Body-Dysmorphia: The Truth Behind Bodybuilding - Fitness Orientations

Notes to self: 26.

To set the record straight, bodybuilding was an incredible purpose I had and one of the best tools for personal development I have participated in. However it's taken me some time to rewire my brain and perspective on where I hold value. Bodybuilding kept me a slave to my senses... What does this mean? Well Ruben a friend of mine recently said to me:

I think it would also be wise to add that he mentioned it's not automatically bad to try look better, but if that consumes you then the manipulation can occur. Let's really highlight that point; It is absolutely fine to want to be in shape, get stronger and feel more comfortable and confident in your own skin.

The issue becomes when we truly start to base our identity in that of our physical body.

I once wore only long sleeve shirts, hardly wore a singlet unless it was an incredible pump at the gym, constantly felt small and never good enough. That was my reality when I was consumed in bodybuilding. My self worth was tied up in how I looked, I felt good when I felt jacked. Ending up here without realising, coming close to considering steroid use and wanting to take things further (even though I didn't have the basics covered: nutrition, sleep and training.) I will only be happy when I'm 'this' big, 'that' jacked. Fulfilment always being just out of my grasp...

Or as Ram Das would say:

As my training priorities shifted I was able to slowly ween myself out of those habits. Now I ideally live shirtless, which once upon a time due to Pectus and then bodybuilding was almost impossible to imagine. Gradual exposure to being in a normal tee-shirt and the realisation that I am not my body and have far more to offer the world than just that.

Moral of this letter is that our orientation towards things shape and shift our identity and if were not careful we lose ourself in that one perspective.

Shifting my orientation around "fitness" to more a health and wellbeing approach incorporating more playfulness, skill work and movement based training methods has completely reshaped my 'bodybuilding' identity. The orientation being love and deep curiosity about the human body and my experience as a whole. VS. I must be jacked to be happy.

We each inhabit a beautifully orchestrated system of adaptation, our body, which is to be explored and admired. It is the one thing we always have with us during our visit to Earth. May we treat them with the love, gain perspective and provide the movement they deserve 💜

Much love

-Hunter