Margaret Serious

Self-care: Ten commandments for having a body

Here’s another sample from “The *More or Less* Definitive Guide to Self-Care,” which I’ve featured in several recent posts. Appropriately for a little Sunday writing session, I found “The Ten Commandments for Having a Body.” Slightly condensed from Anna Borges’ book, they are:

“1. All bodies are good, including yours.

2. You’re not required to always like your body, but you should never punish it.

3. Don’t say anything about your body that you wouldn’t say about your best friend’s.”

“4. Take care of your health out of self-respect, not obligation, and do it in a way you actually enjoy.”

“5. Don’t feel pressured to subscribe to any single body ideology or social ‘movement.'” (Hmm… even this one, I suppose. It goes on here, but let’s not bother.)

“6. Tend to aches and pains…. Don’t deny yourself relief.”

“7. Do what you need to stop body-checking and scrutinizing. You don’t have to keep track of numbers.” (Oh, that sort of body-checking… my mind is back on the hockey sense, one player knocking into another. Sometimes following all the numbers can feel like that.)

“8. Don’t put off life until your body looks a certain way — take that vacation, make that move, buy that outfit.” (Well, this book was published in 2019, but still! Don’t put off what isn’t canceled.)

“9. Forgive yourself for the times you’re not immune to the pressures society places on your body.”

“10. Your body will change, so the respect you cultivate for it can’t be conditional.”

There they are, edited for length to rest my eyes and make sure I have time to take my afternoon walk. Look after yourselves, bodies and all, readers.

Margaret Serious has a page on Facebook.

Filed under:
Sustaining Books

Tags:
Self-care