Your Body & You

Happy Women's history month!

America sure loves to give it's marginalized groups a month to REPRESENT, & NOTHING else, don't they?

Did you know that during Post Reconstruction, Black women promoted exercise amongst themselves as a physical act that had implications for racial competition and Black eugenic development? The body was a tool for racial inclusion. They used their fitness and health to claim a higher social standing because being seen as fit made you a better Black.

The concept of wellness and loving your body isn't new, but a lot has changed since it's start in the 60s. It's time we understand why the body is so much more than a bartering chip for how you're treated by others.

Here are 5 ways the rejooov collective believes you should see the body:

1. Your body, the miracle

Our bodies are literally miracles. We were made in the most efficient way. We have a brain that allows us to think profoundly, strategically protected by a hard skull. A mouth to communicate and an esophagus and digestive system that allows food to fuel our bodies. A central nervous system, muscles, and reflexes that grant us movement and protection. We don't have to tell our hearts to beat or even remember to blink. Our bodies just know what to do to keep us going.

2. Your body, the project

The body we have today is not the body we'll have in two years or even two weeks. As the sun rotates, our bodies change in response to environmental factors, it grows older, and it's affected by the way we eat, and the way we move. The really cool thing about looking at the body as a project is understanding that we have the ability to take control of how our bodies change. We can take part in strengthening and sculpting it.

3. Your body, the support system

Our bodies have carried us through every moment of our lives. It's loved us through bouts of happiness and accomplishments as well as through tough times and maybe even depression. Our bodies are the one entity that doesn't judge us for who we are. It's forgiving, it's malleable, it does whatever we ask of it, from bearing the weight of heavy lifts or expanding the stomach to accept the food we put into it.

4. Your body, the home

We've got three places to live: Earth, the mind &, the body. It's important that we cherish all three. Treating the body like a home means caring for it with respect and intention, which contributes to our overall wellbeing. Taking care of the body isn't some self-love ritual, it's essential maintenance. It's practicing self-compassion and self- acceptance, respecting our limits while fostering a more positive inner environment, and setting boundaries that add to moments of joy.

5. Your body, the reflection

As we grow, so do our bodies. They are subject to our mind and our mind only. So how we think and speak about it has an intense effect on it. & the overall treatment of it is a direct reflection of how you feel about yourself. Whether we love or hate ourselves, it'll manifest in some way. The body is unbiased and genuine. You can't hide from it, and you can't fake it. Your body knows who you are and what you've been through, there's no lying to it.

If you can understand the labor of love the body provides for you expecting NOTHING in return, then you should understand that providing it what it needs is the LEAST we could do for it.

*Even if you are someone in chronic pain, movement will always be the best way to alleviate it. Even if you're disabled, finding ways in which you CAN move your body and doing that will always beat the alternative. You aren't exempt. Consult a doctor, get a trainer, and get to work.

Women in the past did what they could to survive tomorrow, they set the stage so that you could thrive today.

Your body will always do the best it can with all it's got to preform it's miracles, continue growing, providing you support, being a safe space, and offering you a way to see yourself.

So, I ask, why are so many of us, hard pressed, to grant our bodies the simple joy of movement and proper nourishment?

Tell me, what motivates you to or holds YOU back from treating your body as well as it deserves in the comments below.

Thanks for reading! Tell me your thoughts below and check me out almost everywhere on socials:

IG - therejooovco & rejooovmove | TikTok - rejooovcothoughts | X - therejooovco | FB - the rejooov collective, llc

Love & Light,

- Cina