Don’t let body image affect your sex life!

Today, it’s hard to feel beautiful, and for many women feeling beautiful and feeling sexy go hand-in-hand.

Rachel Hercman | Updated: March 20, 2015 5:01 pm

A lot of us suffer from body image issues. You might want your nose to be a little different, someone else might wish that their waist had lesser fat or someone might want to be taller, insecurity about body image is very common.

Today, it’s hard to feel beautiful, and for many women feeling beautiful and feeling sexy go hand-in-hand. The culture we live in makes it difficult for women to feel adequate physically, as everywhere you look—the movies, magazines, billboards- there are images of women that are unrealistic to attain. In many cases the images are photoshopped to make the woman’s body look even more ‘perfected’ than it does in reality, but the knowledge that it’s photoshopped doesn’t curtail its dramatic impact. Consequently, many women walk around with a negative body image and feel like they aren’t perfect enough to be beautiful and for many, this translates into insecurity in the bedroom.

What Does Body Image Have To Do With Sex?

Body image is essentially the way you view your body; self-image is the way you view yourself as a person. For many women, the two go hand-in-hand and easily feed off of each other. A woman could be super accomplished professionally, have many friends, be in a committed healthy relationship with a man who finds her attractive; yet, she sees herself as not good enough because her stomach seems too flabby to her. Or she doesn’t like her nose. Or thinks her hips are too big. In other words, her belief of ‘my body isn’t good enough’ becomes ‘I am not good enough’; it’s almost as if nothing else about her matters. Read about how you can disguise problem areas during sex.

What is a healthy body image?

A healthy body image is one where you have a sense of acceptance with your body, you don’t measure your self-worth based on your body, and most of all, and you can feel comfortable in your own skin. When a woman looks at her body and only sees flaws, she may not only feel bad about her physical identity, but about the kind of happiness she deserves in life, e.g. whether she is worthy of being loved by a partner.

A strong component of sexual satisfaction is being comfortable in one’s skin. If a woman is convinced that she is unattractive, it will be difficult for her to present and she will not be able to fully enjoy the sexual experience. Moreover, she may feel inhibited in having sexual needs. She may think to herself, ‘How can I seek or experience pleasure when I look like this?’ She may be passive and focus on her partner’s pleasure instead of her own, and she may be hesitant to initiate sexual activity. Read about how women who accept their imperfections have a healthy body image.

What can I do to improve my body image?

If you find it hard to drop your conditions for considering yourself beautiful and sexy, try to pretend for a moment that you’ve already met those conditions and you are perfect exactly the way you are. Bask in that confidence and the permission to feel comfortable with your body just the way it is. Does it feel wrong? Unjustified? Arrogant?

See what comes up for you. For some women, doing this exercise allows them to identify messages about their body that they received from family members, relationship partners, or society in general. It can help clarify personal core beliefs about what is beautiful, sexy, and who decides. And most importantly, it is a powerful reminder that negative body beliefs can shift when you are willing to challenge your mind-set and the mirror. Read about how women’s body image is linked to the male thought process.

Try this exercise:

Stand in front of the mirror (or if you’re not comfortable with that, sit in a comfortable position). Pick a body part you don’t like and try to think for a few moments about positive things about that body part. For example; if you don’t like your butt, concentrate on thinking about positive things your butt does for you, such as providing a cushion to sit. Focus on that feeling of gratitude and remind yourself that you are more than just your body.

Developing a healthy body image is no easy feat, but if you can practice gentleness with yourself and surround yourself with positive messages, you will become more comfortable in your own skin. Read about how Sonakshi Sinha shut up critics about her weight.

Image source: Shutterstock

Published: March 20, 2015 4:00 pm | Updated:March 20, 2015 5:01 pm

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