One of the major goals of the 1997 Body Image Survey was to learn more about how people have remade their image. Though we anticipated receiving a few brief suggestions, we were inundated with your personal accounts of change. We have summarized your suggestions but kept your words. Try and discover what factors play a role in your struggle with your body. And be deliberate about creating a lifestyle that increases your chances for ending the war with your body.

1. Develop criteria for self-esteem that go beyond appearance.
   One way to make appearance less important is to develop other benchmarks for self-evaluation. A 51-year-old woman from California summarizes the approach: “By achieving in other areas, balancing successes and failures, searching where positives are possible.” A 53-year-old Washington man says, “focusing on succeeding at work, participating in sports, and friendships have helped me overcome my negative body feelings.”
2. Cultivate the ability to appreciate your body, especially how it functions.
   One middle-aged women writes: “I have often wanted to write an article called ‘I Have a Beautiful Body.’ No. I don’t look like Jane Fonda. I look like a normal 46-year-old woman who has had three children. But my body is beautiful because of all it does for me. I have two eyes that can see, a large nose for smelling, a large mouth for eating and smiling, two hands that can hold and hug, two breasts that have nursed three sons, an abdomen that was home to three babies, two legs that can walk everywhere I want to go, and two feet to take me there.”

   “I have extremely red hair and as a child I hated it because it was so different,” says a 20-year-old woman from California. “I have come to realize that my hair is a beautiful and exotic part of me. Now I cherish it.”

3. Engage in behavior that makes you feel good about yourself.
   “When I have negative thoughts and feelings about my physical appearance, I try to behave in a way that turns them around, like exercise and buying a piece of clothing that enhances my appearance,” says a 30-year-old Missouri woman.”

   Although Rubenesque at age 54, I currently model nude for a local university art school, meditate daily to focus inward, and enjoy dancing, swimming, archery, art, and my writing projects,” says a Georgia woman.

4. Reduce your exposure to noxious images.
   “I stopped buying fashion magazines completely when I was about 24,” says a 30-year-old woman from Michigan. “Comparing myself to the models had a very strong and negative impact.”

   “One of the things that helped me become more accepting of my body was the realization that it was okay to be female,” says a 67-year-old woman from Ohio. “It sounds hokey, but watching old movies starring Sophia Loren and Ava Gardner helped. These women had shoulders, and breasts, and hips, and are some of the sexiest women I have ever seen.”

5. Exercise for strength, fitness, and health, not just weight control.
   “When I was able to stop focusing on how my body looked and began experiencing what it could help me accomplish — climbing, swimming, cycling, surviving in the wilderness — it made me feel extremely satisfied,” says a 28-year-old woman from Louisiana.”

   About a year ago I started walking every day for about an hour,” says a 22-year-old woman from New York. “Because I was walking I felt so good. I also lost 10 pounds, but that didn’t matter. My attitude changed because I cared about my health.”

6. Seek out others who respect and care about your body; teach them how to talk about and touch your body.
   “The most recent experience that has helped has been a lover,” says a 67-year-old Ohio woman. “He makes me glad to be in this body with this shape and these dimensions.”
7. Get out abusive relationships.
   “If my partner didn’t like my appearance, he would no longer be my partner,” says a 31-year-old woman from Alabama. “I eliminate the negative.”
8. Identify and change habitual negative thoughts about your body.
   “I constructed a tape of positive self-talk with personal goals and feelings I want to achieve,” says a 25-year-old Washington woman. “When I have a bad attitude about my body, I pop in my tape. It really helps improve my self-image.”

   “When I look in the mirror at my body I always try to say nice things rather than cringe,” continues the wise-beyond-her-years 25-year-old.

9. Decode more complicated thoughts about the body.
   Are negative thoughts and feelings about your body distracting you from other issues that are really bothering you? A 60-year-old woman writes: “A factor that has helped me come to terms with my body was recognizing that much of my relationship problems had more to do with shyness and lack of social skills than physical appearance. Once I worked on my people skills, found that I worried less about my appearance.”
10. If you can’t get over your bad body image, consider seeking professional help.
    “I was bulimic for 12 years,” says a 36-year-old woman from Oregon. “My recovery was based on individual counseling, support from friends, and a hell of a lot of hard work on my part.”
11. Control what you can, forget about what you can’t.
    “As far as negativity about my physical appearance,” says a 33-year-old woman from Michigan, “I’ve had one simple rule: work on improving what you can realistically change, and don’t spend time worrying about the rest.”

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