9781626569768

of our heads and into our bodies. Lastly, the pillar of collective compassion
synthesizes how we emanate radical self-love, learning to radiate love
through our own beings and onto the beings of others. At the end of the
book you will find a Radical Self-Love Toolkit. It offers concrete action
steps designed to help you move through the thinking, doing, being process,
ultimately landing you in the seat of your most powerful location:
reconnected to your inherent sense of radical self-love.
Pillar 1: Taking Out the Toxic
To live in a world of body terrorism is akin to forcibly imbibing three 7-
Eleven Big Gulps of body shame daily. From the moment we turn on a
television, radio, or computer in the morning until we close the laptop or
put the phone on silent at night, we are inundated with messages relaying
our supposed inherent deficiency. The average adult consumes fifteen and a
half hours of media each day, and even when they don’t contain overt body
shame, the shows we watch, the music we listen to, and the articles we read
deliver messages about bodies in the world, including our own. 4 Taking in
toxic messages blocks our pathway to radical self-love without any real
effort on our part. Just walking down the street or standing in the grocery
store checkout line can be a stroll down body-shame lane thanks to
billboards, bus advertisements, and tabloid covers. By engaging in the
everyday activities of our society, we subconsciously absorb views about
our bodies that are antithetical to radical self-love. Therefore, being
connected to our thoughts is a crucial process for battling body shame.
Marketers diversify their body-terrorism tactics with both conscious and
subconscious directives. There is nothing subconscious about “Don’t delay!
Lose that unsightly belly fat now!” Advertisements like this are designed
for immediacy, urging you to act now because your body is awful!
Unapologetic Inquiry #21
What was your last body-shame impulse purchase? Can you recall
what thoughts moved you to make the purchase?