Title- Love Your Body: A Diet-Free Approach to Balanced Eating
Author- Brooke Parker, R.D.
Published Date– 2009
Published By– Walnut Springs Press
ISBN#- 978- 1-935217-37-4
If the message of this book could be summarized in one word, it would be awareness.
Awareness is empowering, and so are the lessons and messages found in Love Your Body. Brooke takes a deeper look at why women struggle so much with loving themselves and their bodies. She uses her experiences with counseling young women about their body image to help her readers understand how Satan is using sneaky tactics to trick them into worrying about and focusing on how the world views their body.
Using quotes from apostles and prophets as well as the Scriptures, Brooke encourages women to see themselves as Heavenly Father sees them.
The opening line in “Section 3: Your Body is a Gift,” brought about a big A-HA moment for me: “One of Satan’s most powerful methods for taking the influences of the Holy Ghost away from a woman is to create self-hate.” Brooke goes on to say, “He puts his foot in the door by convincing us that we need to become physically perfect according to the world’s standards.”
Most women know what it means to be “physically perfect according to the world’s standards.” But have we ever really thought about what it means to be as close to physically “perfect” on the earth as we can be according to Heavenly Father’s standards? Nobody knows our weaknesses better than our Father in Heaven, and I believe He gives us a lot of credit for doing our best. If doing our best pleases our Heavenly Father, shouldn’t it please us as well?
Brooke gives some good tips as far as dealing with food, reminding her readers throughout that “deprivation doesn’t work.” I think her strength, though, is in how she teaches women to talk to themselves. We would never allow someone else to talk to a spouse, sibling, child or other loved one the way a lot of us talk to ourselves.
In Chapter 12, there are a few body image tests I decided to take and actually wrote my answers in the book (I usually don’t do more than underline a thought here and there). The answers were very telling: I learned that I don’t really care what others think about how I look, but I’m actually very hard on myself and have unreachable (at this point) expectations. Going forward, I can set attainable goals instead of setting myself up for failure, and I can celebrate my smaller accomplishments more often which will encourage me to continue making better choices for myself.
I will be reading sections of Love Your Body with my preteen daughter who has recently started showing signs of concern about her body image.
When I ask my daughters if they think they are beautiful, my 8-year-old answers “Yes!” quickly and with confidence. My 12-year-old answers “Yes,” as well, though not nearly as quickly and with the tiniest amount of doubt in her voice. If I can help them avoid feeling about and talking to themselves they way I have to myself over the years, this book will be worth it’s weight in rubies.
I recommend Love Your Body as a good starting point for everyone, and encourage girls & women of almost any age to read it. Please seek further help if you find yourself unable to stop certain behaviors or need help dealing with any kind of eating disorder.
Heavenly Father knows we are beautiful, and He loves us so much! Let’s resolve to free ourselves from Satan’s grasp and learn to accept, love and see ourselves as our Father in Heaven does.
The publisher of Love Your Body is doing a blog tour giveaway. For more information, keep reading!
From Walnut Springs Press:
We will be giving away 5 copies of Love Your Body: A Diet-Free Approach to Balanced Eating as part of the online book tour. The contest starts February 17th and will close on March 5th at midnight, MST.
Entering the contest is easy–all you have to do is blog, tweet, follow, or comment and then fill out this little form here.
So exactly how do you blog, tweet, follow, etc. Here’s how.
1. Become a follower of our reviewers blogs. You can follow one of our reviewers or you can follow all of them. Remember that each blog you follow gives you another chance to win, so
why wouldn’t you choose to follow them all? But what if we are already following a them ask? Well lucky you because you get an entry for that too.
Walnut Springs Press
Brooke Parker RD
Of Writerly Things
Random-ish by Nichole
Queen of the Clan
Rachelle Writes
The Write Blocks Ronda Gibb Hinrichsen
Tangled Words and Dreams
*Tristi Pinkston, LDS Author
Why Not? Because I Said So!
LDS Women’s Book Review
Cami’s Book
2. Post a comment on the reviews. .
3. Blog about the contest or one of the reviews. Spread the word. Just remember that the blog post either needs to link to the contest or to one of the reviews.
4. Follow us on twitter. Maybe you use twitter, maybe you don’t. But if you do, you should follow us.
http://twitter.com/walnutspringspr
http://twitter.com/brookeparkerrd
http://twitter.com/camichecketts
http://twitter.com/valerieipson
http://twitter.com/Rachellewrites
http://twitter.com/LDSWBR
http://twitter.com/nicholegiles
http://twitter.com/TaDaFerguson
5. Tweet about the contest or one (or all) of the reviews. Yep, 144 characters or less is all it takes to enter.
6. Become a fan of Love Your Body on facebook. Brooke is constantly updating her fanpage with articles, recipes, and helpful hints.
7. Post about the contest on Facebook.
8. Anything else you can think of that will spread the word. If you mention it on goodreads, shelfari, google buzz, or any other social media site, or make it your status on gmail chat, MSN or yahoo messenger let us know. We want to reward your creativity with an entry.
Also, here is the blog tour schedule, so you can find the reviews on the correct days.
February 22
Of Writerly Things Valerie Ipson
February 23
Random-ish by Nichole Nichole Giles
February 24
Queen of the Clan Danyelle Ferguson
February 25
Rachelle Writes Rachelle Christensen
March 1
The Write Blocks Ronda Hinrichsen
March 2
Tangled Words and Dreams Alison Palmer
March 3
*Tristi Pinkston, LDS Author Tristi Pinkston
“David tried to open his eyes, but when he did, the room spun in circles around his head-or maybe his head was spinning in circles around the room; he wasn’t really sure.”