This past February, just before COVID hit, I was in the USA experiencing one of the most invigorating weekends I’ve had in ages! No, it wasn’t a trip to an amazing spa resort, although we did a sumptuous yoga practice and ate divinely delicious food prepared by an extraordinary Chef or at an iconic restaurant in Savannah, Georgia. I was actually immersed in the ‘in residence’ portion of the BARE Master Certified Coach training program I’ve been doing since October 2019.
Aside from doing a coaching demo, getting my own ass coached, being empowered by a private burlesque show, soaking in a body work healing session and living in luxury for a weekend, I delivered a 30-minute talk as part of the 2020 BARE Day, titled, To Live Lighter & Brighter, You’ve Got to Detox from Diet Porn.
As you read on, you’ll learn more about BARE and what might be in it for you. And, you’ll get a glimpse into a story about Diet Porn I shared in this talk, one of many a story that underpins why I’m SO determined to spread the message of BARE through coaching, speaking and writing. BARE is a program, movement and community that empowers women to drop insecurities, distractions and dieting and step into the life they deserve.
In “To Live Lighter & Brighter, You’ve Got to Detox from Diet Porn”, I shared how I describe ‘Diet Porn’ and how it interferes with our passions and potential.
'Diet Porn’ is any item, product or message that represents the thin or fit ‘ideal’ to you and persuades you to diet or exercise in a restrictive or unsustainable way.
It’s not the ‘item’ per se that is ‘Diet Porn’, it’s how you interpret the meaning of the item, product or message that is. What is ‘Diet Porn’ to one person is different to another. The common denominator, though, is that ‘Diet Porn’ lures you into believing the thinner or fitter you are, the worthier you are.
Diet Culture has ‘conditioned’ you to believe this untruth for DECADES (a point I illustrate in my talk). BARE coaching reconditions you to disconnect from this lie of Diet Culture and go on to thrive. It’s my greatest delight to see and feel this transformation happen with clients, just like it was when I realized what Diet Porn was doing to my life years ago.
In my talk I shared how ‘Diet Porn’ disheartened and distracted me (and my clients). For me, ‘Diet Porn’ hijacked my best intentions of moving, sweating or restorative movement (e.g., a rest day!) and used it against me. My encounters with ‘Diet Porn’ started early – age 5; however I wouldn’t know what ‘Diet Porn’ was until I was 45 learning to detox it from distracting me from authentic health and my purpose in life!
This pink heart rate monitor [photo] was a last artefact of ‘Diet Porn’. I’d gifted it to me for my 40th bday – long before fit bits. My first monitor was a gift from my Dad to see what my heart could do because early heart disease runs in our family. This new one counted the calories I burned during a workout. At first I barely noticed that feature, but once I did, my exercising got hijacked!
I was exercising pretty transactionally, meaning I often exercised as a trade off with my body, eating habits or thin ideal, and this calorie counter took that to a new level! I let the amount of calories I burned per workout drive my mood and mindset, often at the expense of my metabolism, musculoskeletal integrity and wellbeing.
Now, as I mentioned at the top, the monitor was at first a health tool - BUT it mutated into a representation of the thin/fit ideal I’d internalized as a child – thus it became ‘Diet Porn’! It drove me to work out in a way that was more about the outcome or my appearance than what felt like love, or self-care or because my body deserved movement to be true to it! Interestingly, I wasn’t alone – research cites that Fitness Trackers CAN undermine SOME people’s intuition about exercise and cause a focus on appearance over health. So can #fitspiration and daily weighing, for instance.
Once I was ‘onto me’ and ‘Diet Porn’ I could use my tracker in a positive way. And once the battery died, I just tossed it! Now I just go by ‘feel’ to monitor my heart! (And I’ve had my ticker checked out officially, ha! All good!).
So, this story isn’t just a story – it’s an invitation to pay attention to the messaging in your gym bag on your wrist or on Instagram about how and why you eat the way you do, dress the way you do or #sweat the way you do!
I bet you can guess one of the handful of ways I suggested attendees ‘detox’ from Diet Porn was to ELIMINATE it! Unfollow any ‘influencer’ who distracts you and toss out a scale, pair of jeans or calorie counter that disheartens you!
Now that I am free from the distractions of ‘Diet Porn’ many amazing things happened!
Here are two outcomes:
1) I reconnected to the joy + vitality of moving my body in an authentically healthy way
AND
2) I had time and energy to pursue my passions and purpose – to get BARE Certified to Coach others to disconnect from ‘Diet Porn’, live BARE and be here sharing this blog!
If you or someone you care about are susceptible to the distraction or disheartenment of ‘Diet Porn’, let’s talk. I offer Living BARE, my signature 10-session, 1:1 BARE Coaching opportunity to a select few. Alternatively, I’d love to share this talk with your audience as part of my Speaking BARE Series.
Let me know how this topic lands for you!
xoxo,
Elysa note: these blog posts were originally posted between 2018 - 2020 on a different website of mine.