Body Positive (and Body Neutral) Affirmations That Feel True

“I love my body!” is a beautiful thing to feel. But on a day when you’re struggling with how you look, it can feel impossible, even fake. That’s why many people find body positive affirmations don’t work for them.

There’s another option: body neutrality. Instead of forcing yourself to love how your body looks, you focus on respecting it and appreciating what it does. Research suggests both approaches can help, and that you don’t have to choose just one.

What research says about body image

Positive body image isn’t the same as loving how you look

Psychologists Tracy Tylka and Nichole Wood-Barcalow describe positive body image as broader than thinking you’re attractive. It includes appreciating your body’s functions, accepting its unique features, and protecting yourself from harmful messages about appearance.

Focusing on what your body can do helps

In a 2015 study, Jessica Alleva and colleagues tested a program called “Expand Your Horizon,” in which women wrote about what their bodies can do: walk, hug, create, heal, sense. The women who took part reported better body appreciation and satisfaction, and less focus on their appearance, compared with a control group.

Self-compassion reduces body dissatisfaction

In a 2015 randomized trial, Ellen Albertson, Kristin Neff and Karen Dill-Shackleford found that three weeks of brief self-compassion meditation reduced body dissatisfaction and body shame and increased body appreciation in women, with benefits still present three months later.

Body positive vs body neutral affirmations

	Body positive	Body neutral
Focus	Loving and celebrating your body	Respecting and accepting your body
Example	“I love my body.”	“My body lets me hug my kids.”
Best for	Days you feel good, or want to	Days loving your body feels out of reach

Use whichever feels true today. Many people switch between them.

Body neutral affirmations (start here on hard days)

1. My body is not a problem to be solved.
2. I don’t have to love my body to take care of it.
3. My body is the least interesting thing about me.
4. I can have a bad body-image day and still have a good day.
5. My body carries me through my life, and that’s enough.
6. I’m more than how I look.
7. I can feel uncomfortable and still be kind to myself.
8. My value doesn’t change with my weight.

Affirmations for appreciating what your body does

9. My legs carry me where I want to go.
10. My arms let me hold the people I love.
11. My lungs breathe for me, all day and all night.
12. My body heals, again and again.
13. My hands help me create and care.
14. My body lets me taste, hear and feel the world.
15. I’m grateful to my body for getting me through hard times.

Body positive affirmations

16. My body deserves love and respect.
17. I’m learning to see my body with kinder eyes.
18. Every body is a good body, including mine.
19. I celebrate my body’s uniqueness.
20. I’m comfortable in my own skin, more each day.
21. My body has a beauty that doesn’t need to match anyone else’s.
22. I dress my body for comfort and joy.

Affirmations for food and movement

23. I eat to nourish myself, not to punish myself.
24. All foods can fit in my life.
25. I move because it feels good, not to earn food or rest.
26. I listen to my body’s hunger and fullness.
27. Rest is part of taking care of my body.

Affirmations for comparison and social media

28. Photos online are edited, posed and filtered. Real bodies aren’t.
29. I unfollow accounts that make me feel bad about myself.
30. Someone else’s body isn’t a measure of mine.
31. I’m allowed to change, age and take up space.
32. I choose what I let into my mind.

Make them yours

The most powerful body affirmations are personal. Think of a specific thing your body has done for you, like running for a bus, carrying a child, recovering from an illness or dancing at a wedding, and put it into words: “My body danced all night at my sister’s wedding. I’m grateful for it.”

For more on treating yourself kindly, see Self-Love Affirmations and How to Stop Negative Self-Talk.

If thoughts about food, weight or your body are taking over your life, or you’re restricting, bingeing or purging, please reach out to a doctor or an eating disorder support service. Help works, and you deserve it.

How Ananda can help

Ananda builds affirmations from your real life: what you’re proud of and what you’re working through. If body image is on your mind, tell it, and it will write seven affirmations that are kind and believable rather than forced, in any of 70 languages.

Sources

• Tylka, T. L., & Wood-Barcalow, N. L. (2015). What is and what is not positive body image? Conceptual foundations and construct definition. Body Image, 14, 118–129.
• Alleva, J. M., Martijn, C., Van Breukelen, G. J. P., Jansen, A., & Karos, K. (2015). Expand Your Horizon: A programme that improves body image and reduces self-objectification by training women to focus on body functionality. Body Image, 15, 81–89.
• Albertson, E. R., Neff, K. D., & Dill-Shackleford, K. E. (2015). Self-compassion and body dissatisfaction in women: A randomized controlled trial of a brief meditation intervention. Mindfulness, 6(3), 444–454.