcomes than Body Mass Index (BMI).
Some notable findings:
Cardiorespiratory Fitness and Mortality Risk: A study published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine analyzed data from nearly 400,000 middle-aged and older adults. The research concluded that an individual's fitness level is a more significant determinant of longevity than their BMI. Specifically, unfit individuals have a substantially higher risk of early death, regardless of their weight status. Conversely, those who are fit, even if classified as obese by BMI standards, have a lower risk of premature death compared to unfit individuals of normal weight.
Physical Fitness vs. BMI in Predicting Health Outcomes: Research published in Circulation found that physically fit women who are overweight or obese, according to BMI, have a 40% lower risk of dying from any cause compared to unfit women with a normal BMI. This underscores that fitness levels can significantly mitigate health risks associated with higher BMI.
And, thankfully, doctors and nurses seem to be hopping on the physical fitness > BMI train 🚂
But, still the growing recognition of the limitations of BMI as a sole indicator of health, and the integration of physical fitness assessments into routine clinical evaluations is still evolving. Currently, vital signs such as blood pressure, heart rate, and respiratory rate remain standard metrics for assessing patient health.
However, some healthcare professionals advocate for incorporating additional measures, like BMI, to provide a more comprehensive understanding of a patient's health status. For instance, a 2009 article in Clinical Advisor discusses the potential benefits of treating BMI as a vital sign to enhance obesity management.
Moreover, a 2009 study published in Obesity Reviews suggests that BMI should be considered a vital sign, proposing protocols to encourage healthcare providers to record BMI routinely and address abnormal BMI values.
While these discussions are ongoing, the adoption of physical fitness assessments as primary indicators of health in clinical practice is not yet widespread. The medical community continues to explore and debate the most effective methods for evaluating and promoting patient health.
Yet, more and more, we see people turning to holistic health practitioners and these "alternative" medicines for their healthcare. The wellness industry is booming, becoming too commercialized, but turning people's heads towards a side of health beyond BMI, looks, and weight; towards this idea that health is indicative of a complete balanced system.
Holistic Health:
Body standards are seeming to be re-examined as the 20th century conventional idea of beauty in thinness, is taking a turn in the midst of the 21st century.
Participants simultaneously adapt to, negotiate, and resist obesity discourse by re-defining health, questioning the BMI, and centering their desire for corporeal “thickness” as critical to their identity as Black women.
However, is there a point that we should draw the line? Is the media perspective that overweight and obese individuals are threatening their health justified in any way? Are we allowing the unhealthy obesogenic Western systems to persist?
3.) ⚟ Where Should We Draw the Line?
An obesogenic environment refers to the physical, social, and cultural surroundings that promote behaviors leading to obesity. These environments make it easier for individuals to gain weight by encouraging poor dietary habits and sedentary lifestyles. Factors contributing to an obesogenic environment include:
Easy access to unhealthy foods: Fast food restaurants, convenience stores, and vending machines offering calorie-dense, nutrient-poor foods.
Lack of physical activity opportunities: Urban design that prioritizes cars over walking, limited access to parks or recreational areas, and a culture that often promotes sitting over active pursuits.
Advertising and media: Promotion of unhealthy foods and sedentary activities (e.g., TV, video games) through media and advertising.
Social norms and behaviors: Cultural preferences for large portion sizes, calorie-heavy diets, and a sedentary lifestyle.
Has body positivity reached such an extreme that we are no longer advocating for more health promotional environments? Is the body positivity movement solely occurring because obesity is so normalized at this point in this obesity epidemic in the Western world 🌍, and specifically in The United States?
The evidence in the last section is suggesting that we can still be healthy despite being overweight or obese. However, is there a line that needs to be drawn? At some point doesn't any form of obesity cause a strain on our hearts' functioning?
Literature reviews on the subject discuss that § ¨several studies have determined that adult obesity and even being overweight are unmistakably associated with various co-morbidities, which include CVD, cancers, and various chronic conditions.¨
According to: A systematic literature review on obesity: Understanding the causes & consequences of obesity and reviewing various machine learning approaches used to predict obesity, over 90% of type II diabetes cases are attributed to obesity. eeesh.
Is society beginning to feed itself poison apples under the guise of extreme body positivity?
Are we allowing ourselves to become sicker by letting the obesogenic Western environments fester?
Should we be more truthful to ourselves? Should we turn on some harsh reality checks like the Magic Mirror and stop the body positive white lies?
Is there a middle ground between hating ourselves and lying to ourselves?
Is there a balance ⚖ between promoting a healthy weight and not pressuring adolescents into eating disorders?
Is there a Middle Way ⚟ between treating ourselves kindly and advocating for better health systems.
One thing is for sure, towards body positivity - we shouldn't be blaming our individual selves for weight gain. When we seem to be being force-fed a different sort of 'poison apple for our health' called an obesogenic environment ✨
There is no reason to blame ourselves for a epidemic phenomena that is the result of a poor system for health creating a bad mix of current unhealthy options and sedentary lifestyles, maladaptive lifestyle habits passed down from generation to generation, and genetic mutations occurring overtime.
4.)😡Who Is To Blame?
Obesity is not a simple problem but a complex health issue stemming from a combination of individual factors (genetics, learned behaviors) and substantial causes (unhealthy societal or cultural eating habits, food deserts).
In the end, this literature review concludes: Most researchers also agree that obesity is an “acquired” disease that, heavily depends on lifestyle factors (i.e., personal choices), such as low rates of physical activity and chronic overeating, despite its genetic and epigenetic influences.
And WHO persuades our lifestyle factors?
Should we ask the magic mirror?
Mirror Mirror on the wall who is the worst obesity culprit of them all?
The
Western
Society
The Western Society epitomized in The United States not only promotes unhealthy food advertisement mayhem and sedentary, indoor lifestyles but it also creates peer pressures and stressors, bad mental health, an inability to process emotions.. drowning our feelings in food with the emotional eating problem, and maladaptive lifestyle habits past down through our families.
Yum, what a lovely mixture for health problems being brewed 🧙♀️
So where does that leave us? How do we create awareness without shaming others?
Is the responsibility only on the parents to lead their kids to healthy lifestyles?
Or maybe it is the schools' responsibilities?
Or maybe is the government to blame?
Should they be creating cities that are more health-ogenic compared to the locations that are obesogenic?
Who is responsible with the early health problem start with childhood obesity?
The parents, schools, or governments?
Us?
How Can We Change Things?
It is not as hard or complicated as we think to create societal change
But, it is left up to US to change.
No.. not the United States...
US, the people, the grassroots change 🤜
5.)➕Towards Positive Change
“ However, many barriers that prevent strategizing on the level of policy alone may be encountered. Instead, the reduction and prevention of obesity will considerably depend on individual lifestyle changes.” - Science Direct
We create our own societal norms.
- What we think, we create and become
Create the mindset to allow yourself to blossom into something new.
In my recent Good News article One Step Closer To Understanding the Origin of Consciousness With Proposed Quantum Computers Experiment you can find a breakdown of the Nobel Prize-winning study that describes how humans can create their own realities, determining the movements of reality around us with our own consciousness.
Let's trade the poison apples on our health for the sunshine, fresh air, and nutritious earth that allow us to blossom into flowers.
🌸
🤝
Can we Agree that this a fair trade?
Letting the magic mirror go, getting rid of the poison apples and fairy tales.
Switching from thinking like the Evil Witch
to thinking like Snow White.
Caring for the earth and its inhabitants, to allow society to become a beautiful bouquet of flowers instead of a sickly cauldron of witches' broth for bad health?
We must understand that true self-love is knowing when to be gentle and when to be tough on ourselves. That truly treating our bodies with respect is keeping it healthy and pushing it just enough without reaching overwhelm or exhaustion.
That in finding a healthy body positivity, we must reach a state of mindfulness where we are okay with how we currently are. Not hating ourselves and getting depressed about our current situation, but being aware of how we are presently and cultivating that deep self-love and compassion to know what is best for our wellbeing.
Allowing ourselves to be okay with the resources that we have available to us for wellbeing. And if we live in a particularly obesogenic environment, pushing to be the change-makers.
This does not mean that you need to be lobbying at the White House, but it can be so simple as being okay with being the odd-one-out. The one okay with trying to ride your bike or walk everywhere, trying to carpool, or not wanting to get fast food or sugary treats as a friend outing.
Commit to so much deep body positivity and self-love that the external comments and societal pressures do not effect you. Have so much confidence, internal motivation, and self-assurance that you can fight allowing the obesogenic environment to effect you.
We create our own normal, our societal “norms”.
When you begin thinking more positively, intending for a healthy lifestyle, then you notice more options, signs, and people that will help you align to these intentions. This is the upward spiral.
Don’t get stuck in the negative spiral, the obesogenic societal wave.
Create what you want, but first, you must decide what you want.
Align, Balance, then… Center 😌
6.)🟰That About SUMS It Up - A Summary :) ⚖
We must learn to look Beyond the Mirror🪞…. To see people beyond their exterior looks, yet still want what is good for them, being mindful and acting with wisdom to not muddle in their lives unless they ask for help.
Look outside the imaginary box we set in place… "There is no box"
Looking beyond the mirror, beyond wellness commoditization and beauty standards.
Towards true holistic health :)
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