Wednesday, May 13, 2009

Improve Your Body Image Step 4: Take Pride in Your Accomplishments

In this step, which is part of a continuing series based on an article by Catherine Cardinal Ph.D., Dr. Cardinal urges us to recognize and take pride in our accomplishments.

4. Take pride in your accomplishments. We are all good at something. Make a list of those things which you feel really good about and read that list every day. “I am kind, courageous, a great swimmer, etc.” Believe in your ability to be competent and also your ability to learn and accomplish new things.

Dr. Catherine Cardinal has been a psychotherapist in private practice for 23 years. She has been a featured expert on many national TV shows, and is the best-selling author of A Cure for the Common Life: The Cardinal Rules of Self Esteem.

Visit Dr. Cardinal on FaceBook


Wow! This is so important...for years...well decades really...I belittled myself and what I had accomplished. I compared myself to others and ALWAYS fell short. I wasn't good enough, fast enough, pretty enough, thin enough, strong enough, smart enough...it didn't matter what "it" was, I wasn't enough.

When I finally started to accept myself and believe that I am enough as I am right now, that is when my life started to turn around--and so did my weight! Ironic that by no longer accepting the message that I was not thin enough I actually started to drop fat!

Instead of minimizing what you have done, celebrate it! This goes back to Sunday's post about goal setting...it is so important to acknowledge that our successes come in small steps. And isn't it way more fun to be able to celebrate many times over...for each step then having to wait until we have accomplished the whole big goal?

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