The title of this article will prompt some eye rolls and internal groans. I understand that this holiday – a holiday all about food and not a lot else – brings up a lot of complicated feelings for many of us. We are excited about the food. We are concerned about the food. We want to eat; we don’t want to eat. We hope to run in a Turkey Trot; we hope to sit on the couch. So many of the difficult feelings we have about food are really about how eating different foods and amounts of food might impact our bodies.
What if we try to be grateful for our bodies this Thanksgiving?
Source: Shutterstock/ Wanda Pelin Canila
For many of us, whenever we think about or see images of our bodies, our inner critic gets the first word. We’ve been conditioned to identify our flaws, whether we perceive the problem to be our stomachs or our noses. But we can focus on these perceived flaws less and practice gratitude more.
“Practicing gratitude” may sound about as pop-psychology as it gets. However, there is growing evidence that focusing on what we are grateful for can improve our quality of life. Specifically, research has found that gratitude interventions can increase positive affect, happiness, and life satisfaction while decreasing negative affect, stress, and depression symptoms. Practicing gratitude even seems to help people sleep better!
One of the most common gratitude interventions asks people to list out things they are grateful for. Reflecting on positive aspects of one’s life is thought to contribute to positive changes in mood. It turns out that listing just three things about your body that you are grateful for can also improve body satisfaction.
In a study that I published with one of my colleagues at Rutgers University, we asked participants to engage in this gratitude list task. People were free to express gratitude for their physical qualities that they liked, their bodies’ abilities to overcome illness and maintain health, and the ways that their bodies function. When compared to a control group, the gratitude group evaluated their appearance more favorably and felt better about their bodies. In other words, just making a list of three things that they liked about their bodies improved their body image.
In another study, participants were asked to engage in a gratitude meditation. This 10-minute meditation exercise improved body satisfaction, even though it didn’t specifically focus participants on feeling grateful for their bodies, per se. (A similar 10-minute mindfulness task in this study also improved body satisfaction.) Body image scientists have theorized that gratitude may help to improve body image because it may reduce our focus on the appearance of our bodies and others’ approval. In other words, there are so many facets of our bodies to be grateful for, and many of them have nothing to do with our physical appearance. Focusing on how our body moves and allows us to be in the world can help to reduce our fixation on our appearance.
So, think about your body gratitude list. One of my neighbors told me that she was grateful her body allowed her to have three children and that she’s healthy enough now that they are adults to enjoy them. A friend suggested she was grateful to be in her 50s and look as good as she did. When I asked a colleague what she was grateful for, she told me that she was glad to be in good physical health and that she likes her hair. Some days, I am grateful that my body gets me (just barely) through the day. On other days, I am grateful that the muscular thighs I used to hate still have some muscle tone, and I’m able to go on long walks with my friends.
Being grateful allows us to attend to the positive in the world. Sometimes, this is referred to as the Amplification Model of Gratitude because gratitude helps us not just become aware of the good things in our lives but really focus in on them and even try to enhance them.
By noticing the positive qualities our bodies possess, we can be thankful for our bodies. We can be grateful whether we are sitting on the couch or crossing the Turkey Trot finish line first this Thanksgiving.
