Diet culture sucks. The stories that we have been conditioned to believe about our worth, the patriarchy, white supremacy, and so much more all play into how we feel about movement, exercise, and our bodies. Instead of viewing your exercise routine as a way to manipulate your body, I challenge you to embrace the limitless other benefits of movement.

Key Takeaways

If You Want To Embrace The Infinite Benefits of Movement and Exercise You Should:

1. Work to unlearn what you have been taught to be true and stop focusing on body manipulation
2. Embrace the positive aspects of movement and exercise that do not have to deal with weight loss
3. Acknowledge the false ways that you have been defining your worthiness and work to shift your mindset towards something more positive
4. Lean into the things you don’t know and unpack the beliefs you have for yourself

Removing Diet Culture From Movement with Christina Montalvo

Christina Montalvo is a great friend, coach, gym owner, and someone who has personally been fucked over by diet culture. She created a unique women’s only strength and conditioning gym that does not encourage fat or weight loss. Christina is here to challenge you to unlearn what you have taught to believe is true and start thinking more critically about the ways you move your body and the reasons behind it.

Embracing the Infinite Benefits of Movement

If you start out having expectations of fat and weight loss when going into a movement routine or working with a trainer, the chances of you feeling disappointed and getting stuck in a cycle of giving up are much higher. Instead of putting pressure around how and why you are moving your body, lean into all of the other benefits of movement and exercise that have nothing to do with weight loss. This can lead to a higher retention rate as a provider and a greater sense of accomplishment as a client.

Unlearning What You Have Been Taught To Believe Is True

There is a good chance that if you choose to engage in movement solely to manipulate your body, there is a much deeper reason guiding your decision-making. By acknowledging the false ways that you have been defining worthiness, checking your privilege, and making yourself your first priority, you can frame your purpose in a nourishing way instead of ripping yourself down.

While it may be hard to unlearn how society has told you to engage with movement, it is only by leaning into the things you don’t know and unpacking the beliefs that you hold within yourself that you can truly start to embrace holistic movement and reject diet culture.

Have you ever experienced an inclusive space where the infinite benefits of exercise and movement are prioritized over weight loss and body manipulation? Share how you work to create that space for yourself and reject diet culture in the comments section of the episode page.

In This Episode

• The importance of separating movement for health and wellness sake from movement for body manipulation sake (8:12)
• Why associating movement and weight control or body manipulation is a problem (11:10)
• The role of social justice when dismantling patriarchal standards and diet culture (18:24)
• How to navigate the space between body autonomy and potentially harmful diet practices (23:38)
• Common themes that are signs of searching for something deeper than a surface physical transformation (27:02)

Quotes

“I think what’s harder than learning anything new is unlearning everything that we have always thought to be true.” (10:14)

“The benefits of exercise and intentional movement are absolutely infinite, and it’s so crazy because I think that the benefits can be and are different for everyone.” (13:33)

“In any case where you are solely operating or participating in something from a place of fear or shame, that is not healthy, that is inherently unhealthy, and that is such a detriment to the wellbeing of anyone.” (18:19)

“Obviously a human can autonomously choose fat loss or weight loss, but there is a much deeper reason why they are choosing it.” (26:01)

“Whenever we are engaging in intentional weight loss, everything else in our life becomes much more grayscale. We turn down the intensity and the importance of everything else in our life, and the most important and prevalent thing becomes our bodies, our food choices, our calorie burn, what we look like, what we weigh. And so in some ways, it is a really socially acceptable way to just ignore and pacify ourselves to all these deeper, much more real, much more powerful, much more impactful problems or areas of focus in our lives.” (28:46)

Links

Join the Tune In Membership Group Here

What Is Intuitive Eating Free Training Series

Follow Christina on Instagram

Join the Listen To Your Body Newsletter

Steph Gaudreau Website

Check out the full show notes here!

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