We've all seen numerous adverts from companies heavily invested in diet culture and unrealistic beauty standards. The women dancing freely down the street when they've reached their goal weight, letting her bare arms see the sun after completing the latest exercise plan, confidently stepping out the front door with a smile only when they have achieved perfectly clear and blemish free skin.
We all have access to joyful experiences, but diet culture places a generous dollop of guilt on us enjoying them in the bodies we inhabit now. There is a sense of feeling undeserving, joy is placed high in an ivory tower, and many of us place joyful, happy, pleasurable experiences in the WHEN box. What's the when box? I'm sure we've all had one at some point - when I've lost the weight, when I fit into those jeans, when I've fixed my skin....My when box used to be overflowing.
Often unconsciously, we place our own pleasure on the back burner because we feel we don't deserve it until our body's imperfections are fixed or resolved. We have been encouraged to use joy as "bait" in the long slog towards attaining an ideal aesthetic which we are promised will deliver a feeling like no other. Except it doesn't really change anything, or at least it didn't work that way for me.
Believing that our bodies aren't already worthy of receiving and experiencing joy and satisfaction is harmful. It belittles the bodies we inhabit right now in this moment, it tears huge chunks from our self esteem and keeps us stuck, limited, and enslaved to multimillion pound industries that only exist for as long as we continue to believe we need fixing.
To welcome joy with open arms, to embrace it, to relish in it, is one of the greatest gifts we can give ourselves and our bodies. The small, every day moments, the first morning stretch that feels like some kind of magic, the warm and safe embrace in the arms of a loved one, the first sip of hot, sweet tea, skin on skin, the satisfying pang of effort in your thighs when you climb a hill for "that view", chocolate melting slowly on your tongue, lovingly massaging the achy, tired arches of your feet, savouring the heavy stream of water under the shower, strutting, wiggling and jiggling to your favourite song.
These experiences make life visceral, present, and memorable. But they also serve a really important reminder; our bodies aren't just vehicles that take us through life, and are expected to "look" good. They are doorways to an insurmountable number of delicious, life affirming, yummy, joyful, grounding, wonderful sensations and experiences.
Making space for more joy is something you deserve now. You deserved it then. You deserve it when. You deserve it now. A friend once told me that we all need to prioritise joy, and my god she was right. I hear her words most days and I'm so grateful for them. Isn't it time we all throw out the full contents of our when box and do the same?
